Forum On Radiation

An alternative view of the nuclear reactors at the Brookhaven National Laboratory and radioactive contamination from the lab in the surrounding communities, meant to serve as a counterweight to a forum last week at Southampton College, will be held Sunday morning at Guild Hall.

Dr. Helen Caldicott, a founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Dr. Jay M. Gould, director of the Radiation and Public Health Project, and other opponents of nuclear power and, in particular, the two reactors at Brookhaven, will speak about "recent findings of extraordinary high radioactivity readings in the Peconic River that can only have come from the Brookhaven National Laboratory," according to a press release.

The forum will be held in the John Drew Theater at Guild Hall, starting at 11 a.m. Admission is free.

Rebuffed By College

Bill Smith, head of Fish Unlimited, Alice Slater of the Global Resource Action Center for the Environment, and Dr. William Weida, a former Pentagon specialist on the conversion of nuclear facilities, will also participate. The author Blanche Wiesen Cook will moderate.

On Nov. 9 at Southampton College, scientists and other officials from the lab defended its industrial and medical research programs and told a sharply divided audience that current releases from the two reactors are within acceptable levels and not harmful. They discussed only briefly cleanup of the contamination, which led to the lab being listed as a Federal Superfund site, and said there was no proof, as opponents have asserted, that the contamination causes breast cancer and other illnesses.

Opponents had demanded to be part of the discussion, held before the World Affairs Council at the college, but were rebuffed by college administrators, who instead offered a separate forum at some later date. Mr. Smith told The Star the group instead decided to focus on Sunday's forum.

Radiation Study

That forum will focus on the Suffolk County Radiation Study, which will measure radioactive strontium levels in water, soil, and fish, as well as baby teeth, at various distances from the lab. Dr. Ernest Sternglass of the University of Pittsburgh Medical School is already collecting baby teeth.

Panel members are also expected to detail the results of recent tests of fish, deer, raccoon, turtles, birds, shellfish, and other wildlife that showed high levels of cesium 137 and strontium 90, said to result from releases from the lab. Similar studies in Germany reportedly showed a tenfold increase in radioactivity after the Chernobyl accident in the former Soviet Union.

The study is being paid for with a grant from the Methodist Church and private donations raised on the East End.

Further details on Sunday's forum are available from Robert Long at Guild Hall. A story on both forums will appear in next week's Star.