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Buttonwillow Raceway built on a nuclear dump site?

3K views 17 replies 12 participants last post by  Richard 350z  
#1 ·
A friend of mine told me that Buttonwillow Raceway was built on a nuclear dump site that the Air Force used to dump waste from the Manhattan Project. He said he lost 2 good friends who were corner workers there due to lung cancer, although neither of them smoked. Due to this, he refuses to race at Buttonwillow. Anybody care to shed some light into this?
 
#7 ·
The story is that BWillow was purchased from a "city" farmer who thought he could retire to a peaceful farm life.... but he learned after spending a small fortune on soil reconditioning that the dirt at BWillow is too alkaline to support growing anything but sagebrush!

Cheers,
Kiyoshi
 
#10 ·
#11 ·
LOL - I used to run programs managing BRAC and environmental liability sites - and trust me, there's enough federal and municipal oversight on all projects that lots don't get released unless they pass a multitude of standards. Tell your friend to put down the peace pipe and pass it to me... :)
 
#14 ·
I seriously doubt it. Tom Dragoun, owner of 7s Only Racing at the track, racecar builder (Mazda GT's and Pro-7s) and all around good guy has been at Buttonwillow 7 days a week for many years. He has run more laps at Buttonwillow than anyone else by a long shot.

Tom doesn't have 2 heads or anything. Must be an ugly rumor.
 
#15 · (Edited)
The Oak Ridge, Tennessee area had quite a few undocumented radioactive waste dump areas in the surrounding forests (not necessarily on a military base, but generally federal land, at least in the 1940s). During the Manhattan project, there wasn't much concern over hazardous waste, and the government and their contractors dumped it all over. My brother used to live there and was peripherally involved in dealing with the aftermath of these dumps. Undocumented radioactive dump areas were still being found as late as the 1980s (which is when he left the area). I don't know if more have been found since.
 
#16 ·
Any ideas on how i could mount/hardwire this into my car?

Image
 
#17 ·
#18 ·
charliex said:
http://www.toxictorts.com/buttonwillow.shtml

luckily i brought home most of buttonwillow in my car.
The track was already built in 1998 and 1999 when Safety-Clean was dumping radioactive waste, so unless they were sneaking into Buttonwillow Raceway at night, digging up and repaving, the location in the town of Buttonwillow (which spans quite a few square miles) must not be at the track.

If this is all you have to worry about, your life must be good. :coolnana: