Epidemiologic Studies

Rocky Flats Plant Site

INTRODUCTION

Overview
This is the seventh in a series of seven volumes which constitute a guide to records of the Rocky Flats Plant useful for conducting health-related research. The primary purpose of Volume VII is to describe record series pertaining to employee occupational exposure and health at the Department of Energy's (DOE) Rocky Flats Plant, now named the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site, near Denver, Colorado. History Associates Incorporated (HAI) prepared this guide as part of its work as the support services contractor for DOE's Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project.

This introduction briefly describes the Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project and HAI's role in the project, provides a history of occupational exposure monitoring and health practices at Rocky Flats, and identifies organizations contributing to occupational exposure monitoring and health policies and activities. Other topics include the scope and arrangement of the guide and the organization to contact for access to these records. Comprehensive introductory and background information is available in Volume I.

Other volumes in the guide pertain to administrative and general subjects, facilities and equipment, production and materials handling, environmental and workplace monitoring, and waste management. In addition, HAI has produced a subject-specific guide, titled The September 1957 Rocky Flats Fire: A Guide to Record Series of the Department of Energy and Its Contractors, which researchers should consult for further information about records related to this incident.

The Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project
The Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project is indicative of DOE Secretary Hazel R. O'Leary's efforts to support openness initiatives in the areas of environment, safety, and health. In view of the importance of various administrative, organizational, and operational records to epidemiologic and health-related studies, a moratorium on the destruction of such records has been in effect since 1989.

In May 1992, the DOE Office of Epidemiology and Health Surveillance (EH-42), responsible for the coordination of all health-related activities throughout the DOE complex, directed each DOE and DOE contractor site to prepare an inventory of all records useful for worker or community health-related studies. EH-42 prepared and furnished each site with guidelines that defined epidemiologic records, provided instructions for describing record series, outlined the sites' role in inventorying epidemiologic records, and discussed the relationship of the epidemiologic inventory to DOE's comprehensive records inventory. The epidemiologic inventories should be completed in 1995. It should be noted, however, that some of the information contained in the site records inventories, such as the location of active (still in use) records or the volume of the records, may change over time. The continued usefulness of the inventories and this guide depends on their systematic update.

Role of HAI
In August 1993, DOE selected HAI as its support services contractor for the Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project. HAI, a professional records management, archives, and historical research services firm incorporated in 1981, has provided records management, historical research, and technical support for a number of DOE projects. HAI's role in the project includes verifying the accuracy, comprehensiveness, and quality of existing inventories, providing guidance to site records management teams, and, in some cases, performing additional records inventories.

BACKGROUND

History of Employee Occupational Exposure and Health
Prior to World War II, scientists working with X-rays and radium understood few of the potential dangers of radiation exposure. In 1929, when the U.S. Advisory Committee on X-Ray and Radium Protection, an advisory body with ties to the National Bureau of Standards, formed to develop the first radiation protection standards, only a small number of individuals dealt with radioactive materials in the workplace. By 1942, when scientists at the University of Chicago Metallurgical Laboratory experimented with the first "atomic pile," however, the potential for radiation exposure increased and pointed to the need for adequate health protection within the atomic energy program.(1)

Charged with proving the feasibility of a sustained nuclear chain reaction, the Metallurgical Laboratory formed a Health Division in 1942 to safeguard project workers against the hazards of radiation. At about the same time, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began to administer the Metallurgical Project through the University, including the newly created Health Division. The physics section within this division gradually evolved into the Health Physics Section, which was responsible for protecting project workers and military personnel from radiation exposure and researching the broader biological effects of radiation on humans for both immediate and future hazards. (2)

Early activities in the Health Division included establishing methods for monitoring worker exposure to radiation. The first external monitoring devices were pocket ionization chambers and pocket dosimeters, tubes the size of a fountain pen containing a wire with an electrical charge that decreased upon exposure to radiation. These were gradually replaced by film dosimeters, which were less expensive and more reliable and could be attached directly to a worker's security badge, thereby lessening the chances of loss. The sensitive emulsion on the film reacted to radiation exposure by darkening. Once processed, the film could be analyzed for exposure levels. By late 1943, use of film badges for monitoring external exposures was becoming more common. (3)

As much, if not more, of a safety issue for the Chicago Health Division staff was the health effects of inhaled or otherwise ingested plutonium. Data collection regarding the effects of plutonium dust inhaled by workers was still in its early stages; little was known about the long-term effects in particular. Adding to the problem was the difficulty of determining internal burden counts. Nasal swipes, with which a worker's nostrils were swabbed with a special filter paper that was read by an alpha counter, provided only a rough estimate of amounts of plutonium in the lungs and body. Urine and blood sampling eventually improved to the point that, when used in conjunction with nose swipes, internal body burden counts were more reliable. (4)

Within a relatively few years, research progressed to the level where standards for exposure could be more than an educated guess. In 1953, one year after Rocky Flats began construction, the Advisory Committee, now known as the National Committee on Radiation Protection (NCRP), issued recommendations for the maximum permissible amounts of radioisotopes in the human body. The following year it recommended maximum dose levels for external exposures. (5) Although the NCRP's relationship with the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) was an informal one, the NCRP's recommendations had a direct effect on the AEC's activities. (6)

Thus, by the time Rocky Flats was operational, the AEC already had monitoring and exposure guidelines from Metallurgical Laboratory research and the NCRP for Dow Chemical Company, the prime contractor at the plant, to follow. Dow Chemical used film badges to monitor workers for external exposure and urine and blood sampling and nose swipes to monitor internal depositions. In 1970, Dow switched from film badges to thermoluminescent dosimeters (TLD). TLDs contain light-emitting crystal phosphors that can be read by a computer after they are exposed to radioactive energy. (7) In 1994, researchers conducting a site dose reconstruction study discovered that the readings of film badges worn by workers from 1953 to 1967 were consistently misinterpreted, causing occupational exposures to be underestimated. Medical examinations of the affected workers and further dose reconstruction work are presently being conducted to determine retrospectively more accurate exposure levels. (8)

Occupational health activities over the years have also included conducting beryllium surveillance programs, dose reduction programs, emergency preparedness planning, routine employee physical examinations, and accident and incident investigations; testing employee respirators for fit and efficiency; and compiling employee demographics, accident and injury reports, and abnormal exposure results.

Employee Occupational Exposure and Health Organizations

Dow Chemical Company (1952-1975)
Occupational Health was not specifically noted on organizational charts as a branch or subbranch of any organization during Dow's tenure, although worker monitoring did take place. Occupational Health matters appear to have been a function of the Health Physics Organization, which created a variety of records, including dosimeter readings, employee sample analyses, employee physical examinations, respirator fit tests, and injury and accident reports.

Rockwell International (1975-1989)
During Rockwell's tenure, the occupational health functions at Rocky Flats operated under the umbrella of the Health, Safety, and Environment Organization, as did other worker health activities. Prior to 1982, occupational health was not specifically mentioned in the titles of any organizations created by Rockwell.

EG&G (1990-1995)
As under Rockwell, the occupational health organization is subsumed under a larger management organization, in this case the Safety, Safeguards, and Security Organization. Worker monitoring efforts fall under the direction of the Radiological Protection Organization, which oversees external and internal dosimetry, dose assessment, instrumentation operations, and the Radiological Health Laboratory.

ACCESS

For more complete information regarding access to the records, please refer to Volume I. The Department of Energy's Rocky Flats Plant: A Guide to Record Series Useful for Health-Related Research.

For specific information or permission to review Rocky Flats records, contact:

U.S. Department of Energy
Records Management Department
Contracts and Services Division
Rocky Flats Office
P.O. Box 928
Golden, CO 80402-0928
Telephone Number: (303) 966-6177

SCOPE

This volume pertains mostly to the health and occupational exposures of employees and visitors at Rocky Flats. Record series generally consist of dosimeter data, protective equipment tests, bioassay results, injury and accident reports, radiation and hazards exposure records, and medical records. Many of the records contain personal data pertaining to individual employees and may, therefore, be covered under the Privacy Act of 1974.

This volume reflects information collected from research conducted during site visits from March 1994 through January 1995. Users of this volume should note that omissions are likely due to the nature of the records targeted for research. For example, the June 6, 1989, seizure of records by the Federal Bureau of Investigation rendered an unknown quantity of records unavailable for review by HAI staff. Moreover, HAI team members did not inventory records stored in radiation-controlled areas.

HAI relied on existing finding aids prepared for Rocky Flats records. HAI was unable to verify that these research tools include all records that may exist. In addition, researchers should note that records at all of the repositories listed in this guide may be moved, transferred to a different location, reviewed for changes in disposition authority, and changed to a different format (i.e., from paper to microfilm).

ARRANGEMENT

1. Sixth Semiannual Report of the Atomic Energy Commission (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, July 1949), 56-57.
2. Barton C. Hacker, The Dragon's Tail: Radiation Safety in the Manhattan Project, 1942-1946 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1987), 28-33, 46.
3. Ibid., 36-37.
4. Ibid., 63-69.
5. George T. Mazuzan and J. Samuel Walker, Controlling the Atom: The Beginnings of Nuclear Regulation, 1946-1962 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984), 34-38, 429-430.
6. Ibid., 324-325.
7. The Rocky Flats Dictionary, second edition (EG&G Rocky Flats, July 1991); William Claiborne, "Workers' Radiation Exposure is Upgraded," Washington Post, 25 May 1994.
8. Claiborne, "Workers'."
9. Privacy Act of 1974 [Public Law 93-579 (Title 5 U.S.C. 552a)], as amended.