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Thursday, July 31, 2008

Guest View: Trinity Effects Re-Evaluated

By John Groh

      A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed in a 2007 progress report that researchers are re-evaluating actual doses of radiation received by the public in the 1945 Trinity atomic explosion.
    On July 16, 1945, the first plutonium implosion bomb was detonated 100 feet above the desert floor at White Sands Missile Range. Prevailing winds carried a cloud of radioactive fallout across Chupadera Mesa through Claunch, Cedervale, Encino, Vaughn and Santa Rosa, continuing on a contamination path as far as Indiana. The surrounding communities of Willard, Corona, Mountainair and Clines Corners defined the bordering "hot spots" of the radioactive fallout.
    The Trinity experiment occurred with no public announcements or evacuations. The blast contaminated surrounding land with radiation 10,000 times the limit of currently established Nuclear Regulatory Commission's safety levels. Beta radiation burned the backs of livestock. Wind and terrain conditions rained debris from a white cloud fallout over 200 ranches for days. Until the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, one month later, the residents of Torrance, Socorro, Guadalupe, and Lincoln counties were unaware of their exposure to radioactive fallout, and would remain uninformed for years.
    The blast sent a cloud mass of radioactive fallout estimated at a maximum height of 70,000 feet. The white column began to disappear into the stratosphere carried by 10 mph northeast winds, dropping white fission dust like light snow onto livestock grazing areas. Off-site monitoring teams patrolled a 40-mile radius with no evacuations or examinations of inhabitants. In the following years, no restrictions on grazing or well drilling were imposed. A 1948 survey of high-level areas of Trinity fallout focused on Chupadera Mesa and agricultural areas surrounding Vaughn, Cedervale and Claunch, with radiation analyzed in cultivated crops of corn, millet, beans and oats. A 1957 soil and plant analysis detected plutonium fallout in the first 2 inches of topsoil as far as 88 miles from the Trinity site.
    Chupadera Mesa, 28 miles northeast of Trinity and running to the southern end of Torrance County, was listed as one of 100 U.S. Radiation sites until its clearance as a radioactive cleanup area by the Department of Energy in 1985. The Los Alamos Historical Document and Retrieval & Assessment Project (LAHDRA) is investigating direct contact from fallout and indirect exposure through contaminated water and the consumption of meat, milk and cultivated foods. Thyroid cancer has been linked to the radionuclide Iodine-131 absorbed through milk and is a subject of the fallout analysis. Research of the Ukraine Chernobyl reactor meltdown in 1986 created new concerns about ingested milk exposed to Iodine-131 radiation contamination, especially in children. The LAHDRA study is reassessing all radionuclide and chemical contamination data.
    Fallout in 1945 was discovered 200 miles away from the Trinity test site, resulting in future nuclear testing conducted at least 150 miles away from the public. One month later, a hot spot was found 1,000 miles away, when Eastman Kodak discovered that the source of fogged X-ray film was the result of Trinity fallout-contaminated packing materials from Indiana. Long-term effects of radiation were not known at the time, and atomic war project secrecy superseded public safety and evacuation issues. In the 1940s, many ranches in the fallout path were not documented by the Army prior to the explosion. As levels in these areas have been deemed safe for public use, there is no current data to indicate any present dangers for radiation; however, the 1985 Chupadera Mesa DOE clearance report is being assessed, along with all other Trinity archival data. Long-term indirect radiation exposure from Trinity is still being evaluated by the CDC study.
    The $10 million, 10-year project is being conducted by ChemRisk, subcontracted by the CDC to re-evaluate recorded data from the Los Alamos National Laboratory archives dating back to 1943. Declassified documents in relation to the study are available to the public at the Zimmerman Library at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque.
    In July, LAHDRA will update its progress on the health implications of long-term airborne release of plutonium compounds from Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Nevada Test Site. The study is scheduled to publish its findings in 2009.
   

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LAHDRA Project sources LAHDRA Project sources
    www.lahdra.org/reports/LAHDRA%20Report%20v5%202007_App%20N_Trinity%20Test.pdf
    www.lahdra.org/meetings/mtg_15/mtg_15.htm
    www.lahdra.org/default.htm
    csd.lm.doe.gov/PDFs/NM.04-3.pdf
    csd.lm.doe.gov/PDFs/NM.04-2.pdf