Uranium Industry's COVID-19 Bailout Request Sparks a Disgusted Pushback


When Jamescita Peshlakai was a little girl, she herded sheep along the Little Colorado River, which courses through the Navajo Nation in northern Arizona.

One July morning in 1979, a dam containing tailings from United Nuclear Corporation's uranium mill some 200 miles away broke, letting loose more than 1,000 tons of waste. Ninety-four million gallons of radioactive water gushed into the Puerco River, which feeds the Little Colorado.

More than 40 years later, the Church Rock spill is still the biggest release of radioactive material in American history.The lambs born soon after that disaster barely lasted after birth, recalled Peshlakai, now an Arizona state senator.

“Once the umbilical cord was cut, they simply died,” she said. “That happened to a lot of livestock at that time, and we did not know it was because of the Church Rock spill.”

https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/uranium-industry-asks-for-bailout-during-covid-19-arizona-11465201