Operation LAC (Large Area Coverage), was a Chemical Corps operation in 1957 and 1958 which dispersed microscopic zinc cadmium sulfide (ZnCdS) particles over much of the United States. The purpose was to determine the dispersion and geographic range of biological or chemical agents. It was not thought at the time to pose any particular health […]
It’s well-recognized that smoking cigarettes can cause lung cancer, but did you know it was because they are radioactive? Polonium-210, a radioactive element that is also chemically toxic, causes the most lung damage. Smoking 1 1/2 packs of cigarettes per day can expose your bronchial epithelium to a radiation dose equivalent to 300 chest x-rays. […]
Phosphorus Fertilizer in Your Lawn or Garden Fertilizers containing phosphorus are a major source of groundwater contamination and radiation exposure during lawn maintenance. The most common method for making fertilizer, that contains phosphorous, leaves behind a waste called phosphogypsum, which emits radon, a radioactive gas. It also contains uranium and radium, which are radioactive elements. […]
On February 2, 1959, 9 experienced hikers died under extremely strange and frightening circumstances in the Ural Mountains of Western Russia.
Police and military investigators were baffled by what they found at the campsite. The tent had been sliced open from the inside and abandoned, with their belongings still inside. This happened while external conditions were as low as minus-25 degrees C, with wind speeds estimated between 8 and 16 meters per second.
Some of the hiker’s bodies were found nearly a mile away from the campsite buried 13 feet beneath the snow.
- Investigators found footprints in the snow of eight or nine people who were wearing socks, a single shoe or were barefoot.
- Two men were found barefoot and dressed only in their underclothes.
- Footprints in the snow indicated that the hikers fled the tent in a hurry.
- Four others were found in a ravine and appeared to have suffered traumatic pressure injuries like that of a car crash but no soft tissue damage.
- One was missing a tongue and eyes.
- Tests on their bodies and clothing showed small traces of radiation.
- Some were wearing clothes that belonged to other team members.
- Their bodies had a deep brown tan.
More than 100 boys, classified as mentally challenged, at the Fernald School in Waltham, Mass., were fed cereal containing radioactive iron and calcium in the 1940s and 1950s. The diet was part of an experiment to prove how quickly nutrients in Quaker oatmeal can travel throughout the human body. Quaker Oat officials wanted to match […]
The shoe fitting fluoroscope was a common device used in shoe stores from 1930 through the 1950s. Basically, it was a wooden box with an open x-ray tube and no reliable shielding to protect bystanders. You may want to think of it as an X-Ray Bomb, everyone near the machine was getting a full dose […]
From 1946 to 1949 over 800 women living in and around poor areas of Nashville were deceived into taking part in a nutritional study where pregnant women were given pills with radioactive iron-59. Funded by Vanderbilt University at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. When the babies were born, they were also tested to see how much […]
