"LOS ALAMOS, N.M. -- Pickup trucks believed present at the world's first nuclear bomb test, coke and whiskey bottles, a calendar and a toothbrush are just a few of the items unearthed by a cleanup of one of Los Alamos National Laboratory's original toxic dump sites, where the detritus of the 1940s Manhattan Project was strewn through some of northern New Mexico's most scenic mesas and canyons."

"More important, workers also extracted 43,000 cubic yards of radioactive debris and toxic soil — all beneath highly specialized containment domes — from what is known as Area B, just across the street from a strip of local businesses, and just more than a mile from downtown Los Alamos.

The three-year, $212 million excavation project on the six-acre site was completed last month, and lab officials boast that environmental conditions there will soon be suitable for residential development.

That's the good news."

Jeri Clausing reports for the Associated Press October 1, 2011. [2]