UNIVERSITY WILL MEET WITH NRC STAFF OVER RADIATION SPILL

Southeast Missouri State University could face a fine for possible safety violations over a radiation spill in Magill Hall of Science that cost the school more than $1 million to clean up last year.

Southeast officials are scheduled to meet Tuesday with federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff in the Chicago suburb of Lisle, Ill., to discuss five possible safety violations.

University officials hope to convince the NRC staff that no fine is warranted over the spilling of radioactive americium-241, a substance that was used as part of a university chemistry course from the late 1960s to the 1980s.

"We will present our case," said Dr. Chris McGowan, dean of the College of Science and Mathematics, who will meet with the NRC staff. Also attending the meeting will be Ken Dobbins, Southeast president; Walt Lilly, biology professor and radiation safety officer; and Jim Moos of Science Applications International Corp., the cleanup contractor.

A final decision from the NRC could be reached three to six weeks after Tuesday's meeting, said Jan Strasma, a spokesman for the NRC's regional office.

"One option is no fine at all," he said.

The possible violations:

* Possession of radioactive material for which the university wasn't licensed. Southeast officials thought the americium-241 had been removed from the campus in 1991.

* Failure to secure strontium 90, a radioactive substance in a piece of science equipment. School officials can't find the piece of equipment. "We don't know where it is," said McGowan.

* Failure to have a radiation safety officer. The university was without a radiation safety officer from August 1999 to February 2000 when Lilly was appointed to the position.

* Overexposure of a cleanup worker to radiation in June 2000.

* Failure of that cleanup worker to adequately check for radioactive contamination, including not sampling the air.

The worker, employed by Englehardt Associates of Madison, Wis., worked to clean up the contamination in the science building on June 12 and 16. But after NRC inspectors found the contamination had spread beyond a basement storage room, the university hired Science Applications International Corp., headquartered in San Diego, to do the cleanup work and health testing of people that might have been exposed to the radiation.

Most serious violation

The NRC's Strasma said the overexposure violation ranks as the most severe of the violations facing the university and the one that could bring the biggest fine, possibly $5,500 or more.

The worker received an estimated dose of radiation more than five times higher than NRC's annual limit. The worker hasn't suffered any health problems, Strasma said.

While the violation involved a cleanup contractor, the work was being done under the auspices of the university and its NRC license, Strasma said.

"We hold the university responsible for action by its employees or individuals that it has contracted to do the work," he said.

The university's failure to have a radiation safety officer for several months likely won't warrant a fine, he said.

Southeast officials said the university previously had a safety officer who left the school in the summer of 1999.

Dobbins said he hopes to soon put the contamination issue behind him. "I hope we never do it again," he said.

McGowan said the cleanup work gutted much of the Magill Hall basement and a lab room. The university still faces expenses to fix up those areas for future use.

The contractor, SAIC, hauled off 30 tons of contaminated materials from the building last fall, including hallway cabinets and seismograph sensors.