As covered by regional and even national media, Beyond Nuclear board member, Kay Drey, has been actively concerned, as are many others, about the risk of a "nuclear fire" due to an underground landfill fire, inching ever closer to a decades-old radioactive waste dump at West Lake Landfill, just upstream from St. Louis drinking water intakes. The radioactive waste came from the processing, by Mallinkrodt Chemical Works in St. Louis, of Belgian Congo uranium ore during the Manhattan Project race to drop atomic bombs on Japan.
The crisis continues to garner headlines on a regular basis, as government officials at all levels, under pressure from area residents, struggle with what to do on this, the 40 year mark of radioactive waste first being buried there (the 70 year old wastes were stored elsewhere before being dumped in the West Lake Landfill). Kay has long led efforts to have the radioactive wastes removed from the Missouri River floodplain.