The Vaujours Fort was built at the end of the XIXst century, for the defense of the city of Paris. It has been a strategic spot during World War One in 1914. It has been taken over by the germans in 1939 who used it as a munitions deposit til 1944 - and they blew up all the munitions before they fled.
In 1955, France adopted the Atomic Energy plan and a team of military ingeneers settled in Vaujours to study explosives usefull to produce nuclear weapons.
Those Òcold shotsÓ scattered uranium, and the rubbishes from the experiences were incinereted outdoors, washed with quantities of water and spread very deeply in nine wells.
The AEC was shut off in 1997 after it was decided to stop nuclear experiments in France. Some concrete had been cast into the 35 meters of the contaminated wells, which meant that any investigation about the ecological impact of the AEC activities, would be impossible.
As long as the inspector who was charged to establish if the site was or not potentially contaminated and unsafe, had also worked for the AEC, no report ever leached about an eventual water or soil contamination ; but no school or house is allowed in the area, and the workers have to be especially protected.
