RICHLAND, Wash. – For Gary Hix, a recent accomplishment at the Plutonium Finishing Plant (PFP) ended a long career chapter at the Hanford Site fa...
March 16, 2016
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Hix, right, discusses a work assignment with a team member.
The crew that cut up and removed the two most hazardous gloveboxes in PFP.
Due to the airborne radiological contamination encountered while cutting apart the glovebox, workers wore protective suits and breathed supplied air for the task. Workers cut the glovebox into pieces and removed the pieces, working from the top of the glovebox down to the floor.
RICHLAND, Wash. – For Gary Hix, a recent accomplishment at the Plutonium Finishing Plant (PFP) ended a long career chapter at the Hanford Site facility.
Hix is the field work supervisor for the team that recently finished cutting up and removing the most hazardous glovebox in the PFP, glovebox HA-9A, performing some of the most hazardous work across the DOE complex.
That glovebox, and a similar one the crew removed, were each about two stories tall and highly contaminated with radiological and chemical hazards. They are among the many components the PFP workforce is removing to prepare the plant for demolition.
Hix’s crew started work on HA-9A in October 2015, but his experience with the glovebox dates to 2004, when he was a nuclear chemical operator. The mission at PFP was to remove process equipment, in this case, mechanics inside the gloveboxes once used to process plutonium. Hix said he chose the A-Line, one of two former production lines at PFP.
“No one wanted to go in there. It was a challenge,” he said.
And it was a challenge. Shut down since the mid-1970s, clear ports that allowed workers to see through from the outside were blackened, due to exposure to radiation and chemicals. Workers relied on each other to tell how and where to move their hands because they couldn’t see through the darkened ports.
“Imagine changing your oil in your car or changing your car tire, blindfolded, relying on someone else to tell you where to move your hand or where to move the wrench,” Hix said.
The team he was on removed components from two of three levels of HA-9A in 2004. Subsequent teams removed the remaining components, leaving the glovebox in the condition Hix and his team would find it in 2015.
During that time, Hix had the opportunity to become upgraded from a bargaining unit employee to a field work supervisor. In late 2015, he nearly left PFP for another opportunity, but chose to stay in a leadership role.
“It’s almost home to me. It’s become part of my life. Having been here since 2000, I want to see the end of it,” he said.
Hix credits his current team for its recent work in cutting apart and removing the same glovebox he worked on more than 10 years ago.
“This group, more than any other group that I’ve worked with, has been more involved in finding ways to be successful. Between the operators and the radiological control technicians on our team, we all want to help, and we all want to find the answers,” he said.
Hix and his team will remove ventilation components, then start a new chapter at PFP as they move onto another hazardous area of the facility to prepare chemical tanks and pipes for removal before or during demolition. Other crews at PFP are removing contaminated ventilation ductwork, removing process lines, performing decontamination, and conducting asbestos abatement, all steps necessary to prepare the facility for safe and compliant demolition.