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Posted: Thursday February 10th 2022 6:46 PM

Dr. Robert Dodge of Ojai will participate in a virtual community forum Feb. 12 about the ongoing battle to clean up the Santa Susana Field Lab on the outskirts of Simi Valley.

There was a partial nuclear meltdown at the site in 1959.

To participate in the online forum on February 12, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., register at: https://bit.ly/3AyOfHO.

Dodge, Melissa Burnstead of Parents vs. Santa Susana Field Lab and Denise Duffield of Physicians for Social Responsibility-LA — will discuss their work.

The online forum is hosted by Chalice Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Conejo Valley Community Forum program, according to its website at: https://bit.ly/32BH0lT

The three activists are featured in a recent documentary, “In the Dark of the Valley,” about the lingering danger of radioactive fallout. It can be viewed on: https://www.nbc.com/in-the-dark-of-the-valley.

The documentary tells the story of a partial meltdown of a sodium reactor at the Santa Susana Field Lab. Some consider the leak the worst nuclear disaster in US history, citing studies that indicate radiation emitted at the Field Lab was 260 times greater than radiation emitted at the site of the infamous partial meltdown at a power plant nuclear plant at Three Mile Island near Middletown, Pennsylvania, in 1979.

The Santa Susana Field Lab collapse was hidden from the public for 20 years before it was discovered by university students and the fight to clean up the site continues to this day.

Dodge is president of Physicians for Social Responsibility-Los Angeles and co-chair of PSR’s Committee to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. PSR is the American branch of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985.

Duffield directs the nuclear threat program for PSR-LA and leads the organization’s efforts to ensure a complete cleanup of the contaminated site.

Bumstead describes becoming an “accidental activist” after her 4-year-old daughter was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of leukemia in 2014. Bumstead met other families at Los Angeles Children’s Hospital whose children had also rare cancers and learned that they all live inside. miles from the Santa Susana Field Laboratory.

Bumstead started a change.org petition which now has over 740,000 signatures demanding the site be cleaned up.