Castle Hill High School: Radioactive ‘goldencake’ is discovered on Sydney campus
- Uranium powder found in school storage
- The Hazmat team expected to remove it this week
One of Australia’s largest public schools has been partially closed after discovering radioactive material that can cause kidney damage in a storage facility.
A box labeled ‘Yellowcake’, a concentrated uranium oxide powder, was found on a science storage shelf at Castle Hill High School in Sydney’s northwest.
The box was said to have been in the room for decades and was only discovered after white powder, presumably asbestos, fell on it.
The school was at the center of an asbestos scare in 2020, with several classrooms closed for a month after the hazardous material was discovered in the roof.
A box labeled “Yellowcake,” a concentrated uranium oxide powder, was found on a science storage shelf at Castle Hill School. Pictured: An Indian worker wearing Yellowcake protection
A teacher said the director of Castle Hill School confirmed that the science storage area was off limits. The school was at the center of an asbestos scandal in 2020
Teachers were told in an email from Castle Hill School Principal Georgina Fleming that the scientific chemical storage facility was strictly off limits until further notice (pictured)
A teacher at school told me news.com.au that the “incompetence is staggering.”
“Somehow it was put in a red box and left in the storage room…forever,” he said.
Teachers were told in an email from Georgina Fleming, Principal of Castle Hill School, that the chemical storage area was strictly off limits until further notice.
Ms Fleming said in the email that the school was ‘probably testing asbestos and other materials’.
The room will remain “isolated and secured” until the material is properly tested and likely to be removed by a hazmat team this week.
Parents and carers were also informed by e-mail.
Students were given yellow cake powder to set off radiation counters in classroom science experiments in the 1960s.
Yellowcake is radioactive, but not highly. It is extremely long-lived, with a ‘half-life’ of over 4 billion years, meaning it slowly emits radiation.
The main reason it is considered toxic is that it can cause kidney damage if inhaled.
The material comes from the grinding and chemical processing of uranium ores.
The Ministry of Education confirmed in a statement that “a potentially hazardous material” was found on Aug. 30 in a “locked storage space for science blocks” at the school.
“The storage area was not accessible to students and the material was in a locked box and was presumably used in the past to support scientific experiments,” the statement said.
The statement said the science block was approved as “safe for normal use” after inspection.
The toxic concentrated uranium powder is believed to have been in scientific storage for fifty years. Pictured: stock photo of a storage shed
Castle Hill School told parents about the Yellowcake scare in an email, but the science block is deemed safe to use normally
Staff and students had been complaining for several years prior to 2020 that strange dust was falling from the ceilings before the asbestos was identified.
The school’s then principal, Vicky Brewer, who retired in 2021, is said to have ignored the complaints.
The NSW Department of Education received a positive asbestos test result from the school four years earlier in 2016, but told the school it had come back negative.
Daily Mail Australia approached the Department of Education and Castle Hill School for comment.