RICHLAND, Wash. - If there were a rookie-of the-year award for field work supervisors, Chad Kirby would be a leading contender.
Kirby, an employee with EM Office of River Protection (ORP) contractor Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS), recently completed his first pump removal and installation evolution as a field work supervisor with the installation of a new 44.5-foot pump in double-shell tank AZ-102 at the Hanford Site.
The installation came about a month after the team safely removed an unreliable pump from the tank and packaged it for disposal. Kirby led an integrated field crew of more than 50 workers for the pump removal process and more than 30 for the installation.
“We had an excellent game plan and a talented project team. Everybody did their job and made sure both the removal and installation processes were completed safely," Kirby said.
The new equipment will allow AZ-102 to support future 242-A Evaporator campaigns and support AX Farm retrieval operations as a receiver tank.
During the pump replacement project, the project team used many innovative tools first deployed last June on the AW-106 pump replacement project.
“Removing contaminated, long-length equipment from a tank is challenging work," said Jeremy Johnson, ORP Deputy Federal Project Director. “The suite of tools used for the pump replacement was developed and designed to ensure the safety of our workers as they successfully executed this project."
The new pump in AZ-102 is the first of seven recently procured vertical turbine pumps to be installed in Hanford’s double-shell tanks. After putting the finishing touches on the AZ-102 project, the team will move back to AW Farm and replace a pump in AW-103 this summer.
Source: U.S. Dept. of Energy, Office of Environmental Management
