Since time immemorial the Yakama Nation lived along a stretch of the Columbia River now known as the Hanford Reach. This area provided sources of food and medicines and contains many sacred sites, like Gable and Rattlesnake mountains, and the white bluffs that peer down from above. But in 1943 the Yakama were driven off their homeland to make way for the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, where the plutonium for the bomb that destroyed Nagasaki was produced. Now this area is one of the most polluted places on the planet.
For the past few years the Yakama along with Columbia Riverkeeper have sponsored a "Hanford Journey," where people have the opportunity to see the beauty of this landscape as well as get a river view of the cocooned nuclear reactors that produced the poisonous legacy that the Tribes have been pushing for decades to get cleaned up and restored.
On this episode of Locus Focus, Columbia Riverkeeper Advocacy Director Dan Serres takes us on a Hanford Journey, as we ride the river in our minds, guided by Dan's passion for reclaiming the land that has become Hanford.