Pentagon Tests Portable Nuclear Reactor. The Last One Left Arlington's Only Radioactive Grave.

[Marlin]

Rode the bus by the SL-1 site many times before someone told me what the road to a pile of dirt was. One of my ELT instructors Arlo Trost was one of the first to enter the building.

Pentagon Tests Portable Nuclear Reactor. The Last One Left Arlington's Only Radioactive Grave.

https://www.military.com/pentagon-tests-portable-nuclear-reactor-the-last-one-left-arlingtons-only-radioactive-grave

[Core Content]

The Department of Defense is developing a new transportable nuclear reactor under Project Pele at the Idaho National Laboratory. This initiative follows the 1961 SL-1 reactor accident, which resulted in three fatalities and the burial of a contaminated soldier in a lead-lined grave at Arlington National Cemetery.

The SL-1 incident established safety standards that have prevented fatal reactor accidents in the United States for 65 years. Project Pele utilizes high-temperature gas-cooled technology and TRISO fuel, which are designed to be meltdown-resistant. These developments aim to provide portable power for remote military operations while addressing the historical safety concerns of mobile nuclear systems.

His headstone looks like every other one at Arlington, but the man beneath it is sealed in lead and concrete, and still faintly radioactive.

White marble, rounded top, a name and a pair of dates, one of thousands in the long rows of Arlington National Cemetery. Section 31, Grave 472. A visitor could walk past it a hundred times and never know.

Beneath it, a soldier is buried in a lead-lined casket, sealed in concrete, lowered into a metal vault, and covered with more concrete still. His body cannot be moved without the federal government's permission. Sixty-five years after his death, it is still faintly radioactive.

Read the full article at Military.com:
https://www.military.com/pentagon-tests-portable-nuclear-reactor-the-last-one-left-arlingtons-only-radioactive-grave