ALBUQUERQUE — The nation’s nuclear-weapons laboratories need tougher safety oversight to fix a track record that includes dozens of lapses, accidents and near misses, according to a government report released Wednesday.
The Government Accountability Office review of Los Alamos National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and Sandia National Laboratories near Albuquerque came in response to security and safety concerns at Los Alamos.
The GAO, an investigative arm of Congress, said it found a lax attitude toward safety procedures, weaknesses in identifying and correcting safety problems, and inadequate oversight by the National Nuclear Security Administration, a division of the Department of Energy. The review cited nearly 60 serious accidents or near misses since 2000.
The GAO recommended that the NNSA retain independent federal oversight but said it should start making annual progress reports to Congress.
