ENSURING THE SO YEAR LIFE OF A FISSILE MATERIAL CONTAINER

Sandia was presented with an opportunity in 1993 to design containers for the long term storageandtransportoffissilematerial. Thisprogramwasundertakenatthedirectionofthe US Department o f Energy and in cooperation with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory which were tasked with developing tl-...: internal fixturing for the contents. The hardware is being supplied by Allied Signal Federal Manufacturing and Technologies, and the packaging will occur at Mason and Hangar Corporation's PantexPlant. Theuniquechallengewastodesignacontainerthatcouldbe sealed with the fissile material contents; and. anytime during the next 50 years, the container couldbetransportedwithonlytheneedforthepre-shipmentleaktest. Thisrequirednotonly a rigorous design capable o f meeting the long term storage and transportation requirements, but also resulted in development o f a surveillance program to ensure that the container continues to perform as designed over the 50-year life. This paper addresses the design o f the container, the testing that was undertaken to demonstrate compliance with US radioactive materials transport regulations, and the surveillance program that has been initiated to ensure the 50-year performance.