A nice day for a hike

Thursday was hike day, so, Rick, Sue, Dave, Tom and I went for a long one in Palos. We went from the Little Red School House to "Site A" (the location of Manhattan Project's Argonne National Laboratory and the burial site of the world's first nuclear reactor, CP1/2 and the world's first heavy water reactor, CP3), "Plot M", a burial site of low level contaminated items and then back to Little Red School House. I had planned on a walk of just over 4 miles, it ended up being just under 7 miles, plus a vertical gain equivalent to climbing a 40 story building. Up the moraine, down the moraine, down the ravine, up the ravine, in the snow, walking on a trail covered in ice. To say I/we were tired afterwards is to put it mildly. After hiking, we rewarded ourselves with buffet lunch at House of Hunan in Palos Heights. I first found out about this site whole my wife and I were X-C skiing in the mid- '70's. At that time, there were still some structures standing on the site, most obvious was a Quonset Hut used as a garage. It was close to this garage that a hockey puck piece of enriched Uranium isotope (238?) was found in the leaf litter by State of Illinois investigators, which caused a major cleanup of the area by Bechtel Corp. and continued groundwater monitoring through a series of boreholes around the site by Argonne natl. Lab, State of Illinois, EPA and others. Radioactivity continues to be measured in groundwater. At "Plot M", which was the major burial site for low level waste, the Guv'ment genius's decided to be safe and enclose "Plot M" in a concrete vault with reinforced concrete ceiling and walls of either 12" or 18", depending on which authority is taken as gospel. Notice, no mention of a concrete floor to the vault! This is a burial site located in a glacial moraine, made up of glacial till - ie. sand, rocks gravel - highly permiable. All to keep the public from digging up radioactive items - clothes, instruments, filters, animal carcases, etc. Begs the question - who could be considered the dumber - those burying the stuff or those who would seek dig it up for trinkets?

So far, no two headed salamanders or deer have been discovered on site. Or two headed humans! Give it time!