Environmental advocates and tribal communities have been fighting to stop the trucking of uranium ore through the Navajo Nation. A new report by the nonprofit Grand Canyon Trust has revealed that the 300-mile haul route from the Pinyon Plain Mine to a uranium processing mill in Utah is statistically more deadly than most roads nationwide.
“Based on what limited data we have, which is the fatal accidents, even with that, it looks like, yes, it is a dangerous stretch of road,” said Josh O’Brien, Grand Canyon Trust senior GIS analyst. “There’s a lot of fatal accidents on it relative to, you know, other roads with similar number of miles driven on.”
He used data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and found that some sections of the route have between 2.4 and 7 times more fatal accidents than the national average. Even though the entire route isn’t solely on the reservation, four out of the five most dangerous spots are all on U.S. 160 within the Navajo Nation.
The worst stretches of this federal highway are east of Tuba City, Dennehotso and the Mexican Water Post near the U.S. 191 injunction as well as west of Kayenta near Tsegi Canyon. The fifth area is northeast of Flagstaff near Doney Park along U.S. 89; it’s the only part of the route that isn’t on tribal land.
“Those are just the ones that came out as statistically significant,” O’Brien said. “That was the impression, the windiness of the roads, at times, through canyons, issues with low visibility. It’s an undivided road and so forth.”
The mine’s operator, Energy Fuels, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
“Every traffic accident, every service call has a different component to it that we've got to be aware of and addressed in a different manner,” said Michael Anderson, director of the Navajo Nation’s Division of Public Safety. “They’re all not cookie cutter situations, so we will continue to do that.”
Two months ago, the company sent a pair of ore-filled trucks from its mine near the Grand Canyon through the Navajo Nation en route to the White Mesa Mill after pledging to issue prior notice to stakeholders, like Coconino County and the Havasupai Tribe.
They claim that never happened.
The company told KJZZ News that no promise was made to alert communities along the route. Days later, Energy Fuels put hauling through the Navajo Nation on hold once Gov. Katie Hobbs stepped in. She urged them to reach a mutual agreement.
Those negotiations are still underway.
In August, the Navajo Nation Council amended its 2012 tribal law that banned the transport of uranium in an attempt to strengthen regulatory autonomy in response to this summer’s unannounced trucking operation through its lands.
But the U.S. government maintains jurisdiction over highways, so the transportation of uranium is legally allowed on U.S. 89 and U.S. 160, and is regulated by federal agencies such as the U.S. Department of Transportation and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Once this hauling truce ends, as many as eight trucks are expected to drive uranium ore along that route each day, while Pinyon Plain Mine is supposed to remain operational for at least two years.
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