Richard W. Perkins is a former scientist at the

Hanford Site The Hanford Site is a decommissioned nuclear production complex operated by the United States federal government on the Columbia River in Benton County in the U.S. state of Washington. It has also been known as SiteW and the Hanford Nuclear R ...

and the

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is one of the United States Department of Energy national laboratories, managed by the Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Science. The main campus of the laboratory is in Richland, Washington ...

at Richland,

Washington state Washington, officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is often referred to as Washington State to distinguish it from the national capital, both named after George Washington ...

. His research included study of nuclear reactors and their effect on their environment, study of the ash from the eruption of

Mount St. Helens Mount St. Helens (known as Lawetlat'la to the local Cowlitz people, and Loowit or Louwala-Clough to the Klickitat) is an active stratovolcano located in Skamania County, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States ...

, and Operation "Star Wars." He also worked with the first

Moon rock Moon rock or lunar rock is rock originating from Earth's Moon. This includes lunar material collected during the course of human exploration of the Moon, and rock that has been ejected naturally from the Moon's surface and landed on Earth ...

s. Although too young to join, he joined the U.S navy to fight in WW2. He learned to use SONAR as part of his training in the navy. He was a member of

the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a Nontrinitarianism, nontrinitarian Restorationism, restorationist Christianity, Christian Christian denomination, denomination and the ...

. Perkins died December 29, 2016, at home at the age of 90.

References

2016 deaths People from Richland, Washington Year of birth missing Latter Day Saints from Washington (state) {{US-scientist-stub