COVID-19 Cases Nearly Triple at NNSA Locations

By Dan Leone
04/03/2020

Confirmed cases of COVID-19 soared to 26 from nine across the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA) national network of sites, laboratories, and production facilities, according to an official tally Friday by agency headquarters in Washington, D.C.

The tally includes both NNSA-owned sites, and facilities where some NNSA-affiliated personnel are present.

The NNSA declined to say exactly where these cases were located. Likewise, the agency and most sites declined to say how many nuclear weapons workers have been tested for the disease, or were in quarantine because of suspected exposure, as of deadline Friday for Nuclear Security & Deterrence Monitor.

At the same time, operations continued as normal at the three main NNSA  weapons production facilities: the Kansas City National Security Campus in Kansas City, Mo.; the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas; and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn. Only Y-12 has acknowledged that it has COVID-19 cases among its workforce.

The federal government has deemed NNSA manufacturing plants mission-essential, leaving workers there no choice but to report to work as usual, despite widespread stay-at-home orders and school closures. 

Here is a list of confirmed COVID-19 cases that Department of Energy headquarters and sites across the country have acknowledged in the past two weeks:

• NNSA Albuquerque Complex, Albuquerque, N.M. – 1 

• DOE Headquarters (Forrestal Building), Washington, D.C. – 3, up two from last week.

• Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, California – 3, up one from two last week.

• Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico – 1. However, this person was a subcontractor for the site’s DOE Environmental Management-sponsored cleanup contractor, N3B Los Alamos. NNSA lab operator Triad National Security said March 30 there is no record of the infected person contacting Triad employees.

• Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque) – 3, up two from one confirmed case last week.

• Sandia National Laboratories (Livermore, Calif.) – 4, up two from two last week.

• Savannah River Site, Aiken, S.C. – 2, up one from two last week. Savannah Rive said it has tested 24 people. Of those, two people tested positive and 14 negative. Eight test results were pending, at deadline.

• Y-12 National Security Complex, Oak Ridge, Tenn. – “Several,” at least two. That’s up one confirmed case from one last week. A spokesperson for contractor Consolidated Nuclear Security refused to quantify the number of cases at the defense-uranium hub.

There was no immediate explanation for the up to seven additional cases cited by the NNSA.

Workers at KCNSC, Pantex, and Y-12 are all reporting for work more or less on normal schedules. Y-12 even continues construction on the Uranium Processing Facility, keeping trade workers in close quarters as the NNSA tries to stave off delays to the nation’s next-generation processing hub for weapon secondary stages.

With some caveats, the host localities of the three major weapons production sites had made provision for essential workers reporting to duty while their usual social and economic supports were unavailable, or less available, amid continued social distancing to stem the spread of the disease. That includes, for the most part, allowing day care facilities to remain open so that essential workers have somewhere to leave young children as city, county and state governments close down schools.

No country in the world has more confirmed cases of COVID-19 than the U.S. The novel coronavirus that broke out in China last year causes the disease.

The U.S. had about 250,000 confirmed cases at deadline: twice as many confirmed cases as last week. At deadline, more than 6,500 people in the U.S. had died from COVID-19: well over double last week’s total of 2,500. At deadline, more than 9,000 people had recovered from their bouts with the disease, domestically. 

Regional and Local COVID-19 Cases Near NNSA Sites

Across the country, COVID-19 is encircling the NNSA complex, spreading through the communities and regions that host critical nuclear weapon sites, according to a tracker maintained by the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md.

Here is a running tally of that spread, maintained by NS&D Monitor.

Kansas City, Mo. – Kansas City National Security Campus

About 140 confirmed cases — more than double the 60 confirmed cases a week ago. This week, Kansas City recorded its first fatal case. Missouri had more than 1,800 confirmed cases overall, with 22 deaths at deadline. That is more than triple the confirmed cases recorded a week ago, and almost triple the deaths.

New Mexico – NNSA Albuquerque, Albuquerque; Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque; Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos.

New Mexico had more than 400 confirmed cases, with seven deaths, at deadline. That is nearly three times the infections and six more deaths than a week ago. More than a third of the total confirmed cases this week were in Bernalillo County, nearby Albuquerque and Sandia. 

More than a month into the outbreak, Los Alamos County itself had yet to record a confirmed case. 

Meanwhile, counties surrounding Los Alamos have double-digit confirmed cases. Taos had 13, Sandoval about 40. Rio Arriba had only five. However, Santa Fe, south of Los Alamos, had nearly 50 confirmed cases, more than double last week’s total.

Oak Ridge, Tenn., Anderson County – Y-12 National Security Complex

There were at deadline 10 confirmed cases in Anderson County, Tenn., which includes the Y-12 National Security Complex. That is up from only three confirmed cases a week ago. Tennessee had more than 2,800 cases statewide, with 36 deaths, at deadline: about triple the number of cases and more than 10 times as many total deaths as last week.

Livermore, Calif., Alameda County – Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (including Sandia California)

There were more than 370 confirmed cases and eight deaths attributed to the disease in Alameda County, at deadline: about 100 more than this time last week. California locked down quicker than much of the rest of the country. Nearby San Francisco had about 450 confirmed cases, at deadline, up a little more than 100 from last week. The second-deadliest California outbreak so far was in Santa Clara, Calif., some 30 miles south by road from Livermore. Santa Clara had more than 36 confirmed COVID-19 deaths at deadline: up 11 from last week. 

California, the largest, most populous state in the union had more than 11,000 confirmed cases at deadline, 5,000 more than last week. That paled in comparison with New York, which amid the worst outbreak in the country had more than 100,000 confirmed cases and more than 2,900 deaths, at deadline. New York state had about 40,000 more confirmed cases and almost 2,000 more deaths than a week ago.

Aiken and Aiken County, S.C. – Savannah River Site

Aiken, S.C., home of the Savannah River Site, had 22 confirmed cases at deadline, double last week’s total. This week, the county recorded its first, and so far only, COVID-19 fatality. The Aiken total was still a small fraction of the roughly 1,500 confirmed cases in South Carolina, where 31 people had died from the disease at deadline. South Carolina had over double the number of confirmed cases and 15 more deaths than a week ago.

Amarillo, Texas, including Potter and Randall counties – Pantex Plant

More than 30 of Texas’ roughly 5,200 cases were scattered throughout Randall and Potter Counties near Amarillo, Texas, host city for Pantex. Potter had 16 confirmed cases, Randall 17: each about 10 more than a week ago. There were no deaths near Pantex and Amarillo, at deadline. Texas had about 2,400 more COVID-19 cases this week than it had last week, with 86 reported deaths statewide, at deadline. That is more than double the total fatalities from a week ago.

Nevada – Nevada National Security Site

Nevada had nearly 1,500 cases at deadline, almost 600 more than a week ago, with almost 40 deaths statewide: about 25 more than last week. Almost all of the state’s total confirmed deaths, 34, were in Las Vegas, more than 100 miles southeast of the Nevada National Security Site. Sin City had nearly three-quarters of the state’s active cases, which discount fatalities, at roughly 1,000. There were four confirmed cases in Nye County, Nev., near the northwestern perimeter of the former Nevada Test Site, up from one a week ago.