Strange Conspiracy in a Land of Freedom, Honor and Integrity 3 – Does Washington even know what human rights and civil rights are? Have our leaders ever had integrity, decency and honor?

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Civil Rights, Human Rights, International Concerns, life in the United States, US government policy, US history, US human rights violations, USA

Strange Conspiracy in a Land of Freedom, Honor and Integrity 3 – Does Washington even know what human rights and civil rights are? Have our leaders ever had integrity, decency and honor?

Published 10-12-09

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Dugway sheep incident
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dead sheep owned by Ray Peck in Skull Valley, 1968[1]

The Dugway sheep incident, also known as the Skull Valley sheep kill, was a 1968 sheep kill that has been connected to United States Army chemical and biological warfare programs at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah. 6,000 sheep were killed on ranches near the base, and the popular explanation blamed Army testing of chemical weapons for the incident, though alternative explanations have been offered. A report first made public in 1998 was called the  first documented admission  from the Army that a nerve agent killed the sheep at Skull Valley.

Contents

* 1 Background
* 2 Incident
* 3 Possible causes
* 4 Aftermath
* 5 See also
* 6 References
* 7 Further reading
* 8 External links

Background

Since its founding in 1941, much of the activity at Dugway Proving Ground is a closely guarded secret. Activities at Dugway included aerial nerve agent testing.[2] According to reports from New Scientist, Dugway was still producing small quantities of anthrax as late as 1998, 30 years after the United States renounced biological weapons.[3] There were at least 1,100 other chemical tests at Dugway during the time period of the Dugway sheep incident. In total, almost 500,000 pounds (230 metric tons) of nerve agent were dispersed during open-air tests.[2] There were also tests at Dugway with other weapons of mass destruction, including 328 open-air tests of biological weapons, 74 dirty bomb tests, and the equivalent of eight intentional meltdowns of nuclear reactors.[2]

Incident

In the days preceding the Dugway sheep incident the United States Army at Dugway Proving Ground conducted at least three separate operations involving nerve agents.[4] All three operations occurred on March 13, 1968. One involved the test firing of a chemical artillery shell, another the burning of 160 U.S. gallons (600 L) of nerve agent in an open air pit and in the third a jet aircraft sprayed nerve agent in a target area about 27 miles (43 km) west of Skull Valley. It is the third event that is usually connected to the Skull Valley sheep kill.[4]

The incident log at Dugway Proving Ground indicated that the sheep incident began with a phone call on March 17, 1968 at 12:30 a.m. The director of the University of Utah’s ecological and epidemiological contract with Dugway, a Dr. Bode, phoned Keith Smart, the chief of the ecology and epidemiology branch at Dugway to report that 3,000 sheep were dead in the Skull Valley area. The initial report of the incident came to Bode from the manager of a Skull Valley livestock company.[5] The sheep were grazing in an area about 27 miles (43 km) from the proving ground; total sheep deaths of 6,000–6,400 were reported over the next several days as a result of the incident.[6] The Dugway Safety Office’s attempt to count the dead sheep compiled a total of 3,483.[7]

Possible causes

One explanation in the aftermath of the incident was that a chemical or biological agent had escaped from the Dugway Proving Ground. Logic dictated that for 3,000 sheep to suffer a near instant death, an agent from Dugway would almost have to be involved.[5] Circumstantial evidence seemed to support this assertion, the United States Army admitted to conducting open-air tests with the nerve agent VX in the days preceding the sheep kill.[5] The Army also intimated that a spray nozzle had malfunctioned during the test causing an aircraft to continue spraying VX as it climbed to higher altitudes.[5][6] It was also reported that a small amount of VX was found in the tissue of the dead sheep.[6]

Other information contradicted the initial assumptions about the cause of the incident. One contradiction to nerve agent exposure as a cause came in the symptoms of some of the sheep following the incident.[7] Several sheep, still alive, sat unmoving on the ground. The sheep refused to eat, but exhibited normal breathing patterns and showed signs of internal hemorrhaging.[7] Regular breathing and internal hemorrhaging are inconsistent with nerve agent exposure.[7] In addition, no other animals in the area, some much more susceptible to nerve agent poisoning, were affected.[5][7]

Aftermath

The incident had an impact on the Army, and U.S. military policy within a year. The international infamy of the incident contributed to President Richard Nixon’s decision to ban all open-air chemical weapon testing in 1969.[2] The sheep incident was one of the events which helped contribute to a rise in public sentiment against the U.S. Army Chemical Corps during and after the Vietnam War.[8] Ultimately, the Chemical Corps was disbanded for a short time as a result.[8]

Following the incident, the Army and other state and federal agencies compiled reports, some of which were later characterized as  studies .[4] A report which remained classified until 1978 and unreleased to the public until nearly 30 years after the incident was called the  first documented admission  by the Army that VX killed the sheep. In 1998, Jim Woolf, reporting for the The Salt Lake Tribune, made the content of the report public for the first time.[2] The report described the evidence that nerve agent was the cause of the sheep kill as  incontrovertible. [4] The 1970 report, compiled by researchers at the U.S. Army’s Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland, stated that VX was found in both snow and grass samples recovered from the area three weeks after the sheep incident.

The report concluded that the  quantity of VX originally present was sufficient to account for the death of the sheep. [4] Even after the report surfaced the Army maintained that it did not accept responsibility for the incident nor did they admit negligence.[2] As late as 1997, one year before the report went public, U.S. Department of Defense officials stated that the reason  it (the report) was never published is because it wasn’t particularly revealing. [9]

See also

* Granite Peak Installation
* Operation CHASE
* United States and weapons of mass destruction

References

1. ^ Lee Davidson and Joe Bauman (2001-02-12).  Toxic Utah: A land littered with poisons . Deseret News. http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/sview/1,3329,250010322,00.html. Retrieved 2008-03-18.
2. ^ a b c d e f Norrell, Brenda.  Skull Valley’s Nerve Gas Neighbors , (LexisNexis), Indian Country Today (Rapid City, South Dakota), October 26, 2005. Retrieved November 26, 2007.
3. ^ Hambling, David.  US army plans to bulk-buy anthrax , New Scientist,September 24, 2005. Retrieved November 27, 2007.
4. ^ a b c d e Woolf, Jim.  Army: Nerve Agent Near Dead Utah Sheep in ’68; Feds Admit Nerve Agent Near Sheep , (LexisNexis),The Salt Lake Tribune, January 1, 1998. Retrieved November 26, 2007.
5. ^ a b c d e Regis, Edward. The Biology of Doom: The History of America’s Secret Germ Warfare Project, (Google Books), Owl Books, 2000, p. 209, (ISBN 080505765X). Retrieved October 10, 2008.
6. ^ a b c Hoeber, Amoretta M. and Douglass, Jr. Joseph D.  The Neglected Threat of Chemical Warfare , (JSTOR), International Security, Vol. 3, No. 1. (Summer, 1978), pp. 55-82. Retrieved November 26, 2007.
7. ^ a b c d e Mauroni, Albert J. America’s Struggle with Chemical-Biological Warfare, (Google Books), Praeger, Westport, Connecticut: 2000, p. 40, (ISBN 0275967565). Retrieved November 26, 2007.
8. ^ a b Mauroni, Al.  The US Army Chemical Corps: Past, Present, and Future , Army Historical Founation. Retrieved October 10, 2008.
9. ^  DoD news briefing – Mr. Kenneth Bacon, ASD (PA),  (Lexis Nexis, relevant excerpt), M2 Presswire, April 8, 1997. Retrieved November 26, 2007.

Further reading

* Boffey, Philip M.  Nerve Gas: Dugway Accident Linked to Utah Sheep Kill , (Citation, log-in required to view article) Science December 27, 1968, Vol. 162, No. 3861, pp. 1460 – 1464. Retrieved November 26, 2007.
* Sheep & the Army, Time Magazine, April 5, 1968, accessed October 10, 2008.
*  Toward the Doomsday Bug , Time Magazine, September 6, 1968, accessed October 12, 2008.
* Van Kampen, K.R., et al.  Effects of nerve gas poisoning in sheep in Skull Valley, Utah , Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, (Abstract), April 15, 1970; Vol. 156 Issue:8 pp. 1032-5, accessed October 10, 2008.
* Wright, Burton.  America’s Struggle With Chemical-Biological Warfare , (Book review), Army Chemical Review, February, 2001, accessed via FindArticles.com on October 12, 2008.

External links

* Biewin, John. Sheep Kill, (radio broadcast), NPR, February 8, 1998, accessed October 10, 2008.
* Cianciosi , Scott.  The Sheep Incident , DamnInteresting.com, March 17, 2008, accessed October 12, 2008.

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugway_sheep_incident
Categories: Chemical warfare | Non-combat military accidents | Military in Utah | Sheep

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugway_sheep_incident

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Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For the book by Cadi Ayyad ben Moussa, see Ash-Shifa.

The Al-Shifa (??????, Arabic for  healing ) pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum North, Sudan was constructed between 1992 and 1996 with components imported from the United States, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, India, and Thailand.

The industrial complex was composed of around four buildings. It was the largest pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum and employed over 300 workers, producing medicine both for human and veterinary use. The factory was used primarily for the manufacture of anti-malaria medicines and veterinary products.

The factory was destroyed in 1998 by a missile attack launched by the United States. It stated several reasons for its action:

* Retaliation for previous attacks on U.S. embassies in several African countries.
* The alleged use of the factory for the processing of VX nerve agent.
* For alleged ties between the owners of the plant and the terrorist group al-Qaeda.

These justifications for the bombing were disputed by the owners of the plant, the Sudanese government, and members of the international community.

Contents

* 1 Destruction
* 2 Evidence
* 3 Consequences
* 4 Criticism
* 5 Responsibility
* 6 References
* 7 External links

Destruction

On August 20, 1998, the factory was destroyed in cruise missile strikes launched by the United States in retaliation for the August 7 truck bomb attacks on its embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya (see 1998 U.S. embassy bombings). The administration of President Bill Clinton justified the attacks, dubbed Operation Infinite Reach, on the grounds that the al-Shifa plant was involved with processing the deadly nerve agent VX, and had ties with the Islamist al-Qaeda group of Osama bin Laden, which was believed to be behind the embassy bombings and Operation Bojinka. The August 20 U.S. action also hit al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, to where bin Laden had moved following his May 1996 expulsion from Sudan.

Evidence
The key piece of physical evidence linking the al-Shifa facility to production of chemical weapons was the discovery of EMPTA in a soil sample taken from the plant during a CIA clandestine operation. EMPTA, or O-Ethyl methylphosphonothioic acid, is classified as a Schedule 2B compound according to the Chemical Weapons Convention and is a VX precursor. Although several theoretical uses for EMPTA were postulated as well as several patented process using EMPTA, such as the manufacture of plastic, no known industrial uses of EMPTA were ever documented nor any products that contained EMPTA. It is, however, not banned by the Chemical Weapons Convention as originally claimed by the US government. Moreover, it does not necessarily follow from the presence of EMPTA near (but outside) the boundary of Al-Shifa that this was produced in the factory: EMPTA could have been  stored in or transported near al-Shifa, instead of being produced by it,  according to a report by Michael Barletta.[1]

Under-Secretary of State Thomas Pickering claimed to have sufficient evidence against Sudan, including contacts between officials at Al-Shifa plant and Iraqi chemical weapons experts, with the Iraq chemical weapons program the only one identified with using EMPTA for VX production. The National Democratic Alliance (NDA), a Sudanese opposition in Cairo led by Mubarak Al-Mahdi, also insisted that the plant was producing ingredients for chemical weapons.[2] Former Clinton administration counter terrorism advisor Richard Clarke and former national security advisor Sandy Berger also noted the facilities alleged ties with the former Iraqi government. Clarke also cited Iraq’s $199,000 contract with al Shifa for veterinary medicine under the UN’s Oil for Food Program.

Officials later acknowledged, however,  that the evidence that prompted President Clinton to order the missile strike on the Shifa plant was not as solid as first portrayed. Indeed, officials later said that there was no proof that the plant had been manufacturing or storing nerve gas, as initially suspected by the Americans, or had been linked to Osama bin Laden, who was a resident of Khartoum in the 1980s. [3]

However, a Clinton State Department official had stated that a money manager for Bin Laden had claimed that Bin Laden had, indeed, invested in Al Shifa. And that the Al Shifa manager even lived in the same Sudan house Bin Laden himself had previously lived in.[4]

The U.S. State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research wrote a report in 1999 questioning the attack on the factory, suggesting that the connection to bin Laden was not accurate; James Risen reported in the New York Times:  Now, the analysts renewed their doubts and told Assistant Secretary of State Phyllis Oakley that the C.I.A.’s evidence on which the attack was based was inadequate. Ms. Oakley asked them to double-check; perhaps there was some intelligence they had not yet seen. The answer came back quickly: There was no additional evidence. Ms. Oakley called a meeting of key aides and a consensus emerged: Contrary to what the Administration was saying, the case tying Al Shifa to Mr. bin Laden or to chemical weapons was weak. [5] The Chairman of El Shifa Pharmaceutical Industries, who is critical of the Sudanese government, more recently told reporters,  I had inventories of every chemical and records of every employee’s history. There were no such [nerve gas] chemicals being made here. [6]

Nonetheless, Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William Cohen testified to the 9/11 Commission in 2004, characterizing Al Shifa as a  WMD-related facility , which played a  chemical weapons role  such as to pose a risk that it, with the help of the Iraqi chemical weapons program connections he also testified to, might help Al Qaeda get chemical weapons technology.[7]

Sudan has since invited the U.S. to conduct chemical tests at the site for evidence to support its claim that the plant might have been a chemical weapons factory; so far, the U.S. has refused the invitation to investigate. Nevertheless, the U.S. has refused to officially apologize for the attacks, suggesting that some privately still suspect that chemical weapons activity existed there.[3]

The Khartoum attack was noted for its outstanding precision, as successive missiles all but leveled the Al-Shifa works with minimal damage to surrounding areas, although one person was killed and ten wounded in the attack.

Directly after the strike the Sudanese government demanded that the Security Council conduct an investigation of the site to determine if it had been used to produce chemical weapons or precursors. Such an investigation was from the start opposed by the US. Nor has USA ever let an independent laboratory analyze the sample allegedly containing EMPTA. Michael Barletta concludes that there is no evidence the al-Shifa factory was ever involved in production of chemical weapons, and it is known that many of the initial US allegations were wrong.[1]

Consequences

Noam Chomsky has argued that the bombing of Al-Shifa was a horrendous crime committed by the United States Government that resulted in the deaths of several hundreds of thousands of Sudanese people from treatable diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis because they were deprived of medicines manufactured at the plant.  Insofar as such consequences ensued, we may compare the crime in Sudan to the assassination of Lumumba, which helped plunge the Congo into decades of slaughter, still continuing, or the overthrow of the democratic government of Guatemala in 1954, which led to 40 years of hideous atrocities; and all too many others like it. [8]

Germany’s ambassador to Sudan from 1996 to 2000, Werner Daum, wrote an article in which he called  several tens of thousands of deaths  of Sudanese civilians caused by a medicine shortage a  reasonable guess .[9] The regional director of the Near East Foundation, who had field experience in the Sudan, published in the Boston Globe another article with the same estimate.

These estimates were disputed by Keith Windschuttle and by Leo Casey, who said the figures were  fabricated out of whole cloth .[10][11] Windschuttle claimed that Daum  had done no research into the matter  and that  the reports of the Sudanese operations of the several Western aid agencies, including Oxfam, Médecins sans Frontières, and Norwegian People’s Aid, who have been operating in this region for decades, will not find any evidence of an unusual increase in the death toll at the time.
The factory was in fact a principal source of Sudan’s anti-malaria and veterinary drugs.[12] Human Rights Watch reported that the bombing had the unintended effect of stopping relief efforts aimed at supplying food to areas of Sudan gripped by famine caused by that country’s ongoing civil war. Many of these agencies had been wholly or partially manned by Americans who subsequently evacuated the country out of fear of retaliation spurred by negative responses by the Sudanese government. A letter by that agency to President Clinton stated  many relief efforts have been postponed indefinitely, including a crucial one run by the U.S.-based International Rescue Committee where more than fifty southerners are dying daily .[13]

Criticism

Outspoken Clinton critic Christopher Hitchens wrote that the factory  could not have been folded like a tent and spirited away in a day or so. And the United States has diplomatic relations with Sudan. … Well then, what was the hurry? … There is really only one possible answer to that question. Clinton needed to look ‘presidential’ for a day. [14]

The 9/11 Commission Report evaluated such so-called  Wag the Dog  theories (the strikes being motivated to deflect attention from domestic, political troubles), and found no reason to believe them, nor disbelieve the testimony and assertions of former President Clinton, former Vice President Gore, CIA Chief Tenet, nor former security advisors Berger and Clarke that the destruction of Al Shifa was still, as of 2004, a justifible national security target. Page 118

The U.S. Justice Department, under President George W. Bush, produced an alleged al-Qaeda defector as a witness on February 13, 2001, in its ongoing case against Osama Bin Laden. The witness, Jamal Ahmad al-Fadl, testified that Al Qaeda operatives he was involved with had been engaged in manufacturing chemical weapons in Khartoum, Sudan, around 1993 or 1994. Page 524

According to The Guardian,  The factory’s owner, Salah Idris, vigorously denied that he or the factory had any link with such weapons or any terrorist group. He is now suing the US government for £35 million after hiring experts to show that the plant made only medicines. Despite growing support for Idris’s case in the US and Britain, Washington refuses to retract any of its claims and is contesting the lawsuit. [15]

The Sudanese government wants the plant preserved in its destroyed condition as a reminder of the American attack and also offered an open door to the U.S. for chemical testing at the site, however, the U.S. refused the invitation. Sudan has asked the U.S. for an apology for the attack but the U.S. has refused on the grounds it has not ruled out the possibility the plant had some connection to chemical weapons development. [1]

The bombing of the al-Shifa factory resurfaced in the news in April, 2006, due to the firing of former CIA analyst Mary O’Neil McCarthy. McCarthy was against the bombing of the factory in 1998, and had written a formal letter of protest to President Clinton. According to former CIA analyst Michael Scheuer, she had voiced doubts that the factory had ties to al Qaeda or was producing chemical weapons. The New York Times reported:  In the case of the Al Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, Sudan, her concerns may have been well-founded. Sudanese officials and the plant’s owner denied any connection to Al Qaeda. In the aftermath of the attack, the internal White House debate over whether the intelligence reports about the plant were accurate spilled into the press. Eventually, Clinton administration officials conceded that the hardest evidence used to justify striking the plant was a single soil sample that seemed to indicate the presence of a chemical used in making VX gas. [16]

Responsibility

Thomas Joscelyn quotes Daniel Benjamin, a former NSC staffer:  The report of the 9/11 Commission notes that the National Security staff reviewed the intelligence in April 2000 and concluded that the CIA’s assessment of its intelligence on bin Laden and al-Shifa had been valid; the memo to Clinton on this was cosigned by Richard Clarke and Mary McCarthy, the NSC senior director for intelligence programs, who opposed the bombing of al-Shifa in 1998. The report also notes that in their testimony before the commission, Al Gore, Sandy Berger, George Tenet, and Richard Clarke all stood by the decision to bomb al-Shifa.  [2]

Former Secretary of Defense Cohen defended, in his testimony to the 9/11 Commission in 2004, along with other cited Clinton security cabinet members in their separate 9/11 Commission testimony, the decision to destroy Al Shifa.:  At the time, the intelligence community at the highest level repeatedly assured us that  it never gets better than this  in terms of confidence in an intelligence conclusion regarding a hard target. There was a good reason for this confidence, including multiple, reinforcing elements of information ranging from links that the organization that built the facility had both with Bin Laden and with the leadership of the Iraqi chemical weapons program; extraordinary security when the facility was constructed; physical evidence from the site; and other information from HUMINT and technical sources. Given what we knew regarding terrorists’ interest in acquiring and using chemical weapons against Americans, and given the intelligence assessment provided us regarding the al-Shifa facility, I continue to believe that destroying it was the right decision. Page 14

References

1. ^ a b Barletta, Michael (Fall 1998).  Chemical Weapons in the Sudan: Allegations and Evidence  (PDF). The Nonproliferation Review: 115-136. http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/npr/vol06/61/barlet61.pdf.
2. ^ Noah, Timothy (March 31, 2004).  Khartoum Revisited, Part 2 . Slate. http://slate.msn.com/id/2098102/.
3. ^ a b Lacey, Marc (October 20, 2005).  Look at the Place  Sudan Says, ‘Say Sorry,’ but U.S. Won’t . The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/20/international/africa/20khartoum.html.
4. ^  U.S. claims more evidence linking Sudanese plant to chemical weapons . CNN. September 1, 1998. http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/africa/9809/01/sudan.plant/.
5. ^ Risen, James (October 27, 1999).  To Bomb Sudan Plant, or Not: A Year Later, Debates Rankle  (archived). The New York Times (Cornell University). http://web.archive.org/web/20000831005711/http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/sudbous.htm.
6. ^ McLaughlin, Abraham (January 26, 2004).  Sudan shifts from pariah to partner . The Christian Science Monitor. http://www.christiansciencemonitor.com/2004/0126/p01s05-woaf.html.
7. ^ Cohen, William S. (March 23, 2004).  Statement to The National Commission On Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States  (PDF). http://www.9-11commission.gov/hearings/hearing8/cohen_statement.pdf.
8. ^ Chomsky, Noam.  9-11 , Seven Stories Pres, 2001
9. ^ Daum, Werner.  Universalism and the West , The Future of War, Vol. 23, Summer 2001
10. ^ A Rejoinder to Chomsky’s  Reply to Casey  by Leo Casey
11. ^ Second Reply to Casey by Noam Chomsky Zmag, October 2001
12. ^ The CBW Conventions Bulletin December 1998
13. ^ Letter to Clinton Urges Sudan Factory Inspection Human Rights Watch, September 15, 1998
14. ^  They bomb pharmacies, don’t they? , Salon.com
15. ^ Antony Barnett and Conal Walsh,  ‘Terror’ link TVs guard UK,  The Guardian (14 October 2001).
16. ^ David S. Cloud,  Colleagues Say C.I.A. Analyst Played by the Rules,  New York Times (23 April 2006).

External links

* A series of pictures of the Al-Shifa factory
* Monterey Institute of International Studies links to related sites
* Chemical Weapons in the Sudan. Allegations and Evidence
* The CIA in Khartoum by John Ryle – Reply by Gary Wills New York Review of Books
* The New McCarthyism
* US Terrorism in Sudan The Bombing of Al-Shifa and its Strategic Role in U.S.-Sudan Relations

Coordinates: 15E38?45?N 32E33?41?E? / ?15.64583EN 32.56139EE? / 15.64583; 32.56139
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_pharmaceutical_factory
Categories: History of Sudan | Clinton administration controversies | Khartoum | Al-Qaeda | Chemical warfare

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_pharmaceutical_factory

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Operation CHASE
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation CHASE (Cut Holes and Sink ‘Em) was a United States Department of Defense program that involved the disposal of unwanted munitions at sea from May 1964 into the early 1970s.[1]

The disposal program involved loading old munitions onto ships which were then slated to be scuttled once they were up to 250 miles off shore.[2][3] While most of the sinkings involved ships loaded with conventional weapons there were four which involved chemical weapons.[2] The chemical weapons disposal site was a three mile (5 km) area of the Atlantic Ocean between the coast of the U.S. state of Florida and the Bahamas.[4] The CHASE program was predated by United States Army disposal of 8000 tons of mustard and lewisite chemical warfare gas aboard the scuttled SS William C. Ralston in April 1958.[1][5] These ships were sunk by having Explosive Ordnance Demolition (EOD) teams open sea cocks on the ship after arrival at the disposal point.[1] The typical Liberty ship sank about three hours after the sea cocks were opened.[1]

Contents

* 1 Operations
o 1.1 CHASE 1
o 1.2 CHASE 2
o 1.3 CHASE 3
o 1.4 CHASE 4
o 1.5 CHASE 5
o 1.6 CHASE 6
o 1.7 CHASE 7
o 1.8 CHASE 8
o 1.9 CHASE 9
o 1.10 CHASE 10
o 1.11 CHASE 11
o 1.12 CHASE 12
* 2 Aftermath
* 3 See also
* 4 References

Operations
CHASE 1

The mothballed C-3 Liberty ship John F. Shafroth was taken from the National Defense Reserve Fleet at Suisun Bay and towed to the Concord Naval Weapons Station for stripping and loading.[1] A major fraction of the munitions in CHASE 1 was Bofors 40 mm gun ammunition from the Naval Ammunition Depot at Hastings, Nebraska.[1] CHASE 1 also included bombs, torpedo warheads, Naval mines, cartridges, projectiles, fuzes, detonators, boosters, overage UGM-27 Polaris motors, and a quantity of contaminated cake mix an Army court had ordered dumped at sea.[1] Shafroth was sunk 47 miles off San Francisco on 23 July 1964 with 9799 tons of munitions.[1]

CHASE 2

Village was loaded with 7348 short tons of munitions at the Naval Weapons Station Earle and towed to a deep-water dump site on 17 September 1964.[1] There were three large and unexpected detonations five minutes after Village slipped beneath the surface.[1] An oil slick and some debris appeared on the surface.[1] The explosion registered on seismic equipment all over the world.[1] Inquiries were received regarding seismic activity off the east coast of the United States, and the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) expressed interest in measuring the differences between seismic shocks and underwater explosive detonations to detect underwater nuclear detonations then banned by treaty.[1]

CHASE 3

Coastal Mariner was loaded with 4040 short tons of munitions at the Naval Weapons Station Earle.[1] The munitions included 512 tons of actual explosives.[1] Four SOFAR bombs were packed in the explosives cargo hold with booster charges of 500 pounds of TNT to detonate the cargo at a depth of 1000 feet (300 meters). The United States Coast Guard issued a notice to mariners and the United States Department of Fish and Wildlife and the United States Bureau of Commercial Fisheries sent observers.[1] The explosives detonated seventeen seconds after Coastal Mariner slipped below the surface on 14 July 1965.[1] The detonation created a 600-foot (200 meter) water spout, but was not deep enough to be recorded on seismic instruments.[1]

CHASE 4

Santiago Iglesias was loaded with 8715 tons of munitions at the Naval Weapons Station Earle, rigged for detonation at 1000 feet (300 meters), and detonated 31 seconds after sinking on 16 September 1965.[1]

CHASE 5

Isaac Van Zandt was loaded with 8000 tons of munitions (including 400 tons of high explosives) at the Naval Base Kitsap and rigged for detonation at 4000 feet (1.2 kilometers).[1] On 23 May 1966 the tow cable parted en route to the planned disposal area.[1] Navy tugs USS Tatnuck (ATA-195) and USS Koka (ATA-185) recovered the tow within six hours, but the location of sinking was changed by the delay.[1]

CHASE 6

Horace Greeley was loaded at the Naval Weapons Station Earle, rigged for detonation at 4000 feet (1.2 kilometers), and detonated on 28 July 1966.[1]

CHASE 7

Michael J. Monahan was loaded with overage UGM-27 Polaris motors at the Naval Weapons Station Charleston and sunk without detonation on 30 April 1967.[1]

CHASE 8

The first chemical weapons disposal via the program was in 1967 and designated CHASE 8. CHASE 8 disposed of mustard gas and GB-filled M-55 rockets.

CHASE 9

Eric C. Gibson was sunk on 15 June 1967.[1]

CHASE 10

CHASE 10 dumped 3,000 tons of United States Army nerve agent filled rockets encased in concrete vaults.[2] Public controversy delayed CHASE 10 disposal until August 1970. Public awareness of operation CHASE 10 was increased by mass media reporting following delivery of information from the Pentagon to the office of U.S. Representative Richard McCarthy in 1969.[4] Both American television and print media followed the story with heavy coverage. In 1970, 58 separate reports were aired on the three major network news programs on NBC, ABC and CBS concerning Operation CHASE. Similarly, The New York Times included Operation CHASE coverage in 42 separate issues during 1970, 21 of those in the month of August.[4]

CHASE 11

CHASE 11 occurred in June 1968 and disposed of United States Army GB and VX, all sealed in tin containers.

CHASE 12

CHASE 12, in August 1968, again disposed of United States Army mustard agent and was numerically (although not chronologically) the final mission to dispose of chemical weapons.

Aftermath

Operation CHASE was exposed to the public during a time when the Army was under increasing public criticism, especially the Army’s Chemical Corps.[3] CHASE was one of the incidents which led to the near-disbanding of the Chemical Corps in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. Concerns were raised over the programs effect on the ocean environment as well as the risk of chemical weapons washing up on shore.[3] The concerns led to the Marine Protection, Research, and Sanctuaries Act in 1972, which prohibited future such missions.[2]

See also

* Dugway sheep incident

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Kurak, Steve  Operation Chase  United States Naval Institute Proceedings September 1967 pp. 40-46
2. ^ a b c d Pike, John.  Operation CHASE , 27 April 2005, Globalsecurity.org. Retrieved 26 November 2007.
3. ^ a b c Mauroni, Al.  The US Army Chemical Corps: Past, Present, and Future , Army Historical Founation. Retrieved 26 November 2007.
4. ^ a b c Wagner, Travis.  Hazardous Waste: Evolution of a National Environmental Problem , (Project Muse), Journal of Policy History, 16.4 (2004) pp. 306-331. Retrieved 26 November 2007.
5. ^ Kraft, James C.  The Last Triple Expander  United States Naval Institute Proceedings February 1977 p. 67

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHASE
Categories: Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Chemical weapons demilitarization | Ocean pollution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHASE

***

Operation Geranium
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Geranium was a U.S. Army mission that dumped more than 3,000 tons of the chemical agent lewisite into the ocean off the Florida coast in 1948.

Contents
* 1 Operation
* 2 Dumping
* 3 See also
* 4 References
* 5 External links

Operation

Operation Geranium occurred from 15 – 20 December 1948[1] and involved the dumping of approximately 3,150 tons of stockpiled lewisite into the Atlantic Ocean.[2][3][1]  Geranium  was so called because lewisite has an odor reminiscent of geraniums.[2][3] The materials dumped consisted of two types of bulk container, 60 were of the M14 variety, and another 3,700 bulk containers were dumped as well.[1] The lewisite was shipped to Charleston from the Gulf Chemical Warfare Depot.[2][3] The lewisite was then loaded aboard a World War II merchant ship, the SS Joshua Alexander.[3] The lewisite was then dumped, at sea, 300 miles off the coast of Florida.[1]

Dumping

Sea dumping was used by the U.S. Army to dispose of World War II lewisite stocks prior to Geranium.[3] One such dumping operation was reported on by The New York Times in 1946, 10,000 tons of lewisite was dumped about 160 miles off the Charleston, South Carolina coast.[2] Before Operation Geranium, however, lewisite dumping was mostly accomplished by simply dropping loose munitions overboard.[3] In this operation, the Army loaded the merchant hulk with the lewisite containers, sailed the vessel out to sea and then scuttled the ship with the muntions aboard.[3] Most of the 20,000 tons of lewisite produced during World War II by the U.S. was disposed of by dumping at sea.[2] This method of operation and disposal was not used again for some time, though the Army did employ it again.[3]

See also

* Operation CHASE

References

1. ^ a b c d Brankowitz, William R. Summary of Some Chemical Munitions Sea Dumps by the United States , Meeting notes, 30 January 1989, p. 38, accessed 7 January 2009.
2. ^ a b c d e Vilensky, Joel A. Dew of Death: The Story of Lewisite, America’s World War I Weapon of Mass Destruction. (Google Books), Indiana University Press, 2005, p. 109, (ISBN 0253346126).
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Brankowitz, William R.  Chemical Weapons Movement History Compilation , p. 9 (p. 13 in PDF), Office of the Program Manager for Chemical Munitions (Demilitarization and Binary) (Provisional), Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, 27 April 1987, accessed 7 January 2009.

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot

External links

* Map of significant U.S. chemical agent dumps (Operation Geranium marked at F1)

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Geranium
Categories: Chemical weapons demilitarization | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Ocean pollution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Geranium

***

Granite Peak Installation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Granite Peak Installation (GPI), also known as Granite Peak Range, was a U.S. biological weapons testing facility located on 250 square miles (650 km2) of Dugway Proving Ground in Utah. GPI was a sub-installation of Dugway but had its own facilities, including utilities. Established in 1943, GPI was deactivated with the end of World War II.

Contents

* 1 History
* 2 Mission
o 2.1 Overview
o 2.2 Testing
* 3 Facilities
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes
* 6 References

History

In October 1943, because of the limitations of a 2,000-acre (8.1 km2) site at Horn Island off the coast Mississippi a biological weapons testing site was established at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.[1][2] Known as the Granite Peak Installation, the site was activated as the U.S. military’s principal bio-weapons testing site beginning in June 1944.[2][3][1] Construction on the massive facilities required by GPI began on July 10, 1944 and continued for seven months, finally ending on January 30, 1945.[2] The total cost for the development and construction of GPI was around $1.3 million.[4] When WWII ended in 1945 GPI was deactivated and closed.[5]

Mission
Overview

GPI was the U.S. bio-weapons program’s main testing site. Granite Peak was a sub-installation of Dugway Proving Ground and many of GPI’s administrative task were overseen by the post commander at Dugway.[1] Personnel stationed at the main Dugway grounds cooperated with tests at GPI. For example, air missions were flown by Dugway detachments, and weather forecast data was also provided by personnel at Dugway.[1] Despite the assistance from Dugway, GPI maintained control over all technical aspects of its operations and testing.[1] GPI was overseen by the Army Special Projects Division.[6]

Testing

One weapon tested was a 91 pound bomb containing  vegetable killer acid , known as VKA (2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid)[7][8] Testing of other munitions continued from 1943-1945, including tests using the causal agent for anthrax.[5] The M33 cluster bomb was used in a series of tests from August-October 1952 at GPI.[9] The Army Chemical Corps exposed over 11,000 guinea pigs to Brucella suis via air-dropped M33s.[9] The guinea pig trials caused one Chemical Corps general to remark,  Now we know what to do if we ever go to war against guinea pigs [9]

Facilities

GPI was a 250-square-mile (650 km2) area of Dugway that was located 30 miles (48 km) from the nearest active area, known as  Dog Area .[10] Because of this isolation the installation developed many of its own facilities, separate from the main facilities at Dugway.[10] GPI had its own utilities, laboratories, living quarters and medical facility.[10] By 1985 only two structures remained extant from the Granite Peak Installation, a pump house and an underground  igloo storage building .[10]

Transportation resources at GPI included an airplane landing strip and 22 miles (35 km) of surfaced roads.[2] Utilities at the site included, sewer and septic systems, power plants, and delivery systems for electricity, water and steam.[2] The base was much larger than the BW site at Horn Island.[2]

See also

* Fort Detrick
* Fort Terry
* Horn Island Testing Station
* Granite Peak

Notes

1. ^ a b c d e Pike, John E. (webmaster).  Granite Peak Range , globalsecurity.org, April 26, 2005, accessed January 13, 2009.
2. ^ a b c d e f Harris, Sheldon H. Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up, (Google Books), Routledge, 1994, pp. 155-56, (ISBN 0415091055).
3. ^ Whitby, Simon M. Biological Warfare Against Crops, (Google Books), Macmillan, 2002, pp. 73-74, (ISBN 0333920856).
4. ^ Regis, Ed. The Biology of Doom, p. 95.
5. ^ a b Isla, Nicolas.  Transparency in past offensive biological weapon programmes: An analysis of Confidence Building Measure Form F 1992-2003 , Hamburg Center for Biological Arms Control, Occasional Paper No. 1, June 2006, p. 26, accessed January 13, 2009.
6. ^ Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism, (Google Books), Columbia University Press, 2005, pp. 63-65, (ISBN 0231129424).
7. ^ Smart, Jeffery K. Medical Aspects of Chemical and Biological Warfare: Chapter 2 – History of Chemical and Biological Warfare: An American Perspective, (PDF: p. 44 – p. 36 in PDF), Borden Institute, Textbooks of Military Medicine, PDF via Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base, accessed December 28, 2008.
8. ^ Regis, Ed. The Biology of Doom, pp. 140-41.
9. ^ a b c Regis, Ed. The Biology of Doom, pp. 143-56.
10. ^ a b c d Buchanan, David G. and Johnson John P.  Dugway Proving Ground – Written and Historical Narrative , Historic American Engineering Record, Library of Congress, HAER #: UT-35, 1984, accessed January 13, 2009.

References

* Regis, Ed. The Biology of Doom: The History of America’s Secret Germ Warfare Project, (Google Books), Macmillan, 2000, (ISBN 080505765X).

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granite_Peak_Installation
Categories: Biological warfare facilities | Military in Utah | Former United States Army research facilities

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granite_Peak_Installation

***

Operation LAC
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation LAC (Large Area Coverage), was a U.S. Army Chemical Corps operation 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.

Contents

* 1 Earlier tests
* 2 Operation
* 3 Specific tests
* 4 Scope
* 5 Risks and issues
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 Further reading

Earlier tests

There were tests that occurred prior to the first spraying affiliated with Operation LAC. The Army admitted to spraying in Minnesota locations from 1953 into the mid-1960s.[1]

Operation

Operation LAC was undertaken in 1957 and 1958 by the U.S. Army Chemical Corps.[2] Principally, the operation involved spraying large areas with zinc cadmium sulfide.[1] The U.S. Air Force loaned the Army a C-119,  Flying Boxcar , and it was used to disperse zinc cadmium sulfide by the ton in the atmosphere over the United States.[3] The first test occurred on December 2, 1957 along a path from South Dakota to International Falls, Minnesota.[4]

The tests were designed to determine the dispersion and geographic range of biological or chemical agents.[3] Stations on the ground tracked the fluorescent zinc cadmium sulfide particles.[3] During the first test and subsequently, much of the material dispersed ended up being carried by winds into Canada.[4] However, as was the case in the first test, particles were detected up to 1,200 miles away from their drop point.[3][4] A typical flight line covering 400 miles would release 5,000 pounds of zinc cadmium sulfide and in fiscal year 1958 around 100 hours were spent in flight for LAC.[4] That flight time included four runs of various lengths, one of which was 1,400 miles.[4]

Specific tests

The December 2, 1957 test was incomplete due to a mass of cold air coming down from Canada.[4] It carried the particles from their drop point and then took a turn northeast, taking most of the particles into Canada with it. Military operators considered the test a partial success because some of the particles were detected 1,200 miles away, at a station in New York state.[4] A February 1958 test at Dugway Proving Ground ended similarly. Another Canadian air mass swept through and carried the particles into the Gulf of Mexico.[4] Two other tests, one along a path from Toledo, Ohio to Abilene, Texas, and another from Detroit, to Springfield, Illinois, to Goodland, Kansas, showed that agents dispersed through this aerial method could achieve widespread coverage when particles were detected on both sides of the flight paths.[4]

Scope
According to Leonard A. Cole, an Army Chemical Corps document titled  Summary of Major Events and Problems  (1958) described the scope of Operation LAC. Cole stated that the document outlined that the tests were the largest ever undertaken by the Chemical Corps and that the test area stretched from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean, and from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.[4] Other sources describe the scope of LAC varyingly, examples include,  Midwestern United States ,[3] and  the states east of the Rockies .[1] Specific locations are mentioned as well. Some of those include: a path from South Dakota to Minneapolis, Minnesota,[2]Dugway Proving Ground, Corpus Christi, Texas, north-central Texas, and the San Francisco Bay area.[1]

Risks and issues

Though anecdotal evidence[1][5] exists of ZnCdS having adverse health effects as a result of LAC, a 1997 report refuted this. The U.S. National Research Council stated, in part,  After an exhaustive, independent review requested by Congress, we have found no evidence that exposure to zinc cadmium sulfide at these levels could cause people to become sick. [6] Still, the use of ZnCdS remains controversial and critics such as Cole have accused the Army of  literally using the country as an experimental laboratory .[7]

See also

* Operation Dew

References

1. ^ a b c d e LeBaron, Wayne. America’s Nuclear Legacy, (Google Books), Nova Publishers, 1998, p. 83–84, (ISBN 1560725567).
2. ^ a b Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-Sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism, (Google Books), Columbia University Press, 2005, p. 108, (ISBN 0231129424).
3. ^ a b c d e Novick, Lloyd F. and Marr, John S. Public Health Issues Disaster Preparedness: Focus on Bioterrorism, (Google Books), Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2003, p. 89, (ISBN 0763725005).
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Cole, Leonard A., The Eleventh Plague, (Google Books), Macmillan, 2002, pp. 19–23, (ISBN 0805072144).
5. ^ Carlton, Jim.  Years Ago, The Military Sprayed Germs on U.S. Cities , Wall Street Journal, October 22, 2001, via American Patriot Friends Network, accessed November 13, 2008.
6. ^ Leary, Warren E.  Secret Army Chemical Tests Did Not Harm Health, Report Says, The New York Times, May 15, 1997, accessed November 13, 2008.
7. ^ Moreno, Jonathan D. Undue Risk: Secret State Experiments on Humans, (Google Books), Routledge, 2001, p. 235, (ISBN 0415928354).

Further reading

* Subcommittee on Zinc Cadmium Sulfide, U.S. National Research Council, Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion, (Google Books), National Academies Press, 1997, (ISBN 0309057833).

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_LAC
Categories: Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Biological warfare | Chemical warfare | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_LAC

***

Category:Human experimentation in the United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pages in category  Human experimentation in the United States
The following 33 pages are in this category, out of 33 total. This list may not reflect recent changes (learn more).
A

* Addiction Research Center

B

* Operation Big Buzz
* Harold Blauer
* Peter Buxtun

C

* Henry Cotton (doctor)

D

* Operation Dew

E

* Edgewood Arsenal experiments
F

* Walter E. Fernald State School

H

* Hofling hospital experiment
* Human radiation experiments

J

* Wendell Johnson

L

* Operation LAC
* Jesse William Lazear

M

* Clara Maass
* Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine
* Operation May Day
* Medical Apartheid
* Milgram experiment
* Project MKULTRA

O

* Oklahoma City sonic boom tests
* Operation Top Hat
* David Orlikow

P

* The Plutonium Files
* Project 112
* Project SHAD

R

* Walter Reed

S
* Eugene Saenger
* Richard Seed
* Stanford prison experiment
* Stateville Penitentiary Malaria Study

T

* Tuskegee syphilis experiment

W

* Operation Whitecoat
* Willowbrook State School

Categories: Human experimentation by country | Torture in the United States | Human rights in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Human_experimentation_in_the_United_States

***

Addiction Research Center
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Addiction Research Center is an unprecedented center of addiction research that was founded in 1948. It was originally based in Lexington, Kentucky, housed on the rural campus of a prison-hospital called Narco, and run jointly with the Federal Bureau of Prisons.[1] It became part of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in 1974. It was relocated to Baltimore in 1979.[2]

References

1. ^ http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/abstract/112579635/ABSTRACT?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0
2. ^ History of the Addiction Research Center

Stub icon     This article about an organization in the United States is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
v • d • e
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addiction_Research_Center
Categories: Addiction and substance abuse organizations | LSD | Human experimentation in the United States | United States organization stubs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addiction_Research_Center

***
Operation Big Buzz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Big Buzz was a U.S. military entomological warfare field test conducted in the U.S. state of Georgia in 1955. The tests involved dispersing over 300,000 yellow fever mosquitoes from aircraft and through ground dispersal methods.

Contents

* 1 Operation
* 2 Results
* 3 See also
* 4 References

Operation

Operation Big Buzz occurred in May 1955 in the U.S. State of Georgia. The operation was a field test designed to determine the feasibility of producing, storing, loading into munitions, and dispersing from aircraft the yellow fever mosquito (Aedes aegypti).[1] The second goal of the operation was to determine whether the mosquitoes would survive their dispersion and seek meals on the ground.[1] Around 330,000 uninfected mosquitoes were dropped from aircraft in E14 bombs and dispersed from the ground. In total about one million female mosquitoes were bred for the testing,[2] remaining mosquitoes were used in munitions loading and storage tests.[1] Those mosquitoes that were air-dispersed were dropped from airplanes 91 meters above the ground, spreading out on their own and due to the wind.[1]

Results

Mosquitoes were collected as far away as 610 meters from the release site.[1] They were also active in seeking blood meals from humans and guinea pigs.[1]

See also

* Operation Big Itch
* Operation Drop Kick
* Operation May Day

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Rose, William H.  An Evaluation of Entomological Warfare as as Potential Danger to the United States and European NATO Nations , U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, March 1981, via thesmokinggun.com, accessed December 27, 2008.
2. ^ Novick, Lloyd and Marr, John S. Public Health Issues Disaster Preparedness, (Google Books), Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2001, p. 89, (ISBN 0763725005).

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Big_Buzz
Categories: Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Biological warfare | Human experimentation in the United States | Military in Georgia (U.S. state)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Big_Buzz

***

Operation Big Itch
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Big Itch was a U.S. entomological warfare field test using uninfected fleas to determine their coverage and survivability as a vector for biological agents.[1] The tests were conducted at Dugway Proving Ground in 1954.

Contents

* 1 Operation
* 2 Results
* 3 See also
* 4 Notes

Operation

Operation Big Itch was a September 1954 series of tests at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.[2][3] The tests were designed to determine coverage patterns and survivability of the tropical rat flea (Xenopsylla cheopis) for use in biological warfare as disease vector.[3] The fleas used in these trials were not infected by any biological agent.[4] The fleas were loaded into two types of munitions and dropped from the air.[4] The E14 bomb and E23 bomb, which could be clustered into the E86 cluster bomb and E77 bomb, respectively.[3] When the cluster bombs reached 2,000 or 1,000 feet (600 or 300 m) the bomblets would drop via parachute, disseminating their vector.[3]

The E14 was designed to hold 100,000 fleas and the E23 was designed to hold 200,000 fleas but the E23 failed in over half of the preliminary Big Itch tests.[3] E23s malfunctioned during testing and the fleas were released into the aircraft where they bit the pilot, bombadier and an observer.[4] As a result, the remaining Big Itch tests were conducted using only the smaller capacity E14.[3] Guinea pigs were used as test subjects and placed around a 660-yard (600 m) circular grid.[3]

Results

Big Itch proved successful,[3][5] the tests showed that not only could the fleas survive the drop from an airplane but they also soon attached themselves to hosts.[6] The weapon proved able to cover a battalion-sized target area and disrupt operations for up to one day.[3] The one-day limit was due to the activity of the fleas; the air dropped fleas were only active for about 24 hours.[2]

See also

* Operation Big Buzz
* Operation Drop Kick
* Operation May Day

Notes

1. ^ Bubonic plague is an infection of the lymphatic system, usually resulting from the bite of an infected flea.
2. ^ a b Rose, William H.  An Evaluation of Entomological Warfare as as Potential Danger to the United States and European NATO Nations , U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, March 1981, via thesmokinggun.com, accessed December 25, 2008.
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Kirby, Reid.  Using the flea as weapon , (Web version via findarticles.com), Army Chemical Review, July 2005, accessed December 23, 2008.
4. ^ a b c Croddy, Eric and Wirtz, James J. Weapons of Mass Destruction: An Encyclopedia of Worldwide Policy, Technology, and History, (Google Books), ABC-CLIO, 2005, p. 304, (ISBN 1851094903).
5. ^ Novick, Lloyd and Marr, John S. Public Health Issues Disaster Preparedness, (Google Books), Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2001, p. 89, (ISBN 0763725005).
6. ^ Leeson, Kate.  Biological Weapons: Bioterrorism and the Public Health , Medical Association for the Prevention of War, 2000, p. 12, accessed December 25, 2008.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Big_Itch
Categories: Biological warfare | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Military in Utah

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Big_Itch

***

Operation Drop Kick
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Drop Kick[1] was a 1956 U.S. entomological warfare field testing program that deployed Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to carry a biological warfare agent. Operation Drop Kick apparently included a 1956 test in Savannah, Georgia, where uninfected mosquitoes were released in a residential neighborhood and another 1956 test in Avon Park Bombing Range, Florida, where 600,000 mosquitoes were released by plane[2].

The 1964 movie Dr. Strangelove also refers to an Operation Drop Kick [3].

See also

* Operation Big Buzz
* Operation Big Itch
* Operation May Day

References

1. ^ Rose, William H.  An Evaluation of Entomological Warfare as as Potential Danger to the United States and European NATO Nations , U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, March 1981, via thesmokinggun.com, accessed December 25, 2008.
2. ^ (1960-01-01)Summary of Major Events and Problems (Reports Control Symbol CSHIS-6). Technical Report United States Army Chemical Corps.
3. ^  Memorable quotes for Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb . http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/quotes. Retrieved 2008-12-28.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Drop_Kick
Categories: Biological warfare | Non-combat military operations involving the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Drop_Kick

***

Operation May Day
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation May Day was a series of entomological warfare (EW) tests conducted by the U.S. military in Savannah, Georgia in 1956.

Operation

Operation May Day involved a series of EW tests from April to November 1956. The tests were designed to reveal information about the dispersal of yellow fever mosquitoes in an urban area. The mosquitoes were released from ground level in Savannah, Georgia and then recovered using traps baited with dry ice. The operation was detailed in partially declassified U.S. Army report in 1981.[1]

See also

* Operation Big Buzz
* Operation Big Itch
* Operation Drop Kick

References

1. ^ Rose, William H.  An Evaluation of Entomological Warfare as as Potential Danger to the United States and European NATO Nations , U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, March 1981, via thesmokinggun.com, accessed December 25, 2008.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_May_Day
Categories: Biological warfare | Human experimentation in the United States | Savannah, Georgia | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Military in Georgia (U.S. state)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_May_Day

***

Harold Blauer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Harold Blauer (1910 – January 8, 1953) was an American tennis player who died as a result of injections of a mescaline derivative (code-named EA-1298) as part of Project MKULTRA, a covert CIA mind-control and chemical interrogation research program, run by the Office of Scientific Intelligence. Blauer had no knowledge of the experiment being performed on him, and after his death the experiment was covered up by the state of New York, U.S. Government, and the CIA for 22 years.[1]

Contents

* 1 Blauer’s treatment
* 2 Death
* 3 Malpractice lawsuit
* 4 Case reopened
* 5 See also
* 6 References

Blauer’s treatment

Blauer was voluntarily admitted to the New York State Psychiatric Institute (NYSPI) in December 1952 to be treated for depression following a divorce. Blauer was then taken from his room and told he would be receiving an injection. He demurred at first, but agreed reluctantly after being told it was a treatment for his depression.[2] After this and the next three injections, Blauer told medical staff that he did not want any more treatment because of the negative reactions he was experiencing. However, he was convinced after each injection to continue treatment after being threatened with commitment to a mental asylum.[3]

In reality, Blauer’s treatment was administered as a part of the top-secret army-funded Project Pelican, a part of Project MKULTRA. It was overseen by Dr. Paul H. Hoch, the director of experimental psychiatry at the NYSPI. Hoch secretly was collaborating with Dr. Amadeo Marrazzi, the chief of clinical research at the Army Chemical Corps. Fort Detrick’s Special Operations Division had made secret contacts with the NYSPI in order to develop biological weapons that could cause a range of effects from minor disablement to longer incapacitation and death. Blauer was unwittingly chosen as a test subject for one of these biological weapons.[4]

Death

Blauer’s fifth injection was 16 times stronger than any of the previous ones. After receiving it, his body stiffened, his eyes rolled, and he frothed at the mouth while his teeth clenched for two hours. Finally, he collapsed in a coma and died. His death certificate cited his death as  coronary arteriosclerosis; sudden death after intravenous injection of a mescaline derivative,  caused by a preexisting heart condition.[2][3]

Malpractice lawsuit

Blauer’s ex-wife filed a lawsuit for medical malpractice against the state of New York. While conferences between attorneys were taking place between the NYSPI, state of New York, army, and Department of Justice, the army took Blauer’s medical records out of state to avoid discovery and hid them in a safe, despite a court order ordering their production. During the trial, numerous false statements were made by the defense, such as citing preexisting heart conditions as the reason for his death.

The malpractice claim was settled for $18,000, despite New York’s attorney claiming it was worth at least $60,000. $6000 was secretly reimbursed to the state of New York later by the U.S. Government.[3][1]

Case reopened

In August 1975, the U.S. army contacted Blauer’s daughter, Elizabeth Barrett, and told her they had found Blauer’s case file locked in a safe. Barrett reopened the case, filing three consolidated lawsuits. The district court ruled that Blauer’s death was caused by the negligence of the United States, that the drugs given to Blauer had been inadequately tested in lab mice, and that the New York attorney had falsely claimed the drugs were from the Army Medical Corps to give the impression that they were a treatment for depression. On June 4 1987, the court entered a judgment against the United States for $702,044.00.[1]
See also

* Project MKULTRA

References

1. ^ a b c  Elizabeth Barrett, Individually and As Administratrix of Theestate of Harold Blauer, Deceased, Plaintiff, v. United States of America, Defendant.united States of America, Third-party Plaintiff-appellee, v. State of New York, Third-party Defendant-appellant . U.S. Court of Appeals. 1988-02-1988. http://cases.justia.com/us-court-of-appeals/F2/853/124/121222/. Retrieved 2009-03-17.
2. ^ a b Gutman, W.E. (2002).  The new Frankensteins . The Panama News. http://www.thepanamanews.com/pn/v_08/issue_13/science_02.html. Retrieved 2009-03-17.
3. ^ a b c Standler, Ronald (1999-05-08).  Nonconsensual Medical Experiments on Human Beings . http://www.rbs2.com/humres.htm. Retrieved 2009-03-17.
4. ^ Albarelli, H.P.; John Kelly (2001-07-06).  New Evidence in Army Scientist’s Death . WorldNet Daily. http://pollarchive.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=23489. Retrieved 2009-03-17.

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Blauer
Categories: 1910 births | 1953 deaths | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Blauer

***

Peter Buxtun
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Buxton media.jpg

Peter Buxtun (sometimes referred to as Peter Buxton) is a former employee of the United States Public Health Service who became known as the whistleblower responsible for ending the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment.

Buxtun, then a 27-year-old social worker and epidemiologist in San Francisco,[1] was hired by the Public Health Service in December 1965[2] to interview patients with sexually transmitted diseases; in the course of his duties, he learned of the Tuskegee Experiment from co-workers. He later said— I didn’t want to believe it. This was the Public Health Service. We didn’t do things like that. [1] In November 1966, he filed an official protest on ethical grounds with the Service’s Division of Venereal Diseases; this was rejected on the grounds that the Experiment was not yet complete. He filed another protest in November 1968; again, his concerns were ruled irrelevant.[3]

In 1972, Buxtun leaked information on the Tuskegee Experiment to Jean Heller of the Washington Star. Heller’s story exposing the Experiment was published on July 25, 1972; the Experiment was terminated shortly thereafter.[4] Buxtun subsequently testified at the ensuing Congressional hearing.

In May 1999, Buxtun attended the launch of a memorial center and public exhibit to the experiment in Tuskegee.[5]

References

1. ^ a b Heller, Jean (July 20, 1997).  The legacy of Tuskegee . St Petersburg Times: p. 1D.
2. ^ Rubin, Allen; Babbie, Earl R. (2005). Research Methods for Social Work. Thomson Wadsworth. p. 70. http://books.google.ca/books?id=eAdbEn-yZbcC&pg=PA70&lpg=PA70&dq=%22peter+buxtun%22+syphilis&source=web&ots=k9kE54DMeS&sig=WPZY3SohO7ZNJv6Oq2vC8JOI_58&hl=en#PPA70,M1.
3. ^ Thomas, Stephen B., PhD; Quinn, Sandra Crouse, MEd (November 1991).  The Tuskegee Syphilis Study, 1932 to 1972: Implications for HIV Education and AIDS Risk Education Programs in the Black Community . American Journal of Public Health (American Public Health Association) 81 (11): 1498–1505. ISSN 1541-0448. http://minority-health.pitt.edu/archive/00000393/01/The_Tuskegee_Syphilis_Study_1932_to.pdf. Retrieved 2008-03-06.
4. ^ Stryker, Jeff (13 April 1997).  Tuskegee’s long arm still touches a nerve . New York Times: p. 4.
5. ^  Center launched as training tool . Associated Press. May 17, 1999.

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Buxtun
Categories: American whistleblowers | Human experimentation in the United States | United States Public Health Service | Polish Americans | Living people

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Buxtun

***

Henry Cotton (doctor)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Henry Andrews Cotton, M.D. (1876–May 1933) was an American psychiatrist and the medical director of New Jersey State Hospital at Trenton (previously named New Jersey State Lunatic Asylum, now known as Trenton Psychiatric Hospital) in Trenton, New Jersey between 1907 and 1930. He embraced the concept of scientific medicine that was emerging among physicians at the turn of the twentieth century, which included a belief that insanity was the result of untreated infections in the body, and to treat them he directed his dental and medical staff to practice  surgical bacteriology  on the patients.[1]

Contents

* 1 Career
o 1.1 Surgical removal
o 1.2 Exaggerated cure rates and honors
o 1.3 Investigation and controversy
o 1.4 Retirement
* 2 References
* 3 Further reading
* 4 External links

Career

Henry A. Cotton had studied in Europe under Emil Kraepelin and Alois Alzheimer, considered the pioneers of the day, and was a student of Dr. Adolf Meyer of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, who dominated American psychiatry in the early 1900s. Based on the observation that patients with high fever often turn delusional or hallucinating, Meyer introduced the possibility of infections (then viewed as the cutting edge concept of scientific medicine) being a biological cause of behavioral abnormalities, in contrast to eugenic theories which emphasized heredity and to Freud’s theories of childhood traumas. Cotton would become the leading practitioner of the new approach in the United States.

After becoming medical director of Trenton State Hospital at the remarkable age of only 30, Henry A. Cotton began to institute many progressive ideas, such as abolishing mechanical restraints that had created nightmare conditions in asylums for hundreds of years and implementing daily staff meetings to discuss patient care.

Surgical removal

Cotton began to implement the emerging medical theory of infection-based psychological disorders by pulling patients’ teeth, as they were suspected of harboring infections. If this failed to cure a patient, he sought sources of infection in tonsils and sinuses and often a tonsillectomy was recommended as additional treatment. If a cure was not achieved after these procedures, other organs were suspected of harboring infection. Testicles, ovaries, gall bladders, stomachs, spleens, cervixes, and especially colons might be suspected as the focus of infection and removed surgically.[1]

Exaggerated cure rates and honors

This was before even rudimentary scientific methods such as control groups—much less double-blind experiments—existed, statistical methodology for applications in human behavior and medical research did not emerge during the lifetime of Cotton. He could only follow faulty methods to compile data, much of it allowing for projection of anticipated results. He reported wonderful success with his procedures, with cure rates of 85%; this, in conjunction with the feeling at the time that investigating such biological causes was the state of the art of medicine, brought him a great deal of attention, and worldwide praise. He was honored at medical institutions and associations in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Europe and asked to make presentations about his work and to share information with the others who practiced the same or similar methods. Patients, or their families, begged to be treated at Trenton, and those who could not, demanded that their own doctors treat them with these new wonder cures. The state acknowledged the savings in expenses to taxpayers from the new treatments and cures. In June 1922, the New York Times wrote in a review of Cotton’s published lectures:

At the State Hospital at Trenton, N.J., under the brilliant leadership of the medical director, Dr. Henry A. Cotton, there is on foot the most searching, aggressive, and profound scientific investigation that has yet been made of the whole field of mental and nervous disorders… there is hope, high hope… for the future.

Unfortunately, in an era before antibiotics surgery resulted in a very high rate of postoperative morbidity and mortality, largely from postoperative infection. Among his patients at this time was Margaret Fisher, daughter of wealthy and famed Yale economist Irving Fisher, who believed in the hygienic movement of the period. Diagnosed by physicians in Bloomingdale Asylum as schizophrenic, which was untreatable until the modern development of some pharmaceutical agents, Fisher had his daughter transferred to Trenton, however, because Cotton attributed her condition to a  marked retention of fecal matter in the cecal colon with marked enlargement of the colon in this area  for which she was subjected to a series of colonic surgeries before dying of a streptococcal infection in 1919. The danger of surgery was recognized by some patients in the institution, who, despite their mental illness, developed a very rational fear of the surgical procedures, some resisting violently as they were forced into the operating theater in complete contradiction of what are now commonly accepted medical ethics. A paternalistic attitude and the permission of the family of seriously insane patients was the basis of intervention at the time.

Differences of professional opinion existed among psychiatrists regarding focal sepsis as a cause of psychosis and not all believed in the benefits of surgical intervention to achieve cures. Meyer, head of the most respected psychiatric clinic and training institution for psychiatrists in the United States, at Johns Hopkins University, accepted the theory. He was encouraged by a like-minded member of the state board of trustees who oversaw Trenton State Hospital to provide an independent professional review of the work of Cotton’s staff. Meyer commissioned another of his former students who practiced psychiatry on his staff at the Phipps Clinic, Dr. Phyllis Greenacre, to critique Cotton’s work. Her study began in the fall of 1924 just after Meyer visited the hospital and privately had expressed concern about the statistical methods being applied to provide an assessment of Cotton’s work. Cotton’s staff made no effort to facilitate the study.

Investigation and controversy

From the outset, Greenacre’s reports were critical, with regard to both the hospital, which she felt was as unwholesome as the typical asylum, and Cotton, whom she found  singularly peculiar . She realized that the appearance and behavior of almost all of the psychotic patients was disturbing to her because their teeth had been removed, making it difficult for them to eat or speak. Further reports cast serious doubt on Cotton’s reported results; she found the staff records to be chaotic and the data to be internally contradictory. In 1925 criticism of the hospital reached the New Jersey State Senate, which launched an investigation with testimony from unhappy former patients and employees of the hospital. Countering the criticism, the trustees of the hospital confirmed their confidence in the staff and director, and presented extensive professional praise of the hospital and the procedures followed under the direction of Cotton, whom they considered a pioneer. On September 24, 1925 the New York Times stated that,  eminent physicians and surgeons testified that the New Jersey State Hospital for the Insane was the most progressive institution in the world for the care of the insane, and that the newer method of treating the insane by the removal of focal infection placed the institution in a unique position with respect to hospitals for the mentally ill  and related accolades given in support of Henry A. Cotton by many professionals and politicians.

Falling ill during the public hearing, some[who?] assert that Cotton suffered a nervous breakdown, diagnosed himself as suffering from several infected teeth, which he promptly had removed, pronounced himself cured, and returned to work. Soon Cotton opened a private hospital in Trenton which did a hugely lucrative business treating mentally ill members of rich families seeking the most modern treatments for their conditions. Meyer reassigned Greenacre without completing her report and resisted her efforts to complete the report. Admitting a shared belief in the possibility that focal sepsis might be the source of mental illness, Meyer never pressed his protege to confront the scientific analysis of the erroneous statistics the hospital staff provided to Cotton, his silence guaranteeing continuance of the practices. Later Cotton would occasionally admit to death rates as high as 30% in his published papers. It appears that the true death rates were closer to 45% and that Cotton never fully recognized the errors his staff made in analyzing his work.

Retirement

In October 1930 Cotton was retired from the state hospital and was appointed medical director emeritus. Although this ended the abdominal surgeries which were so dangerous before the discovery of antibiotics, the hospital continued to adhere to Cotton’s humane treatment guidelines and, to carry out his less risky medical procedures until the late 1950s. Henry A. Cotton continued to direct the staff at Charles Hospital until his death.

In the early 1930s Cotton’s rate of postoperative mortality began to be a matter of professional debate in the state department of institutions by some concerned that he intended to press to resume his position at the state hospital. Another report on Cotton’s work was begun in 1932 by Emil Frankel. He noted that he had seen Greenacre’s report and agreed with it substantially, but his report also failed to be completed.

Henry A. Cotton died suddenly of a heart attack in 1933 and was lauded in the New York Times and the local press, as well as international professional publications, for having been a pioneer seeking a better path for the treatment of the patients in mental hospitals.

References

1. ^ a b Ian Freckelton. Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine. (Book review), Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, Vol. 12, No. 2, 2005, pp. 435-438.

Further reading

* Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine, Andrew Scull, Yale University Press, 2005. ISBN 0-300-10729-3
External links

* Balanced review of Scull’s book on Henry A. Cotton, M.D. by Hugh Freeman, a psychiatrist and former editor of the British Journal of Psychiatry
* Chapter on Trenton’s Charitable Institutions, including Trenton Hospital, from 1929 History book
* One page article on Cotton by Andrew Scull
* History of Trenton Psychiatric Hospital in American Journal of Psychiatry

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Cotton_(doctor)
Categories: American psychiatrists | 1876 births | 1933 deaths | New Jersey physicians | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Cotton_(doctor)

***

Operation Dew
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Dew refers to two separate field trials conducted by the United States in the 1950s. The tests were designed to study the behavior of aerosol-released biological agents.

Contents

* 1 General description
* 2 Dew I
* 3 Dew II
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes
* 6 References

General description

Operation Dew took place from 1951-1952 off the southeast coast of the United States, including near Georgia, and North and South Carolina.[1][2] Operation Dew consisted of two sets of trials, Dew I and Dew II.[2] The tests involved the release of 250 pounds (110 kg) of fluorescent particles from a minesweeper off the coast.[1] Operation Dew I was described in a U.S. Army report known as  Dugway Special Report 162 , dated August 1, 1952.[2] The purpose of Operation Dew was to study the behavior of aerosol-released biological agents.[1]

Dew I

Operation Dew I consisted of five separate trials from March 26, 1952 until April 21, 1952 that were designed to test the feasibility of maintaining a large aerosol cloud released offshore until it drifted over land, achieving a large area coverage.[2] The tests released zinc cadmium sulfide along a 100-to-150-nautical-mile (190 to 280 km) line approximately 5 to 10 nautical miles (10 to 20 km) off the coast of Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina.[2] Two of the trials dispersed clouds of zinc cadmium sulfide over large areas of all three U.S. states. The tests affected over 60,000 square miles (150,000 km²) of populated coastal region in the U.S. southeast.[3] The Dew I releases were from a Navy minesweeper, the USS Tercel.[2]

Dew II

Dew II involved the release of fluorescent particles and Lycopodium spores from an aircraft.[2] Dew II was described in a 1953 Army report which remained classified at the time of a 1997 report by the U.S. National Research Council concerning the U.S. Army’s zinc cadmium sulfide dispersion program of the 1950s.[2]

See also

* Operation LAC

Notes

1. ^ a b c Croddy, Eric, et al. Chemical and Biological Warfare: A Comprehensive Survey for the Concerned Citizen, (Google Books), Springer, 2002, p. 231, (ISBN 0387950761).
2. ^ a b c d e f g h U.S. National Research Council, Subcommittee on Zinc Cadmium Sulfide. Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion, (Google Books), National Academies Press, 1997, pp. 44-77, (ISBN 0309057833).
3. ^ Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion, p. 74.

References

* U.S. National Research Council, Subcommittee on Zinc Cadmium Sulfide. Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion, (Google Books), National Academies Press, 1997,(ISBN 0309057833).

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dew
Categories: Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Biological warfare | Human experimentation in the United States | 1950s in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dew

**

Lycopodium
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lycopodium

Lycopodium annotinum
Scientific classification
Kingdom:     Plantae
Division:     Lycopodiophyta
Class:     Lycopodiopsida
Order:     Lycopodiales
Family:     Lycopodiaceae
Genus:     Lycopodium
Species
see text

Lycopodium is a genus of clubmosses, also known as ground pines, in the family Lycopodiaceae, a family of fern-allies (see Pteridophyta). They are flowerless, vascular, terrestrial or epiphytic plants, with widely-branched, erect, prostrate or creeping stems, with small, simple, needle-like or scale-like leaves that cover the stem and branches thickly. The fertile leaves are arranged in cone-like strobili. Specialized leaves (sporophylls) bear reniform spore-cases (sporangia) in the axils, which contain spores of one kind only. These club-shaped capsules give the genus its name.

Lycopods reproduce sexually by spores. The plant has an underground sexual phase that produces gametes, and this alternates in the life cycle with the spore-producing plant. The prothallium developed from the spore is a subterranean mass of tissue of considerable size and bears both the male and female organs (antheridium and archegonia). However, it is more common that they are distributed vegetatively through above or below ground rhizomes.

There are approximately 950 species[citation needed], with 37 species widely distributed in temperate and tropical climates, though they are confined to mountains in the tropics.

Lycopodium powder

The term Lycopodium is also used to describe the yellowish, powdery spores of certain club mosses, especially Lycopodium clavatum, used in the past in fireworks, photographic flash powder, fingerprint powders, as a covering for pills and explosives. In physics experiments, the powder is also used to make sound-waves in air visible for observation and measurement, and to make a pattern of electrostatic charge visible. For example, Nicéphore Niépce used Lycopodium as fuel for a demonstration model of the first internal combustion engine, the Pyreolophore as early as 1807. Chester Carlson used lycopodium powder in his early experiments to demonstrate xerography.

It is also used as an ice cream stabilizer[citation needed].

Species

* Lycopodium aberdaricum (central and southern Africa)
* Lycopodium alboffii (southernmost South America and the Falkland Islands)
* Lycopodium alticola (southwest China)
* Lycopodium annotinum (Interrupted Clubmoss; circumpolar north temperate)
* Lycopodium assurgens (Brazil (Minas Gerais, Santa Catarina))
* Lycopodium casuarinoides (southeast Asia (Japan to Bhutan and Borneo))
* Lycopodium centrochinense (east Asia (central China to India and the Philippines)
* Lypocodium cernuum creeping club moss (lowland mixed forest) — found along bush margins or disturbed ground; height approximately 400 mm
* Lycopodium clavatum (Stag’s-horn Clubmoss; subcosmopolitan, see separate page for details)
* Lycopodium confertum (southern South America and the Falkland Islands)
* Lycopodium dendroideum (northern North America)
* Lycopodium deuterodensum, tree club moss (eastern Australia, New Caledonia, New Zealand) — has appressed leaves; height approximately 600 mm
* Lycopodium diaphanum (Tristan da Cunha)
* Lycopodium dubium (cold temperate and subarctic Europe and Asia; treated as a synonym of L. annotinum by some authors)
* Lycopodium fastigiatum (southeastern Australia, New Zealand)
* Lycopodium gayanum (south-central Chile and adjacent westernmost Argentina)
* Lycopodium hickeyi (northeastern North America)
* Lycopodium hygrophilum (New Guinea)
* Lycopodium interjectum (southwest China (Sichuan))
* Lycopodium japonicum (eastern Asia (Japan west and south to India and Sri Lanka))
* Lycopodium juniperoideum (northeast Asia (central Siberia southeast to Taiwan))
* Lycopodium jussiaei (northern South America, Caribbean)
* Lycopodium lagopus (circumpolar arctic and subarctic)
* Lypocodium lucidulum, shining club moss (North America) — occurs in wet woods and among rocks; has no distinct strobili; bears its spore capsules at the bases of leaves scattered along the branches
* Lycopodium magellanicum (South and Central America (Andes), southern Atlantic Ocean and southern Indian Ocean islands)
* Lycopodium minchegense (southeast China (Fujian))
* Lycopodium obscurum (northeast North America, northeast Asia)
* Lycopodium paniculatum (southern South America (Andes))
* Lycopodium papuanum (New Guinea)
* Lycopodium pullei (New Guinea)
* Lycopodium scariosum (southeastern Australia, New Zealand, Borneo (Mount Kinabalu))
* Lycopodium selago (uplands of western Europe)
* Lycopodium simulans (southwest China (Yunnan))
* Lycopodium spectabile (Java)
* Lycopodium subarcticum (northeast Siberia)
* Lycopodium taliense (southwest China (Yunnan))
* Lycopodium venustulum (Hawaii, Western Samoa, Society Islands)
* Lycopodium vestitum (northwest South America (Andes))
* Lycopodium volubile, climbing club moss (southwest Pacific Ocean islands (New Zealand north to Java), Australia (Queensland)) — found along bush margins and disturbed ground; has a creeping habit and can climb up vegetation
* Lycopodium zonatum (southeast Tibet)

External links

* Species list (takes a broad view of the genus, including the species here separated in the genus Diphasiastrum)
* Burning Lycopodium Powder: Simulating a Grain Elevator Explosion by Kevin A. Boudreaux

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lycopodium
Categories: Lycopodiophyta

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lycopodium

***

Edgewood Arsenal experiments
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Edgewood Arsenal experiments (also known as Project 112) are said to be related to or part of CIA mind control programs after World War II, like MKULTRA. Journalist Linda Hunt, citing records from the National Archives, revealed that eight German scientists worked at Edgewood under Project Paperclip: see  Secret Agenda: the United States Government, Nazi Scientists and Project Paperclip  St. Martin’s Press, 1991;  ABC PrimeTime Live,  Operation Paperclip, 1991, and hearings before the House Judiciary Committee, 1991. The experiments were performed at the Edgewood Arsenal, northeast of Baltimore, Maryland, and involved the use of hallucinogens such LSD, THC, and BZ, in addition to biological and chemical agents. Experiments on human subjects utilizing such agents goes back to at least World War I. In the mid-1970s, in the wake of many health claims made from exposure to such agents, including psychotropic and hallucinogenic drugs administered in later experiments, Congress began investigations of misuse of such experiments, and inadequate informed consent given by the soldiers and civilians involved.

The Edgewood experiments took place from approximately 1952-1974 at the Bio Medical Laboratory, which is now known as the U. S. Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense. The volunteer would spend the weekend on-site. They would perform tests and procedures (math, navigation, following orders, memory and interview) while sober. The volunteer would then be dosed by a scientist and perform the same tests. These tests occurred in the building/hospital under the care of doctors and nurses. At times the tests would be taken outside to study the effects while in the field. For example the volunteer would have to guard a check point while under the influence to see what effects certain drugs had on the patient.

A pamphlet produced by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Health Effects from Chemical, Biological, and Radiological Weapons (Oct. 2003), discusses the Edgewood Arsenal Experiments in some detail:

Renewed interest led to renewed human testing by the Department of Defense (DoD), although ultimately on a much smaller scale. Thus, between 1950 and 1975, about 6,720 soldiers took part in experiments involving exposures to 254 different chemicals, conducted at U.S. Army Laboratories at Edgewood Arsenal, MD (NRC 1982, NRC 1984, NAS 1993). Congressional hearings into these experiments in 1974 and 1975 resulted in disclosures, notification of subjects as to the nature of their chemical exposures, and ultimately to compensation for a few families of subjects who had died during the experiments (NAS 3). These experiments were conducted primarily to learn how various agents would affect humans (NRC 1982). Other agencies including the CIA and the Special Operations Division of the Department of the Army were also reportedly involved in these studies (NAS 1993). Only a small number of all the experiments done during this period involved mustard agents or Lewisite. Records indicate that between 1955 and 1965, of the 6,720 soldiers tested, only 147 human subjects underwent exposure to mustard agent at Edgewood (NRC 1982). According to the 1984 NRC review, human experiments at DoD’s Edgewood Arsenal involved about 1,500 subjects who were experimentally exposed to irritant and blister agents including:

* lachrymatory agents, e.g., CN;

* riot control agents, e.g., CS;

* chloropicrin (PS);
* Diphenylaminochlorarsine (DM, Adamsite);

* other ocular and respiratory irritants; and

* mustard agents.

For example, from 1958 to 1973 at least 1,366 human subjects underwent experimental exposure specifically with the riot control agent CS at Edgewood Arsenal (NRC 1984). Of those involved in the experiments:

* 1,073 Subjects were exposed to aerosolized CS;

* 180 Subjects were exposed dermally;

* 82 subjects had both skin applications and aerosol exposures;

and finally

* 31 subjects experienced ocular exposure via direct CS application to their eyes.

Most of these experiments involved tests of protective equipment and of subjects’ ability to perform military tasks during exposure.

The report cites three earlier studies for its data, namely;

* Veterans at Risk: Health Effects of Mustard Gas and Lewisite
* Possible Long-Term Health Effects of Short-Term Exposure to Chemical Agents, Volume 1, Anticholinesterases, and Anticholinergics. (1982). Commission on Life Sciences. The National Academies Press
* Possible Long-Term Health Effects of Short-Term Exposure To Chemical Agents, Volume 2: Cholinesterase Reactivators, Psychochemicals and Irritants and Vesicants (1984) Commission on Life Sciences. The National Academies Press.

The Veterans Affairs pamphlet, written to aid government clinicians in understanding the presence of various symptoms in presenting patients at their clinics and hospitals, also discusses the use of psychoactive drugs on human subjects:

About 260 subjects were experimentally exposed to various psychochemicals including phencyclidine (PCP), and 10 related synthetic analogs of the active ingredient of cannabis (NRC 1984). The NRC report also mentions human experiments involving exposure of 741 soldiers to LSD (NRC 1984).

The Vanderbilt University Television News Archive has two videos about the experiments, both from a  July 17, 1975 NBC Evening News segment . In one, NBC newsman John Chancellor reports on how Norman Augustine, then-acting Secretary of Army, ordered a probe of Army use of LSD in soldier and civilian experiments. In a separate piece, by reporter Tom Pettit, Major General Lloyd Fellenz, from Edgewood Arsenal, explains how the experiments there were about searching for humane weapons, adding that the use of LSD was unacceptable.

A Washington Post article, dated July 23, 1975, by Bill Richards ( 6,940 Took Drugs ) reported that a top civilian drug researcher for the Army said a total of 6,940 servicemen had been involved in Army chemical and drug experiments, and that, furthermore, the tests were proceeding at Edgewood Arsenal as of the date of the article. A Government Accounting Office May 2004 report, Chemical and Biological Defense (p. 24), states that there even more victims of the experimental program, a number that may never be completely known:

We also reported that the Army Chemical Corps conducted a classified medical research program for developing incapacitating agents. This program involved testing nerve agents, nerve agent antidotes, psycho chemicals, and irritants. The chemicals were given to volunteer service members at Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland; Dugway Proving Ground, Utah; and Forts Benning, Bragg, and McClellan. In total, Army documents identified 7,120 Army and Air Force personnel who participated in these tests.15 Further, GAO concluded that precise information on the scope and the magnitude of tests involving human subjects was not available, and the exact number of human subjects might never be known.

GAO explains at the outset of their report the rationale for the study:

In the 1962-74 time period, the Department of Defense (DOD) conducted a classified chemical and biological warfare test program —- Project 112 —- that might have exposed service members and civilian personnel to chemical or biological agents. In 2000 the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) began obtaining information from DOD about the program. Concerned that veterans and others might have health problems from exposure during Project 112 and similar DOD tests, Congress required DOD in the 2003 Defense Authorization Act to identify Project 112 tests and personnel potentially exposed—service members and the number of civilian personnel—and other chemical and biological tests that might have exposed service members.

Finally, it appears there were similar experiments conducted at the UK Ministry of Defence establishment at Porton Down, Wiltshire, into at least the 1970s. See the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives at King’s College London.

External links

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Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgewood_Arsenal_experiments
Categories: History of the United States government | Military psychiatry | Mind control | Military history of the United States | Central Intelligence Agency operations | Psychedelic research | Biological warfare | Chemical warfare | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgewood_Arsenal_experiments

***

Walter E. Fernald State School
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fernald, Walter E., State School
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic District
Walter E. Fernald State School is located in Massachusetts
Location:     200 Trapelo Rd., Waltham, Massachusetts
Coordinates:     42E23?28?N 71E12?38?W? / ?42.39111EN 71.21056EW? / 42.39111; -71.21056
Built/Founded:     1888
Architect:     Preston, William G.; Hoyt, Clarence P.
Architectural style(s):     Greek Revival, Queen Anne, Late 19th And 20th Century Revivals
Governing body:     State
MPS:     Massachusetts State Hospitals And State Schools MPS
Added to NRHP:     January 21, 1994
NRHP Reference#:     93001487
[1]

The Walter E. Fernald State School, now the Walter E. Fernald Developmental Center, located in Waltham, Massachusetts, is the Western hemisphere’s oldest publicly funded institution serving people who have developmental disabilities. [2] Originally a Victorian sanatorium, it became a  poster child  for the American eugenics movement during the 1920s. It later was the scene of medical experiments in the twentieth century. Investigations into this research led to new regulations regarding human research in children.

Contents

* 1 History
* 2 Nuclear Medicine Research in Children
* 3 Twenty-first Century
* 4 References
* 5 External links

History

The Fernald Center, originally called the Massachusetts School for Idiotic Children, was founded by reformer Samuel Gridley Howe in 1848 with a $2,500 appropriation from the Massachusetts State Legislature. The school eventually comprised 72 buildings total, located on 186 acres (0.75 km2). At its peak, some 2,500 people were confined there, most of them  feeble-minded  boys.

Under its first resident superintendent, Walter E. Fernald (1859–1924), an advocate of eugenics, the school was viewed as a model educational facility in the field of mental retardation. It was renamed in his honor in 1925, following his death the previous year.

The institution did serve a large population of mentally retarded children, but the The Boston Globe estimates that upwards of half of the inmates tested with IQs in the normal range. In the 20th century, living conditions were spartan or worse; approximately 36 children slept in each dormitory room. There were widespread reports of physical and sexual abuse[citation needed], This situation changed radically, starting in the 1970s, when a class action suit, Ricci v. Okin, was filed to upgrade conditions at Fernald and several other state institutions for persons with mental retardation in Massachusetts. U.S. District Court Judge Joseph L. Tauro, who assumed oversight of the case in 1972, formally disengaged from the case in 1993, declaring that improvements in the care and conditions at the facilities had made them  second to none anywhere in the world.

Nuclear Medicine Research in Children

The Fernald School was the site of the 1946–53 joint experiments by Harvard University and MIT that exposed young male children to tracer doses of radioactive isotopes. [3] Documents obtained in 1994 by the United States Department of Energy [4]revealed the following details:

* The experiment was conducted in part by a research fellow sponsored by the Quaker Oats Company.
* MIT Professor of Nutrition Robert S. Harris led the experiment, which studied the absorption of calcium and iron.
* The boys were encouraged to join a  Science Club , which offered larger portions of food, parties, and trips to Boston Red Sox baseball games.
* The 57 club members ate iron-enriched cereals and calcium-enriched milk for breakfast. In order to track absorption, several radioactive calcium tracers were given orally or intravenously.
* Radiation levels in stool and blood samples would serve as dependent variables.
* in another study, 17 subjects received iron supplement shots containing radioisotopes or iron.[5]
* Neither the children nor their parents ever gave adequate informed consent for participation in a scientific study.

[6]

The Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments, reporting to the United States Department of Energy in 1994, reported on these experiments:

In 1946, one study exposed seventeen subjects to radioactive iron. The second study, which involved a series of seventeen related subexperiments, exposed fifty-seven subjects to radioactive calcium between 1950 and 1953. It is clear that the doses involved were low and that it is extremely unlikely that any of the children who were used as subjects were harmed as a consequence. These studies remain morally troubling, however, for several reasons. First, although parents or guardians were asked for their permission to have their children involved in the research, the available evidence suggests that the information provided was, at best, incomplete. Second, there is the question of the fairness of selecting institutionalized children at all, children whose life circumstances were by any standard already heavily burdened.

The highest dose of radiation that any subject was exposed to was 330 millirem, the equivalent of less than one year’s background radiation in Denver.[7]

The school also participated in studies of thyroid function in patients with Down Syndrome and their parents. [8] This study showed that their iodine metabolism was similar to normal controls.

Twenty-first Century

The buildings and grounds survive as a center for mentally disabled adults, operated by the Massachusetts Department of Mental Retardation. In 2001, 320 adults resided at Fernald, with ages ranging from 27 to 96 years and an average age of 47 years. According to a December 13, 2004 article in the Boston Globe, Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney announced in 2003 that the facility would be closed and the land sold by 2007. In 2003, a coalition of family advocates and state employee unions began a campaign to save Fernald and asked U.S. District Judge Joseph L. Tauro to resume his oversight of the Ricci v. Okin class action lawsuit that had led to improvements at Fernald and the other state facilities beginning in the 1970s.

In an August 14, 2007 ruling, Judge Tauro ordered the Department of Mental Retardation to consider the individual wishes of all 185 institution residents before closing the facility. However, in September 2007, the new administration of Governor Deval Patrick appealed Tauro’s ruling to the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston. In a statement, the Patrick administration contended that Fernald had become too expensive to continue to operate and that equal or better care could be provided in private, community-based settings for the remaining Fernald residents. The administration’s cost claims have been disputed by the Fernald League for the Retarded, Inc., the Massachusetts Coalition of Families and Advocates for the Retarded, Inc. (COFAR) and other family-based organizations, which have continued to advocate for the preservation of Fernald as a site for ICF/MR-level care for its current residents. Those advocacy organizations have proposed a  postage-stamp  plan under which Fernald would be scaled back in size and the remaining portion of the campus sold for development. The Patrick administration, however, has declined to negotiate with those Fernald advocates, and has pressed ahead with its appeal and closure plans.

Fernald was the subject of a 2007 documentary film  Front Wards, Back Wards  directed by W.C. Rogers, which has been shown on some PBS television stations.

References

1. ^  National Register Information System . National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2009-03-13. http://www.nr.nps.gov/.
2. ^   The Walter E. Fernald Association  . http://fernaldassociation.com/fernaldCenter.htm. Retrieved 2009-06-09.
3. ^ BRONNER F, HARRIS RS, MALETSKOS CJ, BENDA CE (January 1956).  Studies in calcium metabolism; the fate of intravenously injected radiocalcium in human beings . The Journal of Clinical Investigation 35 (1): 78–88. doi:10.1172/JCI103254. PMID 13278403.
4. ^  OT-19. Radioisotope Studies at the Fernald State School, Massachusetts . http://www.hss.energy.gov/healthsafety/ohre/roadmap/experiments/0491doc.html#0491_Other. Retrieved 2009-06-07.
5. ^ SHARPE LM, PEACOCK WC, COOKE R, HARRIS RS (July 1950).  The effect of phytate and other food factors on iron absorption . The Journal of Nutrition 41 (3): 433–46. http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=15428911.
6. ^  Chapter 7: The Studies at Fernald School . ACHRE Report.  It is clear that the doses involved were low and that it is extremely unlikely that any of the children who were used as subjects were harmed as a consequence.
7. ^ Hussain, Zareena (January 7, 1998).  MIT to pay $1.85 million in Fernald radiation settlement . The Tech 11 (65). http://tech.mit.edu/V117/N65/bfernald.65n.html. Retrieved 2009-06-09.
8. ^ KURLAND GS, FISHMAN J, HAMOLSKY MW, FREEDBERG AS (April 1957).  Radioisotope study of thyroid function in 21 mongoloid subjects, including observations in 7 parents . The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism 17 (4): 552–60. PMID 13406017. http://jcem.endojournals.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=13406017.

* D’Antonio, Michael. The State Boys Rebellion. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004.

External links
* Excerpts from the writings of Walter E. Fernald

v • d • e
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Keeper of the Register A History of the National Register of Historic Places A Property types A Historic district A Contributing property
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Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_E._Fernald_State_School
Categories: Historic districts in the United States | Human experimentation in the United States | Hospitals in Massachusetts | National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts | Special schools in the United States | Waltham, Massachusetts | Queen Anne architecture | 1888 architecture | Medical ethics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_E._Fernald_State_School

***
Hofling hospital experiment
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In 1966, the psychiatrist Charles K. Hofling conducted a field experiment on obedience in the nurse-physician relationship.[1] In the natural hospital setting, nurses were ordered by unknown doctors to administer what could have been a dangerous dose of a (fictional) drug to their patients. In spite of official guidelines forbidding administration in such circumstances, Hofling found that 21 out of the 22 nurses would have given the patient an overdose of medicine.

Contents

* 1 Procedure
* 2 Findings
* 3 Conclusions
* 4 Criticism
* 5 Books
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 External links

Procedure

A doctor unknown to a nurse would call her by telephone with orders to administer 20 mg of a fictional drug named  Astroten  to a patient and that he/she will sign for the medication later. The bottle had been surreptitiously placed in the drug cabinet, but the  drug  was not on the approved list. It was clearly labeled that 10 mg was the maximum daily dose.
The experimental protocol was explained to a group of nurses and nursing students, who were asked to predict how many nurses would give the drug to the patient. Of the twelve nurses, ten said they would not do it. All twenty-one nursing students said they would refuse to administer the drug.

Hofling then selected 22 nurses at a hospital in the United States for the actual experiment. They were each called by an experimenter with the alias of Dr. Smith who said that he would be around to write up the paperwork as soon as he got to the hospital. The nurses were stopped at the door to the patient room before they could administer the  drug .

There were several reasons that the nurses should have refused to obey the authority. 1.) The dosage they were instructed to administer was twice that of the recommended safe daily dosage. 2.) Hospital protocol stated that nurses should only take instructions from doctors known to them, therefore they should definitely not have followed instructions given by an unknown doctor over the phone. 3.) The drug was not on their list of drugs to be administered that day and the required paperwork to be filled before drug administration was not completed.

Findings

Hofling found that 21 out of the 22 nurses would have given the patient an overdose of medicine. None of the investigators, and only one experienced nurse who examined the protocol in advance, correctly guessed the experimental results. He also found that all 22 nurses whom he had given the questionnaire to had said they would not obey the orders of the doctor, and that 10 out of the 22 nurses had done this before, with a different drug.

Conclusions

The nurses were thought to have allowed themselves to be deceived because of their high opinions of the standards of the medical profession. The study revealed the danger to patients that existed because the nurses’ view of professional standards induced them to suppress their good judgement.

Criticism

Because it was a field experiment, it had high ecological validity and experimental validity. However, in order to do the experiment truthfully, the nurses had to be denied informed consent. The nurses were accustomed to accepting advice from authority figures. Finally, the medicine used was fictional. When the experiment was repeated with Valium, a drug with which the nurses were acquainted, none of the nurses obeyed

Books

* Basic Psychiatric Concepts in Nursing (1960). Charles K. Hofling, Madeleine M. Leininger, Elizabeth Bregg. J. B. Lippencott, 2nd ed. 1967: ISBN 0-397-54062-0
* Textbook of Psychiatry for Medical Practice edited by C. K. Hofling. J. B. Lippencott, 3rd ed. 1975: ISBN 0-397-52070-0
* Aging: The Process and the People (1978). Usdin, Gene & Charles K. Hofling, editors. American College of Psychiatrists. New York: Brunner/Mazel Publishers
* The Family: Evaluation and Treatment (1980). ed. C. K. Hofling and J. M. Lewis, New York: Brunner/Mazel Publishers
* Law and Ethics in the Practice of Psychiatry (1981). New York: Brunner/Mazel Publishers, ISBN 0-87630-250-9
* Custer and the Little Big Horn: A Psychobiographical Inquiry (1985). Wayne State University Press, ISBN 0-8143-1814-2

See also

* Milgram experiment

References

1. ^ Hofling CK et al. (1966)  An Experimental Study of Nurse-Physician Relationships . Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 141:171-180.

[edit] External links
* Obedience studies

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hofling_hospital_experiment
Categories: Group processes | Social psychology | Psychology experiments | Human experimentation in the United States | Medical ethics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hofling_hospital_experiment

***

Human radiation experiments
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Since the discovery of ionizing radiation, a number of human radiation experiments have been performed to understand the effects of ionizing radiation and radioactive contamination on the human body.

Contents

* 1 Experiments performed in the United States
o 1.1 Radioactive Iodine Experiments
o 1.2 Uranium Experiments
o 1.3 Plutonium experiments
o 1.4 Fallout research
o 1.5 Project Sunshine
* 2 Legal Repercussions
* 3 See also
* 4 References
* 5 Further reading
* 6 External links

Experiments performed in the United States
Radioactive Iodine Experiments

In 1953, the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) ran several studies on the health effects of radioactive iodine in newborns and pregnant women at the University of Iowa. In one study, researchers gave pregnant women from 100 to 200 microcuries of iodine-131, in order to study the women’s aborted embryos in an attempt to discover at what stage, and to what extent radioactive iodine crosses the placental barrier. In another study, they gave 25 newborn babies (who were under 36 hours old and weighed from 5.5-8.5 lbs) iodine-131, either by oral administration or through an injection, so that they could measure the amount of iodine in their thyroid glands. [1]

In another AEC study, researchers at the University of Nebraska College of Medicine fed iodine-131 to 28 healthy infants, through a gastric tube to test the concentration of iodine in the infants’ thyroid glands. [1]
In a 1953 operation called  Green Run,  the AEC dropped radiodine 131 and xenon 133 over a 500,000 acre area which contained three small towns near the Hanford site in Washington [2].

In 1953, the AEC sponsored a study to discover if radioactive iodine affected premature babies differently from full-term babies. In the experiment, researchers from Harper Hospital in Detroit orally administered iodine-131 to 65 premature and full-term infants who weighed from 2.1-5.5 lbs [1]

Uranium Experiments

Between 1953 and 1957, eleven patients at Massachusetts General Hospital were injected with uranium as part of research funded by the Manhattan Project [2]

Plutonium experiments

During and after the end of World War II, scientists working on the Manhattan Project and other nuclear weapons research projects conducted studies of the effects of plutonium on laboratory animals and human subjects. In the case of human subjects, this involved injecting solutions containing (typically) five micrograms of plutonium into hospital patients who were thought either to be terminally ill or to have a life expectancy of less than ten years due either to age or chronic disease condition. The injections were made without the informed consent of those patients. [3]

In her book, The Plutonium Files: America’s Secret Medical Experiments in the Cold War, Eileen Welsome, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for The Albuquerque Tribune, revealed the extent of the experiments conducted on unwitting participants.[4] At the Fernald school in Massachusetts, an institution for  feeble-minded  boys, 73 disabled children were fed oatmeal containing radioactive calcium and other radioisotopes. The radioactive tracers allowed scientists to track how the nutrients were digested. Immediately after World War II, 829 pregnant mothers in Tennessee received what they were told were  vitamin drinks  that would improve the health of their babies, but were, in fact, mixtures containing radioactive iron, to determine how fast the radioisotope crossed into the placenta. Other incidents included an eighteen-year-old woman at an upstate New York hospital, expecting to be treated for a pituitary gland disorder, who was injected with plutonium.[5] Such experiments are now considered to be a serious breach of medical ethics.

Fallout research

In 1954, American scientists conducted fallout exposure research on the citizens of the Marshall Islands after the Castle Bravo nuclear test in Project 4.1. The Bravo test was detonated upwind of Rongelap Atoll and the residents were exposed to serious radiation levels, up to 180 rads. 236 Marshallese were exposed, some developed severe radiation sickness and one died, long term effects included birth defects,  jellyfish  babies, and thyroid problems.[6]

The decision to explode the Bravo slide under the prevailing winds was made by Dr Alvin C. Graves (1912-1966), the Scientific Director of Operation Castle. Dr Graves had total authority over firing the weapon, above that of the military Commander of Operation Castle. Dr Graves had himself received an exposure of 200 Roentgens in the 1946 Los Alamos accident in which his personal friend, Dr Louis Slotin, died from radiation exposure. Dr Graves appears in the widely available film of the earlier 1952 test Mike, which examines the last minute fallout decisions [7]. The narrator (Western actor Reed Hadley) is filmed aboard the control ship in that film which shows the final conference. Hadley points out that 20,000 people live in the potential area of the fallout. He asks the control panel scientist if the test can be aborted and is told yes but it would ruin all their preparations in setting up timed measuring instruments in the race against the Russians. In Mike the fallout correctly landed north of the inhabited area, but in the 1954 Bravo test, there was a lot of wind shear and the wind which was blowing north the day before the test steadily veered towards the east.

In addition, the yield of Bravo, the first ever American lithium deuteride (solid fusion fuel) bomb, was twice the maximum expected figure (because lithium-7 was unexpectedly split to give fusionable tritium, in addition to the predicted effect of lithium-6). The combination of unexpectedly high yield plus the wind veering (which was already in progress even before Bravo was fired), contaminated the inhabited islands to the east of the detonation. It was not a deliberate radiation experiment, although questions do remain over the reason the emergency messages from US weather personnel, who were contaminated on Rongerik like the Marshallese, were ignored for two days after the test. Once the heavy fallout on the inhabited islands was discovered, all of the people were evacuated promptly and regularly checked for signs of injury.

Project Sunshine

Early in the Cold War, researchers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia attempted to determine just how much nuclear fallout would be required to make the Earth uninhabitable.[8][9] They realized that atmospheric nuclear testing had provided them an opportunity to investigate this. Such tests had dispersed radioactive contamination worldwide, and examination of human bodies could reveal how readily it was taken up and hence how much damage it caused. Of particular interest was strontium-90 in the bones. Infants were the primary focus, as they would have had a full opportunity to absorb the new contaminants.[10]

As a result of this conclusion, researchers began a program to collect human bodies and bones from all over the world, with a particular focus on infants. The bones were cremated and the ashes analyzed for radioisotopes. This project was kept secret primarily because it would be a public relations disaster; as a result parents and family were not told what was being done with the body parts of their relatives[11].

Legal Repercussions

On January 15, 1994, President Bill Clinton formed the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments (ACHRE). Ruth Faden of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics chaired the first ever committee. This committee was created to investigate and report the use of human beings as test subjects in experiments involving the effects of ionizing radiation in federally funded research. The committee discovered the causes of the experiments, and reasons why the proper oversight did not exist, and made several recommendations to prevent future occurrences of similar events. The final report issued by the ACHRE can be found at the Department of Energy’s website here: [1].

See also

* MKULTRA
* Nuclear and radiation accidents
* Radiation poisoning
* Radioactive contamination
* Human experimentation
* Totskoye range nuclear tests
* Walter E. Fernald State School

References

1. ^ a b c Veracity, Dani (March 6, 2006).  Human medical experimentation in the United States: The shocking true history of modern medicine and psychiatry (1833-1965)  (in English). NaturalNews.com. http://www.naturalnews.com/019189.html. Retrieved 2009-03-12.
2. ^ a b Sharav, Vera.  Human Experiments: A Chronology of Human Research  (in English). Alliance for Human Research Protection. http://www.ahrp.org/history/chronology.php. Retrieved 2009-03-12.
3. ^ http://library.lanl.gov/cgi-bin/getfile?00326640.pdf
4. ^ Book review The New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 341:1941-1942, December 16, 1999.
5. ^ Democracy Now  | Plutonium Files: How the U.S. Secretly Fed Radioactivity to Thousands of Americans
6. ^ Nuclear Issues
7. ^ Internet Archive: Details: Operation Ivy
8. ^ ACHRE Report:New Ethical Questions for Medical Researchers
In 1949, the AEC undertook Project Gabriel, a secret effort to study the question of whether the tests could threaten the viability of life on earth. In 1953, Gabriel led to Project Sunshine…
9. ^ energy.gov PDF, Report on Project Gabriel, July 1954.
10. ^ guardian.co.uk, Britain snatched babies’ bodies for nuclear labs
11. ^ Dundee University Medical School; PDF

Further reading

* The Plutonium Files: America’s secret medical experiments in the Cold War, by Eileen Welsome, Dial Press, c1999, New York, N.Y., ISBN 0-385-31402-7
* Killing Our Own: The disaster of America’s experience with atomic radiation, by Harvey Wasserman, Delacorte Press, c1992, ISBN 978-0440045670
* The Treatment: The Story of Those Who Died in the Cincinnati Radiation Tests, by Martha Stephens, Duke University Press, c2002, Durham, N.C., ISBN 0-8223-2811-9
* Holly M. Barker, Bravo for the Marshallese: Regaining Control in a Post-Nuclear, Post-Colonial World, Wadsworth, 2004. ISBN 0-534-61326-8
* Chair’s Perspective on the Work of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments by Ruth Faden

External links

* PROJECT SUNSHINE AND THE SLIPPERY SLOPE
* The nuclear bodysnatchers
* Grave injustices
*  A Little of the Buchenwald Touch : America’s Secret Radiation Experiments
* Cheryl Welsh, Outlaw nonconsensual human experiments now The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, June 16, 2009.
* Embassy of the Republic of the Marshall Islands
* The Final Report of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments
* Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_radiation_experiments
Categories: Radiobiology | Bioethics | Human experimentation in the United States | Radiation health effects
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_radiation_experiments

***

Totskoye range nuclear tests
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Coordinates: 52E38.54?N 52E48.55?E? / ?52.64233EN 52.80917EE? / 52.64233; 52.80917
Nuclear bombing test during the 1954 military exercises on Totskoye range
Georgy Zhukov (then Deputy Defence Minister) and Vyacheslav Malyshev (then Minister of Medium Machinebuilding) during the exercises on Totskoye range

Totskoye is a military range established in September 1941 to the north of Totskoye village, about 40 km from Buzuluk in Orenburg Oblast, Russia (in Southern Urals) under the jurisdiction of the South Urals Military District
[edit] History

In 1954, nuclear bombing tests were performed in Totskoye range during the training exercise Snezhok (Snowball) with some 45,000 people, Soviet soldiers and prisoners[1], were exposed to radiation from a bomb twice as powerful as the one dropped on Hiroshima nine years earlier. The exercise was commended by the Marshal of the Soviet Union, G. Zhukov. At 9:33 a.m. on 14 September 1954, a Soviet Tu-4 bomber dropped a 40 kiloton atomic weapon from 8,000 m (25,000 feet). The bomb exploded 350 m (1,200 feet) above Totskoye range 13 km from Totskoye.

The experiment was similar to others performed at the time by USA, UK and other atomic countries,[2][3] and was designed to test the performance of military hardware and soldiers in the event of a nuclear war. It involved the 270th Rifle Division,[4] 320 planes, 600 tanks and 600 armoured personnel carriers. Deputy Defence Minister Georgy Zhukov witnessed the blast from an underground nuclear bunker. Five minutes after the blast, the planes were ordered to bomb the explosion site, and three hours later (after the demarcation of the radioactive zone) the armoured vehicles were ordered to practice the taking of a hostile area after a nuclear attack.[5]

The local population was never warned and therefore never evacuated as they were part of this big experiment. After the explosion the people were even encouraged to utilize the wood of the trees that fell because of the explosion.

Consequences

Thousands are believed to have died as a result of radiations, both immediately and in the years following. The pilot flying the Tu-4 developed leukemia and his co-pilot developed bone cancer. There are no official figures showing how many of the 45,000 men sent to the range died as a result of the test. People exposed to radiation during tests were denied medical care, their military records were falsified to show different serving places and the test remained secret.[6] The sick people that sought their help in local hospitals later were surprised to find out that their medical cards with their histories of sickness disappeared out of the hopitals.

Tamara Zlotnikova, a former member of the Russian Duma, is helping survivors fight for compensation. She believes that the toll from the test was enormous. A study carried out by the health ministry on cities with the worst health problems puts Orenburg second out of 88. Even today, the incidence of some cancers in Orenburg, a city 130 miles from the range, is double that of the people who suffered in Chernobyl.[1][2] However, there may be other factors such as high pollution levels in the Ural River which contributed to the health problems in Orenburg.

Over half of a century later this fact is still under a strict supervision of the federal government. The local law enforcement personnel continues to harass the journalists that try to obtain a footage from that range. First the exercise became widely known only in 1993. Even the soldiers that participated in the exercise did not know what they were part of as were told that there will be an imitation of the nuclear explosion. Local population was never examined for medical issues, although a numerous pathalogies were recorded since then. The government congratulated the local population for their heroism to provide the nuclear shield for their Motherland.

References

1. ^ Orenbug’s Nagasaki (Russian)
2. ^ Human Nuclear Experiments (last retrieved: Wed, 10 Jan 2007 10:09:06 +0100)
3. ^  Exercise Desert Rock  Staff Film Reports No 177 of The Armed Force (U.S. Department of Defense), 1951
4. ^ V.I. Feskov et al., ‘The Soviet Army in the Cold War 1945-90, Tomsk, 2004, p.94
5. ^  Nuclear test in Totskoye in 1954  (last retrieved: Wed, 10 Jan 2007 10:09:06 +0100).
6. ^ The Sunday Times (UK) article, 24 June 2001.

*  Nuclear Testing in the USSR. Volume 2. Soviet Nuclear Testing Technologies. Environmental Effects. Safety Provisions. Nuclear Test Sites , Begell-House, Inc., New York, 1998

* A.A. Romanyukha, E.A. Ignatiev, D.V. Ivanov and A.G. Vasilyev ,  The Distance Effect on the Individual Exposures Evaluated from the Soviet Nuclear Bomb Test in 1954 at Totskoye Test Site in 1954 , Radiation Protection Dosimetry 86:53-58 (1999) online abstract
* ?????? ????????? ?????? (Totskoye Military Exercise), a book (Russian)

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totskoye_range_nuclear_tests
Categories: Nuclear test sites | Orenburg Oblast | Human experimentation in Russia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totskoye_range_nuclear_tests

180px-Totskoe-Zhukov_Malyshev.jpg
Georgy Zhukov (then Deputy Defence Minister) and Vyacheslav Malyshev (then Minister of Medium Machinebuilding) during the exercises on Totskoye range

180px-Totskoe-nuke.jpg
Nuclear bombing test during the 1954 military exercises on Totskoye range

***

Wendell Johnson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dr. Wendell Johnson (April 16, 1906 – August 29, 1965) was an American psychologist, speech pathologist and author and was a proponent of General Semantics (or GS). He was born in Roxbury, Kansas and died in Iowa City, Iowa. The Wendell Johnson Speech and Hearing Center, part of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics is named after this scientific pioneer.

Stuttering contributions

Considered one of the earliest and most influential speech pathologists in the field, he spent most of his life trying to find the cause and cure for stuttering — through teaching, research, scholarly and other writing, lecturing, supervision of graduate students, and persuading K-12 schools, the Veterans Administration and other institutions of the need for speech pathologists. He played a major role in the creation of the American Speech and Hearing Association.

A recent lawsuit was settled in 2007 regarding a stuttering experiment that Dr. Johnson created and oversaw on 22 orphan children in Davenport, Iowa, in 1939. The victims of Johnson’s experiment received nearly $1 million in the settlement.

Johnson chose one of his graduate students, Mary Tudor (researcher), to conduct the experiment and he supervised her research. Many of the orphan children were psychologically scarred by Johnson’s experiment after Tudor spent four months in 1939 conditioning them to stutter through negative speech therapy in which she belittled them for their own normal speech imperfections. Dubbed  The Monster Study  by some of his peers who were horrified that Johnson would experiment on orphan children to prove a theory, the experiment was kept hidden for fear Johnson’s reputation would be tarnished in the wake of human experiments conducted by the Nazis during World War II. The University of Iowa publicly apologized for the Monster Study in 2001. A university spokesman called the experiment  regrettable  and added:  This is a study that should never be considered defensible in any era…In no way would I ever think of defending this study. In no way. It’s more than unfortunate.  Before her death, Mary Tudor expressed deep regret about her role in the Monster Study and maintained that Wendell Johnson should have done more to reverse the negative effects on the orphan children’s speech. In spite of Wendell Johnson’s role in the creation of the Monster Study, Tudor still felt he had made many positive contributions to speech pathology and stuttering research.

Johnson’s book People in Quandaries: The Semantics of Personal Adjustment (1946; still in print from the Institute of General Semantics) is an excellent introduction to general semantics applied to psychotherapy. In 1956 his Your Most Enchanted Listener was published; in 1972, his Living With Change: The Semantics of Coping, a collection of selected portions of transcriptions of hundreds of his talks, organized by Dorothy Moeller, provided further general semantic insights. He also published many articles in his lifetime, in journals, including ETC: A Review of General Semantics. [1] Neil Postman acknowledges the influence of People in Quandaries in his own excellent general semantics book Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk (1976, Delacorte, New York):

I am tempted to say that there are two kinds of people in the world — those who will learn something from this book (People in Quandaries) and those who will not. The best blessing I can give you is to wish that as you go through life you will be surrounded by the former and neglected by the latter.

Patricia Zebrowski, University of Iowa assistant professor of speech pathology and audiology, notes,  The body of data that resulted from Johnson’s work on children who stutter and their parents is still the largest collection of scientific information on the subject of stuttering onset. Although new work has determined that children who stutter are doing something different in their speech production than non-stutterers, Johnson was the first to talk about the importance of a stutterer’s thoughts, attitudes, beliefs, and feelings. We still don’t know what causes stuttering, but the ‘Iowa’ way of approaching study and treatment is still heavily influenced by Johnson, but with an added emphasis on speech production.

One of the most thorough single Web site collections of material regarding Wendell Johnson is http://www.uiowa.edu/~cyberlaw/oldinav/wjhome.html . It contains links to his Who’s Who in America entry and c.v., bibliographies, excerpts from his writing, audio of his general semantics lectures, articles by others about Johnson, and an excerpt from Robert Goldfarb, editor, Ethics: A Case Study from Fluency (2005).

The latter is a book devoted to an impartial scientific evaluation of the Monster Study after the experiment became national news in the wake of a series of articles conducted by an investigative reporter at the San Jose Mercury News in 2001. The panel of authors in the book consists mostly of speech pathologists who fail to reach any consensus on either the ethical ramifications or scientific consequences of the Monster Study. Richard Schwartz concludes in Chapter 6 of the book that the Monster Study  was unfortunate in Tudor and Johnson’s lack of regard for the potential harm to the children who participated and in their selection of institutionalized children simply because they were easily available. The deception and the apparent lack of debriefing were also not justifiable.  Other authors concur claiming the orphan experiment was not within the ethical boundaries of acceptable research. Others, however, felt that the ethical standards in 1939 were different from those used today. Some felt the study was poorly designed and executed by Tudor, and as a result the data offered no proof of Johnson’s subsequent theory that  stuttering begins, not in the child’s mouth but in the parent’s ear  — i.e., that it is the well-meaning parent’s effort to help the child avoid what the parent has labelled  stuttering  (but is in fact within the range of normal speech) that contributes to what ultimately becomes the problem diagnosed as stuttering.

External links
* http://www.uiowa.edu/~cyberlaw/oldinav/wjhome.html

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Johnson
Categories: 1906 births | 1965 deaths | American psychologists | General semantics | Human experimentation in the United States | People from McPherson County, Kansas | University of Iowa faculty

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Johnson

***

Jesse William Lazear
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jesse William Lazear

Jesse William Lazear
Born     2 May 1866
Baltimore
Died     26 September 1900
Quemados, Cuba
Nationality     American
Alma mater     Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons

Jesse William Lazear (2 May 1866, Baltimore – 26 September 1900 in Quemados, Cuba) was an American physician[1][2][3][4].

He was the son of William and Charlotte née Pettigrew. He attended Washington & Jefferson College [5] and obtained his Bachelor of Arts in 1889 from Johns Hopkins University and his PhD in Medicine in 1892 from the Medical School at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. He did his specialization in Paris at the Institut Pasteur. In 1896 he married Mabel Houston with whom he had two children.

He was a physician at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore starting in 1895; he studied malaria and yellow fever. In 1900 he reported for duty as the assistant surgeon at Columbia Barracks (Quemados) for the United States Army.

After a few months in Quemados, Lazear, together with Walter Reed (1851-1902), James Carroll (1854-1907) and Aristides Agramonte (1869-1931), participated in a commission studying the transmission of yellow fever, the Yellow Fever Board. During his research at Camp Colombia, he confirmed the 1881 theory of Carlos Finlay that mosquitos transmitted this disease. A portion of his study, though, had been conducted on himself: without telling his colleagues, he had allowed himself to be bitten by yellow fever-infected mosquitoes and died of the disease at age 34. A dormitory at Johns Hopkins University was named after him in honor of his sacrifice, as was the chemistry building at Washington & Jefferson College, Lazear’s alma mater.
[edit] References

1. ^ del Regato, J A (1986),  Jesse William Lazear: the successful experimental transmission of yellow fever by the mosquito. , Medical heritage 2 (6): 443–52, PMID 11613919
2. ^ Carmichael, E B (1972),  Jesse William Lazear. , The Alabama journal of medical sciences 9 (1): 102–14, 1972 Jan, PMID 4556484
3. ^ Osler; Paton; Thayer (Aug 1901),  JESSE WILLIAM LAZEAR MEMORIAL. , Science (New York, N.Y.) 14 (345): 225, 1901 Aug 9, doi:10.1126/science.14.345.225, ISSN 0036-8075, PMID 17797834
4. ^  JESSE WILLIAM LAZEAR. , Science (New York, N.Y.) 12 (311): 932–933, Dec 1900, 1900 Dec 14, doi:10.1126/science.12.311.932, ISSN 0036-8075, PMID 17796027
5. ^ Biography of Jesse W. Lazear | Military Medicine | Find Articles at BNET.com

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_William_Lazear
Categories: 1866 births | 1900 deaths | Deaths from yellow fever | Cuban-Americans | American physicians | Johns Hopkins Hospital physicians | Washington & Jefferson College alumni | Infectious disease deaths in Cuba | Human experimentation in the United States | Columbia Medical School alumni

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_William_Lazear

***

Edward Lazear
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Edward Paul Lazear

24th Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors
In office
2006 – 2009
President     George W. Bush
Preceded by     Ben Bernanke
Succeeded by     Christina Romer
Born     1948
Alma mater     University of California, Los Angeles
Harvard University

Edward Paul  Ed  Lazear (born 1948) is an award-winning American economist, considered the founder of personnel economics, and was the chief economic advisor to President George W. Bush.

Contents

* 1 Career
* 2 Research
* 3 Awards
* 4 Books
* 5 Patents
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 External links

Career

Lazear graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles with a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in economics in 1971. He received his doctorate in economics from Harvard University in 1974.

From 1985 to 1992, he was a professor of Urban and Labor Economics at the University of Chicago. Since 1992, he has been an economics professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Lazear has served as a research assistant at the National Bureau of Economic Research, as well as a research fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the Institute for the Study of Labor. He is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. In 1996, he founded the Society of Labor Economists. Prior to his nomination and confirmation as chief economic advisor to the President, Lazear was a member of Bush’s tax reform advisory panel in 2005.

Research

Lazear is the founding editor of the Journal of Labor Economics. He has published over 100 scholarly articles. [1]

Most of his work has to do with motivating and compensating workers. One of his most famous papers,  Rank-Order Tournaments as Optimum Labor Contracts,  argues that in certain circumstances, it is in a firm’s best interest to rank its employees and pay particularly high wages to the top-ranked employees. This helps explain why the highest jobs, like chief executive officer, often draw paychecks that are much higher than the next-highest jobs, even though the skill differences between those employees are not very high. It also helps explain the partnership structure of law firms, in which associate lawyers compete to become partners and earn a much higher salary. He has also analyzed how peer pressure and mandatory retirement can help reduce principal-agent problems in companies.

Awards

Lazear has won a number of awards over his career. Among those that he has won are:

* 1998 Leo Melamed Biennial Prize.
* 2003 Adam Smith Prize, European Association of Labor Economists.
* 2004 Prize in Labor Economics, Institute for the Study of Labor.

Books

* Lazear, Edward (1995). Personnel Economics. MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-12188-3.
* Edward Lazear, ed (1996). Culture Wars in America. Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 0-8179-5762-6.
* Lazear, Edward (1995). Economic Transition in Eastern Europe and Russia: Realities of Reform. Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 0-8179-9332-0.
* Lazear, Edward (2002). Education in the Twenty-first Century. Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 0-8179-2892-8.
* Lazear, Edward (2008). Personnel Economics in Practice. Wiley. ISBN 0-471-67592-1.

Patents

Edward Lazear is listed as a coinventor on 5 pending US patent applications.[1] Some of these pending patent applications are considered to be tax patents.[2] This has led to criticism of Lazear by organizations opposed to tax patents, such as Citizens for Tax Justice. Lazear, however, no longer has any ownership rights in these pending applications and cannot receive any royalties from them should they ever issue as valid patents. The full ownership rights to these applications are owned by Liquid Engines.

See also
* Tournament theory

References

1. ^ Pending US patent applications listing Edward Lazear as a coinventor and their corresponding international counterparts
2. ^ Stamper, Dustin  Bush Economist Listed as Inventor on Tax Strategy Patent Application , Tax Notes, September 17, 2001

External links

* Edward Lazear’s personal homepage.
* Lazear’s Hoover Institute bio.

Government offices
Preceded by
Ben Bernanke     Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
2006-2009     Succeeded by
Christina Romer

v • d • e
Chairs of the Council of Economic Advisers
Nourse A Keyserling A Burns A Saulnier A Heller A Ackley A Okun A McCracken A Stein A Greenspan A Schultze A Weidenbaum A Feldstein A Sprinkel A Boskin A Tyson A Stiglitz A Yellen A Baily A Hubbard A Mankiw A Rosen A Bernanke A Lazear A Romer

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lazear
Categories: 1948 births | Living people | University of California, Los Angeles alumni | Harvard University alumni | University of Chicago faculty | Stanford University faculty | American economists | United States Council of Economic Advisors | George W. Bush Administration personnel

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lazear

***

Category:George W. Bush Administration personnel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search

Individuals who served in a significant capacity in the executive branch during the George W. Bush Administration.
Subcategories

This category has only the following subcategory.
G

*
[+] George W. Bush Administration cabinet members (42 P)

Pages in category  George W. Bush Administration personnel

The following 124 pages are in this category, out of 124 total. This list may not reflect recent changes (learn more).
A

* Elliott Abrams
* David Addington
* Charles E. Allen
* Claude Allen
* Richard Armitage (politician)

B

* James Baker
* Stewart Baker
* Hector Barreto
* Thomas J. Barrett
* Merlin Bartz
* Rod Beckstrom
* Roy Bernardi
* Joshua Bolten
* Robert C. Bonner
* Eric M. Bost
* David Brailer
* Michael D. Brown

C

* Stephen Cambone
* Andrew Card
* Paul Cellucci
* David S. C. Chu
* Jay M. Cohen
* James B. Comey
* Charles F. Conner
* Seth Cropsey
* Jack Dyer Crouch, II

D

* Robert Delahunty
* William DeWitt, Jr.
* Susan Dudley

E

* Gary Edson
* Gordon R. England
* Clark Ervin

F

* J. Michael Farren
* Kenneth Feinberg
* Fred F. Fielding
* D. Cameron Findlay
* Linda Fisher
* Ari Fleischer
* Albert Frink
* Daniel Fried
* David Frum

G

* Greg Garcia

G cont.

* Pete Geren
* James K. Glassman
* Timothy Goeglein
* Alberto Gonzales
* Emilio T. Gonzalez
* Porter Goss
* Blake Gottesman
* J. Steven Griles

H

* Stephen Hadley
* Joe Hagin
* John P. Hannah
* William D. Hansen
* Michael Hayden
* Jay Hein
* Israel Hernandez
* Eugene W. Hickok
* Glenn Hubbard (economics)
* Karen Hughes
* Ray Lee Hunt

J

* Michael P. Jackson
* James Rispoli
* James Franklin Jeffrey
* Frank Jimenez
* John W. Keys
* Charles E. Johnson (government official)
* Stephen L. Johnson
* Robert Joseph

K

* Joel Kaplan
* Neel Kashkari
* Theodore Kassinger
* Eric Keroack

L
* Dave Lauriski
* Steven J. Law
* Edward Lazear
* James Loy

M

* Scott McClellan
* Leo Mackay, Jr.
* Paul McNulty
* John Magaw
* Gordon H. Mansfield
* Mary Matalin
* Kyle E. McSlarrow

M cont.

* Harriet Miers
* Alberto J. Mora
* Craig S. Morford
* Julie Myers

N

* John Negroponte
* Gale Norton

P

* Dana Perino
* Philip Perry

R

* Howard M. Radzely
* Robert C. Tapella
* John Rood
* Karl Rove

S

* David Safavian
* David Sampson
* Ellen Sauerbrey
* Lynn Scarlett
* Kori Schake
* Paul A. Schneider
* Clay Sell
* Robert J. Shea
* Raymond Simon
* Stewart Simonson
* Tony Snow
* William R. Steiger
* Hal Stratton

T

* Sara Taylor
* George Tenet
* Hugo Teufel III
* Carol Thompson
* Larry Thompson
* Randall L. Tobias
* Jim Towey
* Tevi Troy

W

* Jared Weinstein
* Christine Todd Whitman
* David Wilkins
* Richard S. Williamson
* Paul Wolfowitz

Y

* John Yoo

Z

* Robert Zoellick

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:George_W._Bush_Administration_personnel
Categories: Presidency of George W. Bush | United States government personnel by presidential administration | 21st-century United States government officials

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:George_W._Bush_Administration_personnel

***

And – Dick Cheney and John Bolton – (very, very bad humans)

***

Eric Keroack
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dr. Eric J. Keroack is an American obstetrician-gynecologist.[1]

In late 2006, he was named as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services, the office that oversees federally funded teenage pregnancy, family planning, and abstinence programs, using its $283 million annual budget.[2]

The nomination of Keroack, an anti-contraceptive advocate, to a position responsible for ensuring low-income women get access to birth control has been criticized.[3][4][5][6]

The Massachusetts native has faced criticism before, after making the claim that sex with multiple partners hurts women’s ability to bond by altering their brain chemistry.[7] He claims that premarital sex suppresses the hormone oxytocin, thereby impairing one’s ability to forge a successful long-term relationship.[8]

Before assuming his position with HHS on November 20, 2006, Keroack was the medical director of A Woman’s Concern, a Christian nonprofit organization based in Dorchester, Massachusetts. It runs six centers in the state that offer free pregnancy testing, ultrasounds and counseling and works to  help women escape the temptation and violence of abortion.  Its crisis pregnancy centers oppose contraception and do not distribute information concerning birth control.[2]

In January 2007, Keroack received  two formal warnings from the Massachusetts board of medicine ordering him to refrain from prescribing drugs to people who are not his patients and from providing mental health counseling without proper training. [9]

On March 29, 2007 Keroack resigned his position at HHS.[10]

References
1. ^ Health Grades, doctor profile for Dr. Eric Keroack
2. ^ a b  Contraception, abortion foe to head family-planning office . Associated Press. November 17, 2006. http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/11/17/family.planning.ap/index.html. Retrieved 2006-11-22.
3. ^  Bush’s Latest Appointment . The Huffington Post. November 17, 2006. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2006/11/17/bushs-latest-appointment_n_34349.html.
4. ^  The Family Un-Planner . slate.com. November 21, 2006. http://www.slate.com/id/2154249/.
5. ^  A bad choice for families . San Francisco Chronicle. November 24, 2006. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/11/24/EDG0ELJ4EV1.DTL&hw=Keroack&sn=001&sc=1000. Retrieved 2006-11-24.
6. ^  Sack that Quack Keroack: Reproductive Rights Community Steps up Fight to Oust Anti-Abortion Appointee . The Indypendent. January 10, 2007. http://www.indypendent.org/?p=718.
7. ^  Too much sex? Controversy surrounds Bush appointee . SooToday.com. November 20, 2006. http://www.sootoday.com/content/news/full_story.asp?StoryNumber=20991.
8. ^ Stacy Schiff (January 20, 2007).  Sex and the Single-Minded . The New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/2007/01/20/opinion/20schiff.html?th&emc=th. Retrieved 2007-01-21.
9. ^ Andrea Estes (2007-04-07).  Doctor who quit US post was warned by state Medical board cited prescriptions . Boston Globe. http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/04/07/doctor_who_quit_us_post_was_warned_by_state/.
10. ^ The Associated Press (2007-03-29]).  U.S. family planning head resigns after state agency acts against him . International Herald Tribune. http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/03/29/america/NA-GEN-US-Family-Planning-Resignation.php. Retrieved 2007-03-29.

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(They’re Monsters – the whole damn bunch of ‘em are monsters. – my note)

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Clara Maass
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Clara Maass.
Clara Louise Maass (June 28, 1876 – August 24, 1901) was an American nurse who died as a result of volunteering for medical experiments to study yellow fever. [1]

Contents

* 1 Early life
* 2 Army service
* 3 Yellow fever studies
* 4 Death
* 5 Legacy
* 6 References
* 7 External links

Early life

Clara Maass was born in East Orange, New Jersey to German immigrants Hedwig and Robert Maass. She was the oldest of 9 children in a devout Lutheran family.

In 1895 she became one of the first graduates of Newark German Hospital’s Christina Trefz Training School for Nurses. By 1898, she had been promoted to head nurse at Newark German Hospital where she was known for her hard work and dedication to her profession.

Army service

In April 1898, during the Spanish-American War, Maass volunteered as a contract nurse for the United States Army (the Army Nurse Corps did not yet exist). She served with the Seventh U. S. Army Corps from October 1, 1898 to February 5, 1899 in Jacksonville, Florida, Savannah, Georgia, and Santiago, Cuba. She was discharged in 1899 but then volunteered again with the Eighth U.S. Army Corps in the Philippines from November 1899 to mid-1900.
During her army service she saw few battle injuries, instead caring mostly for soldiers suffering from infectious diseases like typhoid, malaria, dengue and yellow fever. She contracted dengue in Manila and was sent home.

Yellow fever studies

Shortly after finishing her second assignment with the army, Maass returned to Cuba in October 1900 after being summoned by William Gorgas, who was working with the U.S. Army’s Yellow Fever Commission. The commission, headed by Major Walter Reed, was established during the post-war occupation of Cuba in order to investigate yellow fever, which was endemic in Cuba. One of the commission’s goals was to determine how the disease was spread: by mosquito bites or by contact with contaminated objects.

The commission recruited human subjects because they did not know of any animals that could contract yellow fever. In the first recorded instance of informed consent in human experiments, volunteers were told that participation in the studies might cause their deaths. As an incentive, volunteers were paid US$100, which was a large amount at the time, with an additional $100 if the volunteer became ill.

In March 1901, Maass volunteered to be bitten by a Culex fasciata mosquito (now called Aedes aegypti) that had been allowed to feed on yellow fever patients. She contracted a mild case of the disease from which she quickly recovered. By this time, the researchers were certain that mosquitoes were the route of transmission, but lacked the scientific evidence to prove it because some volunteers who were bitten remained healthy. Maass continued to volunteer for experiments.

Death

On August 14, 1901, Maass allowed herself to be bitten by infected mosquitoes for the second time. The researchers were hoping to show that her earlier case of yellow fever was sufficient to immunize her against the disease. Unfortunately, this was not the case. Maass once again became ill with yellow fever on August 18 and died on August 24. Her death roused public sentiment and put an end to yellow fever experiments on humans.[citation needed]

Maass was buried in Colon Cemetery in Havana with military honors. Her body was moved to Fairmount Cemetery, Newark, New Jersey, on February 20, 1902.[2]

Legacy
A 13¢ US postage stamp in Maass’ honor. The caption reads  She gave her life .

* In 1951, the 50th anniversary of her death, Cuba issued a postage stamp in her honor.
* On June 19, 1952, Newark German Hospital (which had since moved to Belleville, New Jersey) was renamed Clara Maass Memorial Hospital, and it is now known as Clara Maass Medical Center.
* In 1976, the 100th anniversary of her birth, Maass was honored with a 13¢ United States commemorative stamp.
* Also in 1976, the American Nurses Association inducted her into its Nursing Hall of Fame.
* The Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church honors her on August 13 with Florence Nightingale as a  Renewer of Society .

References

1. ^  Yellow Fever Experiments Have Deadly Results. Clara Maass, the Girl Martyr, Buried In Colon Cemetery. She Was the Third to Die Out of Eight Bitten -Hers Was a Pathetic Case, a Trained Nurse, Who Had Served on the Battlefields of Santiago and About Manila, Often Exposed to Fever Infection. Girl Martyr. Clara Maass, Trained Nurse, the Third to Die in the Yellow Fever Experiments in Havana, Order to Turn Over Testimony. Cuban Newspaper Man Killed. . Boston Globe. August 27, 1901.  Of the eight persons bitten by infected mosquitoes in connection with yellow fever board during the last three weeks three have died.
2. ^ Clara Louise Maass, Find A Grave. Accessed August 23, 2007.

External links

* American Nurses Association Hall of Fame
* Clara Maass entry at Find A Grave with photos of her headstone, both before and after vandalism.

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_Maass
Categories: 1876 births | 1901 deaths | Deaths from yellow fever | People from Essex County, New Jersey | American Lutherans | Female saints | German Americans | American nurses | People of the Spanish-American War | Female wartime nurses | Burials in Fairmount Cemetery, Newark | Scientific misconduct | Medical ethics | Infectious disease deaths in Cuba | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_Maass

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Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine is a 2005 book which discusses the work of controversial psychiatrist Henry Cotton at Trenton State Hospital in New Jersey in the 1920s. Cotton became convinced that insanity was fundamentally a biological disorder and he surgically removed body parts to try to improve mental health.[1][2][3][4] This often began with the removal of teeth and tonsils:

An 18 year-old girl with agitated depression successively had her upper and lower molars extracted, a tonsillectomy, sinus drainage, treatment for an infected cervix, removal of intestinal adhesions — all without effecting improvement in her psychiatric condition. Then the remainder of her teeth were removed and she was sent home, pronounced cured.[1]

Scull argues that Cotton’s obsession with focal sepsis as the root cause of mental illness  persisted in spite of all evidence to the contrary and the frightening incidence of death and harm from the operations he initiated .[1] Cotton’s approach attracted some detractors, but the medical establishment of the day did not effectively renounce or discipline him.[1]

One reviewer called Madhouse  a fine piece of historical research with a modern relevance , and added that  it makes compelling reading .[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Ian Freckelton. Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine. (Book review), Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, Vol. 12, No. 2, 2005, pp. 435-438.
2. ^ David Gollaher. Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine (review), Journal of Social History, Volume 39, Number 4, Summer 2006, pp. 1221-1223.
3. ^ Book Review: Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine, BMJ, 330:1276 (28 May 2005).
4. ^ Book Review: Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine, History of Psychiatry, Vol. 17, No. 4, 499-500 (2006).

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madhouse:_A_Tragic_Tale_of_Megalomania_and_Modern_Medicine
Categories: Psychiatry | Medical books | Ethics books | 2005 books | Human experimentation in the United States

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Medical Apartheid
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present is a 2007 book by Harriet A. Washington. It is a comprehensive history of medical experimentation on African Americans. From the era of slavery to the present day, this book presents the first full account of black America’s mistreatment as unwitting subjects of medical experimentation. Medical Apartheid won the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction.[1][2]

See also

* Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male
* The Plutonium Files
* Acres of Skin

References

1. ^ Medical Apartheid
2. ^ Unequal Treatment
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_Apartheid
Categories: 2007 books | Medical books | American books | Human experimentation in the United States | National Book Critics Circle Award winner

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_Apartheid

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Acres of Skin
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Acres of Skin: Human Experiments at Holmesburg Prison is a 1998 book by Allen M. Hornblum, published by Routledge, ISBN 0-415-91990-8. The book documents clinical non-therapeutic medical experiments on prison inmates at Holmesburg Prison in Philadelphia from 1951 to 1974, conducted under the direction of dermatologist Albert M. Kligman.[1] The title of the book is a reference to Kligman’s reaction on seeing hundreds of prisoners when he entered the prison:  All I saw before me were acres of skin  …  It was like a farmer seeing a fertile field for the first time .[2]

The publication of Acres of Skin in 1998 attracted considerable international media interest.[3] The book has been reviewed in several journals including the International Journal of Dermatology,[4] Social History of Medicine[5] and Canadian Journal of History.[1]

References

1. ^ a b Theresa Richardson. Acres of Skin: Human Experiments at Holmesburg Prison (Review) Canadian Journal of History, April 1, 2001.
2. ^ Allen M. Hornblum. Sentenced to Science: One Black Man’s Story of Imprisonment in America, The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007, p. 52.
3. ^ Allen M. Hornblum. Sentenced to Science: One Black Man’s Story of Imprisonment in America, The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007, p. ix.
4. ^ Jeanine Millikan. Book Review: Acres of Skin International Journal of Dermatology, 38(2): 158, February 1999.
5. ^ T.W. Laqueur. Book Review: Acres of Skin: Human Experiments at Holmesburg Prison Social History of Medicine, Volume 16, Number 1, April 2003 , pp. 159-161.

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acres_of_Skin
Categories: Human experimentation | Medical books | 1998 books

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acres_of_Skin

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The Plutonium Files
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Plutonium Files: America’s Secret Medical Experiments in the Cold War is a 1999 book by Eileen Welsome. It is a history of U.S. government-engineered radiation experiments on unwitting Americans, based on the Pulitzer Prize–winning series Welsome wrote for the Albuquerque Tribune.[1][2]

The purpose of the experiments was to assess the effect of radioactivity on the human body. For example, between April 1945 and July 1947, 18 people were injected with plutonium by doctors associated with the Manhattan Project. None of these men, women, and children were told what was being done, and none gave informed consent. Most of the subjects, Welsome writes,  were the poor, the powerless, and the sick — the very people who count most on the government to protect them .[3]

These medical experiments were covered up for 40 years. When they became public, the government apologized but not a single doctor or hospital was publicly blamed.[3]

One reviewer stated that the Welsome’s book is a  powerful indictment of an important part of the Manhattan Project and a warning of the evil that supposedly high-minded people can do when convinced of their own superiority and devoted to a goal that blinds them to simple humanity .[3]

See also

* Research Involving Prisoners
* Medical apartheid
* Acres of Skin

References

1. ^ Book review The New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 341:1941-1942, December 16, 1999.
2. ^ Book Review Bulletin of the History of Medicine, Volume 76, Number 3, Fall 2002, pp. 637-638.
3. ^ a b c R.C. Longworth. Injected  Book review:The Plutonium Files: America’s Secret Medical Experiments in the Cold War, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Nov/Dec 1999, 55(6): 58-61.

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Tuskegee syphilis experiment
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male)
Jump to: navigation, search
Tuskegee study  redirects here. For the studies associated with the recruitment and training of the Tuskegee Airmen, see Tuskegee Airmen.
Depression-era U.S. poster advocating early syphilis treatment. Although treatments were available, participants in the study did not receive them.

The Tuskegee syphilis experiment[1] (also known as the Tuskegee syphilis study or Public Health Service syphilis study) was a clinical study conducted between 1932 and 1972 in Tuskegee, Alabama, by the U.S. Public Health Service. Investigators recruited 399 impoverished African-American sharecroppers with syphilis for research related to the natural progression of the untreated disease, in hopes of justifying treatment programs for blacks.[2]

The 40-year study was controversial for reasons related to ethical standards, primarily because researchers failed to treat patients appropriately after the 1940s validation of penicillin as an effective cure for the disease. Revelation of study failures led to major changes in U.S. law and regulation on the protection of participants in clinical studies. Now studies require informed consent, communication of diagnosis, and accurate reporting of test results.[3]

When the study began in 1932, standard medical treatments for syphilis were toxic, dangerous, and of questionable effectiveness. Part of the study goal was to determine if patients were better off not being treated with such toxic remedies. Additionally, researchers wanted to understand each stage of the disease in hopes of developing suitable treatments for each.

By 1947 penicillin had become the standard treatment for syphilis. Choices might have included treating all syphilitic subjects and closing the study, or splitting off a control group for testing with penicillin. Instead, the Tuskegee scientists continued the study, withholding penicillin and information about it from the patients. In addition, scientists prevented participants from accessing syphilis treatment programs available to others in the area. The study continued, under numerous supervisors, until 1972, when a leak to the press resulted in its termination. Victims included numerous men who died of syphilis, wives who contracted the disease, and children born with congenital syphilis.[4]

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study, cited as  arguably the most infamous biomedical research study in U.S. history, [5] led to the 1979 Belmont Report and the establishment of the Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP).[6] It also led to federal regulation requiring Institutional Review Boards for protection of human subjects in studies involving human subjects. The Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP) manages this responsibility within the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).[7]

Contents

* 1 History
o 1.1 Study clinicians
o 1.2 Study details
* 2 Study termination and aftermath
* 3 Ethical implications
* 4 In popular culture
* 5 Original Study papers
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 Further reading
* 9 External links

History
Study clinicians
Some of the Tuskegee Study Group clinicians. Dr. Reginald D. James (third to right), a black physician involved with public health work in Macon County, was not directly involved in the study. Nurse Rivers is on the left.

The venereal disease section of the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) formed a study group at its national headquarters. Dr. Taliaferro Clark was credited with its origin. His initial goal was to follow untreated syphilis in a group of black men for 6 to 9 months, and then follow up with a treatment phase. When he understood the intention of other study members to use deceptive practices, Dr. Clark disagreed with the plan to conduct an extended study.[clarification needed] He retired the year after the study began.

Representing the PHS, Clark had solicited the participation of the Tuskegee Institute (a historically black college (HBCU) that was well-known in Alabama) and of the Arkansas regional PHS office. Dr. Eugene Dibble, an African-American doctor, was head of the John Andrew Hospital at the Tuskegee Institute. Dr. Oliver C. Wenger was director of the regional PHS Venereal Disease Clinic in Hot Springs, Arkansas. He and his staff took a lead in developing study procedures.

Wenger and his staff played a critical role in developing early study protocols. Wenger continued to advise and assist the Tuskegee Study when it turned into a long-term, no-treatment observational study.[8]

Dr. Raymond H. Vonderlehr was appointed on-site director of the research program and developed the policies that shaped the long-term follow-up section of the project. For example, he decided to gain the  consent  of the subjects for spinal taps (to look for signs of neurosyphilis) by depicting the diagnostic test as a  special free treatment . In correspondence from the time, Wenger congratulated Vonderlehr for his  flair for framing letters to negros . Vonderlehr retired as head of the venereal disease section in 1943, shortly after penicillin had first been shown to be a cure for syphilis.

Nurse Eunice Rivers, an African-American trained at Tuskegee Institute who worked at its affiliated John Andrew Hospital, was recruited at the start of the study. Dr. Vonderlehr was a strong advocate for her participation, as she was the direct link to the community. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the Tuskegee Study began by offering lower class African Americans, who often could not afford health care, the chance to join  Miss Rivers’ Lodge . Patients were to receive free physical examinations at Tuskegee University, free rides to and from the clinic, hot meals on examination days, and free treatment for minor ailments.

As the study became long term, Nurse Rivers became the chief person with continuity. Unlike the changing slate of national, regional and on-site PHS administrators, doctors, and researchers, Rivers stayed at Tuskegee University. She was the only study staff person to work with participants for the full 40 years. By the 1950s, Nurse Rivers had become pivotal to the study—her personal knowledge of the subjects enabled maintenance of long-term follow up. In the study’s later years, Dr. John R. Heller led the national division.
“     For the most part, doctors and civil servants simply did their jobs. Some merely followed orders, others worked for the glory of science.     ”
—Dr John Heller, Director of the Public Health Service’s Division of Venereal Diseases[9]

By the late 1940s, doctors, hospitals and public health centers throughout the country routinely treated diagnosed syphilis with penicillin. In the period following World War II, the revelation of the Holocaust and related Nazi medical abuses brought about changes in international law. Western allies formulated the Nuremberg Code to protect the rights of research subjects. No one appeared to have reevaluated the protocols of the Tuskegee Study according to the new standards.

In 1972 the Tuskegee Study was brought to public and national attention by a whistleblower, who gave information to the Washington Star and the New York Times. Heller of PHS still defended the ethics of the study, stating:  The men’s status did not warrant ethical debate. They were subjects, not patients; clinical material, not sick people. [10]

Dr. Taliaferro Clark

Dr. Oliver Wenger

Dr. Raymond Vonderlehr

Dr. John Heller

Dr. Eugene Dibble

Eunice Rivers, nurse and study co-ordinator

Charlie Pollard, survivor

Herman Shaw, survivor

Study details

Subject blood draw, circa 1953
The Tuskegee Study Group Letter inviting subjects to receive  special treatment , actually a diagnostic lumbar puncture.
The study began as a clinical trial of the incidence of syphilis in the Macon County population. Initially, subjects were studied for six to eight months, then treated with contemporary methods including Salvarsan, mercurial ointments, and bismuth. These methods were, at best, mildly effective; the disadvantage that these were all highly toxic was balanced by the fact that no other methods were known. The Tuskegee Institute participated in the study, as its representatives understood the intent was to benefit public health in this poor population.[11] The Tuskegee University-affiliated hospital effectively loaned the PHS its medical facilities. Other predominantly black institutions and local black doctors also participated. The Rosenwald Fund, a major Chicago-based philanthropy devoted to black education and community development in the South, provided financial support to pay for the eventual treatment of the patients. Initially, study researchers recruited 399 syphilitic Black men, and 201 healthy Black men as controls.

Continuing effects of the Stock Market Crash of 1929 and the beginning of the Great Depression led the Rosenwald Fund to withdraw its offer of funding. Study directors initially thought this might mean the end of the study, as there was no funding to buy medication for the treatment phase of the study. They issued a final report.

In 1928 the Oslo Study in Norway had reported on the pathologic manifestations of untreated syphilis in several hundred white males. This study was a retrospective study; investigators pieced together information from patients who had already contracted syphilis and had remained untreated for some time.

The Tuskegee study group decided to salvage their work and perform a prospective study equivalent to the Oslo Study. This was not inherently unethical; since there was nothing the investigators could do therapeutically at the time, they could study the natural progression of the disease as long as they did not harm their subjects. They reasoned that the knowledge gained would benefit humankind. In the end, however, they did harm their subjects, by depriving them of appropriate treatment after it had been discovered. The study was characterized as  the longest non-therapeutic experiment on human beings in medical history. [12]

Ethical considerations were limited from the start, and rapidly deteriorated. For example, to ensure that the men would show up for the possibly dangerous, painful, diagnostic and non-therapeutic spinal tap, the doctors sent the 400 patients a misleading letter titled,  Last Chance for Special Free Treatment  (see insert). The study also required all participants to undergo an autopsy after death—in order to receive funeral benefits. After penicillin was discovered as a cure, researchers continued to deny such treatment to many study participants. Many patients were lied to and given placebo treatments— so that researchers could observe the progression of the fatal disease.[11] In 1934, the Tuskegee Study published its first clinical data, and issued their first major report in 1936. This was prior to the discovery of penicillin as a treatment for syphilis. The study was not secret; it issued several published reports and data sets appeared throughout its duration.

By 1947 penicillin had become standard therapy for syphilis. The US government sponsored several public health programs to form  rapid treatment centers  to eradicate the disease. When campaigns to eradicate venereal disease came to Macon County, however, study researchers prevented their patients from participating.[13] During World War II, 250 of the subject men registered for the draft. They were consequently diagnosed and ordered to obtain treatment for syphilis before they could be taken into the armed services.[13]

PHS researchers prevented them from getting treatment, thus depriving them of chances for a cure, service to the nation, and gaining the benefit of the GI Bill for education, passed after the war. At the time, the PHS representative was quoted as saying:  So far, we are keeping the known positive patients from getting treatment. [13]

By the end of the study in 1972, only 74 of the test subjects were alive. Twenty-eight of the original 399 men had died of syphilis, 100 were dead of related complications, 40 of their wives had been infected, and 19 of their children were born with congenital syphilis.

Study termination and aftermath

Peter Buxtun, a PHS venereal disease investigator, the  whistle-blower .

In 1966 Peter Buxtun, a PHS venereal-disease investigator in San Francisco, sent a letter to the national director of the Division of Venereal Diseases to express his concerns about the ethics and morality of the extended Tuskegee Study. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) (which by then controlled the study) reaffirmed the need to continue the study until completion (until all subjects had died and been autopsied). To bolster its position, the CDC sought and gained support for the continuation of the study from local chapters of the National Medical Association (representing African-American physicians) and the American Medical Association (AMA).

In 1968 William (Bill) Carter Jenkins, an African-American statistician in the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS), part of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW), founded and edited The Drum, a newsletter devoted to ending racial discrimination in HEW. The cabinet-level department included the CDC. In The Drum, Jenkins called for an end to the Tuskegee Study. He did not succeed; it is not clear who read his work.[14]

Buxtun finally went to the press in the early 1970s. The story broke first in the Washington Star on July 25, 1972. It became front-page news in the New York Times the following day. Senator Ted Kennedy called Congressional hearings, at which Buxtun and HEW officials testified. As a result of public outcry, in 1972, the CDC and PHS appointed an ad hoc advisory panel to review the study. It determined the study was medically unjustified and ordered its termination. As part of a settlement of a class action lawsuit subsequently filed by the NAACP, the U.S. government paid $9 million and agreed to provide free medical treatment to surviving participants, as well as to surviving family members infected as a consequence of the study.

In 1974 Congress passed the National Research Act and created a commission, to study and write regulations governing studies involving human participants. On May 16, 1997, President Bill Clinton formally apologized and held a ceremony for the Tuskegee study participants:  What was done cannot be undone. But we can end the silence. We can stop turning our heads away. We can look at you in the eye and finally say on behalf of the American people, what the United States government did was shameful, and I am sorry … To our African American citizens, I am sorry that your federal government orchestrated a study so clearly racist. [15] Five of the eight remaining study survivors attended the White House ceremony.

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study significantly damaged the trust of the black community toward public health efforts in the United States. [16] As a result, many distrust the medical community and are reluctant to participate in programs such as organ donation. The study may also have contributed to the reluctance of many poor black people to seek routine preventive care.[17] Two groups of researchers at Johns Hopkins debated the effects that the Tuskegee Study has had on blacks and their willingness to participate in medical trials.[18] Distrust of the government because of the study has contributed to persistent rumors in the black community that the government was responsible for the HIV/AIDS crisis by having introduced the virus to the black community.  In 1990, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference conducted a survey among 1056 African American Church members in five cities. They found that 34% of the respondents believed that AIDS was an artificial virus, 35% believed that AIDS is a form of genocide, and 44% believed that the government is not telling the truth about AIDS. [10]

Ethical implications

The ethics of the early stages of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study can be considered in contrast to developments after the use of penicillin was verified as valid treatment. In 1932 treatments for syphilis were relatively ineffective and had severe side effects.[19] Researchers knew that syphilis was particularly prevalent in poor, black communities.[20] Prevailing medical ethics at the time did not have the exacting standards for informed consent, which is now expected. Doctors routinely withheld information about patients’ conditions from them.[citation needed]

After penicillin was found to be an effective treatment for syphilis, the study continued for another 25 years without treating those suffering from the disease. After the study and its consequences became front-page news, it was ended in a day.[19] The aftershocks of this study led directly to the establishment of the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research and the National Research Act. This act requires the establishment of Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) at institutions receiving federal grants.

In popular culture

* Gil Scott-Heron released a 33-second song  Tuskeegee 626  on the Bridges album.
* Dr. David Feldshuh wrote a stage play in 1992 based on the history of the Tuskegee study, titled Miss Evers’ Boys. It was a runner-up for the 1992 Pulitzer Prize in drama,[21] In 1997 it was adapted for an HBO made-for-TV movie. The HBO adaptation was nominated for eleven Emmy Awards,[22] and won in four categories.[23]
* Frank Zappa’s musical Thing-Fish was loosely inspired by the events.
* Don Byron’s debut album, Tuskegee Experiments, is named after the study.
* The television series New York Undercover used the study as the subject of a second-season episode titled  Bad Blood .
* Marvel Comics’ limited series Truth: Red, White & Black reinterpreted the Tuskegee Experiment as part of the Weapon Plus program.
* In novel Rant by Chuck Palahniuk epidemiologist Phoebe Truffeau tells about this experiment.
* In the pilot episode of House, Dr. Cuddy refers to House’s experimental treatments with  You don’t prescribe medicine based on guesses. At least we don’t since Tuskegee and Mengele.

Original Study papers
* Caldwell, J. G; E. V. Price, et al. (1973).  Aortic regurgitation in the Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis . J Chronic Dis 26 (3): 187–94.
* Hiltner, S. (1973).  The Tuskegee Syphilis Study under review . Christ Century 90 (43): 1174–6.
* Kampmeier, R. H. (1972).  The Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis . South Med J 65 (10): 1247–51.
* Kampmeier, R. H. (1974).  Final report on the  Tuskegee syphilis study . South Med J 67 (11): 1349–53.
* Olansky, S.; L. Simpson, et al. (1954).  Environmental factors in the Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis . Public Health Rep 69 (7): 691–8.
* Rockwell, D. H.; A. R. Yobs, et al. (1964).  The Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis; the 30th Year of Observation . Arch Intern Med 114: 792–8.
* Schuman, S. H.; S. Olansky, et al. (1955).  Untreated syphilis in the male negro; background and current status of patients in the Tuskegee study. . J Chronic Dis 2 (5): 543–58.

See also

* World Medical Association
* International Conference on Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Registration of Pharmaceuticals for Human Use
* Declaration of Geneva
* Declaration of Helsinki
* Operation Whitecoat

References

1. ^  Tuskegee Study – Timeline . NCHHSTP. CDC. 2008-06-25. http://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
2. ^ http://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm
3. ^  Final Report of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study Legacy Committee . Tuskegee Syphilis Study Legacy Committee. 1996-05-20. http://www.hsl.virginia.edu/historical/medical_history/bad_blood/report.cfm. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
4. ^ Heller J (1972-07-26).  Syphilis Victims in U.S. Study Went Untreated for 40 Years; Syphilis Victims Got No Therapy . New York Times (Associated Press). http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40616F6345A137B93C4AB178CD85F468785F9. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
5. ^ Katz RV, Kegeles SS, Kressin NR, et al. (November 2006).  The Tuskegee Legacy Project: willingness of minorities to participate in biomedical research . J Health Care Poor Underserved 17 (4): 698–715. doi:10.1353/hpu.2006.0126. PMID 17242525. PMC: 1780164. http://muse.jhu.edu/cgi-bin/resolve_openurl.cgi?issn=1049-2089&volume=17&issue=4&spage=698&aulast=Katz.
6. ^ Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP) (2005-06-23).  Protection of Human Subjects . Title 45, Code of Federal Regulations, Part 46. US Department of Health and Human Services. http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/guidance/45cfr46.htm. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
7. ^  Office for Human Research Protections . Department of Health and Human Services. 2008-09-28. http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
8. ^ DiClemente RJ, Blumenthal DS (2003). Community-based health research: issues and methods. New York: Springer Pub. pp. 50. ISBN 0-8261-2025-3. http://www.google.co.in/books?id=KN_-9lwSI5oC.
9. ^ Alexander Cockburn; Jeffrey St. Clair (1998). Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press. London: Verso. pp. 67. ISBN 1859841392. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=s5qIj_h_PtkC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=%22some+merely+followed+orders,+others+worked+for+the+glory+of+science+&source=web&ots=zcnx0d0xsd&sig=M-IcQ5KHCBmaEjNgZG1B72FA0aQ&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result.
10. ^ a b  Research Ethics: The Tuskegee Syphilis Study . Tuskegee University. http://www.tuskegee.edu/Global/Story.asp?s=1207598. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
11. ^ a b Parker, Laura (1997-04-28).  ‘Bad Blood’ Still Flows In Tuskegee Study . USA Today. http://www.tuskegee.edu/global/Story.asp?s=1209852. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
12. ^ Jones J (1981). Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment. New York: Free Press. ISBN 0029166764.
13. ^ a b c  Doctor of Public Health Student Handbook  (PDF). University of Kentucky College of Public Health. 2004. pp. 17. http://www.ukcph.org/Portals/0/DoctorofPublicHealth/Dr.P.HStudentHandbook.pdf.
14. ^ Bill Jenkins left the PHS in the mid-1970s for doctoral studies. In 1980, he joined the CDC Division of Sexually Transmitted Diseases, where he managed the Participants Health Benefits Program that ensured health services for survivors of the Tuskegee Study.
15. ^  Remarks by the President in apology for study done in Tuskegee . Office of the Press Secretary, The White House. 1997-05-16. http://clinton4.nara.gov/textonly/New/Remarks/Fri/19970516-898.html. Retrieved 2009-09-06.
16. ^ Thomas SB, Quinn SC (November 1991).  The Tuskegee Syphilis Study, 1932 to 1972: implications for HIV education and AIDS risk education programs in the black community . Am J Public Health 81 (11): 1498–505. PMID 1951814. PMC: 1405662. http://www.ajph.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=1951814.
17. ^ Cohen E (2007-02-26).  Tuskegee’s ghosts: Fear hinders black marrow donation . CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/02/07/bone.marrow/index.html. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
18. ^  Did Tuskegee damage trust on clinical trials? . CNN. 2008-03-17. http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/03/17/clinical.trials.ap/index.html. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
19. ^ a b Chadwick A (2002-07-25).  Remembering the Tuskegee Experiment . NPR. http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/2002/jul/tuskegee/. Retrieved 2008-12-04.
20. ^ Merril RM, Timmreck TC (2006).  Experimental Studies in Epidemiology – Ethics in Experimental Research . Introduction to Epidemiology. Sudbury, Mass.: Jones and Bartlett Publishers. pp. 195. ISBN 0763735825.
21. ^  The Pulitzer Prizes : Drama . The Pulitzer Prizes — Columbia University. http://www.pulitzer.org/bycat/Drama.
22. ^ Geddes, Darryl (1997-09-11).  HBO’s adaptation of Feldshuh’s play Miss Evers’ Boys is up for 12 Emmys . Cornell Chronicle. http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/97/9.11.97/Emmys.html.
23. ^  Awards for Miss Evers’ Boys . IMDb. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119679/awards.

Further reading
* Gjestland T.  The Oslo study of untreated syphilis: an epidemiologic investigation of the natural course of the syphilitic infection based upon a re-study of the Boeck-Bruusgaard material,  Acta Derm Venereol (1955) 35(Suppl 34):3-368.
* Gray, Fred D. (1998). The Tuskegee Syphilis Study: The Real Story and Beyond. Montgomery, Alabama: NewSouth Books.
* Jones, James H. (1981). Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment. New York: Free Press.
* The Deadly Deception, by Denisce DiAnni, PBS/WGBH NOVA documentary video, 1993.
* Reverby, Susan M. (1998).  History of an Apology: From Tuskegee to the White House . Research Nurse.
* Reverby, Susan M. (2000). Tuskegee’s Truths: Rethinking the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. University of North Carolina Press.
* Reverby, Susan M. (2009). Examining Tuskegee: The Infamous Syphilis Study and its Legacy. University of North Carolina Press.
* Jean Heller (Associated Press),  Syphilis Victims in the U.S. Study Went Untreated for 40 Years  New York Times, July 26, 1972: 1, 8.
* Thomas, Stephen B; Sandra Crouse Quinn (1991).  The Tuskegee Syphilis Study, 1932-1972: Implications for HIV Education and AIDS Risk Programs in the Black Community . American Journal of Public Health 81 (1503).
* Carlson, Elof Axel (2006). Times of triumph, times of doubt : science and the battle for the public trust. Cold Spring Harbor Press. ISBN 0-87969-805-5.
* Washington, Harriet A. (2007). Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans From Colonial Times to the Present.

External links

* CDC Tuskegee Syphilis Study Page
* Excellent review of the TSS
* Patient medical files held at National Archives and Records Administration Southeast Region, Morrow, GA
* Mary Harper; Leader in Minority Health
* Interview at Democracy Now : Ogg Vorbis recording, interview transcript
* Interview at NPR: ‘Medical Apartheid’ Tracks History of Abuses
* IHT book review: Book Review: Medical Apartheid
* Tuskegee Syphilis Study article, Encyclopedia of Alabama
* New York Times review of HBO movie  Miss Evers’ Boys

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment
Categories: History of Alabama | Infectious diseases | Human experimentation in the United States | Tuskegee University | Medical ethics | Medical controversies | Health disasters | Clinical trials | History of racism in the United States | Scientific misconduct

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Study_of_Untreated_Syphilis_in_the_Negro_Male

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(Above site includes photos of the doctors and scientists who did this and makes a virtual rogues morgue of very educated bad men)

***

Oklahoma City sonic boom tests
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Oklahoma City sonic boom tests, also known as Operation Bongo II, refer to a controversial experiment in which 1,253 sonic booms were carried out over Oklahoma City, Oklahoma over a period of six months in 1964. The experiment, which ran from February 3 through July 29, 1964 inclusive, intended to quantify the effects of transcontinental supersonic transport (SST) aircraft on a city. The program was managed by the Federal Aviation Administration, which enlisted the aid of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the U.S. Air Force. Public opinion measurement was subcontracted to the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) of the University of Chicago.

It was not the first experiment, as tests had been done at Wallops Island, Virginia in 1958 and 1960, at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada in 1960 and 1961, and in St. Louis, Missouri in 1961 and 1962. However, none of these tests examined sociological and economic factors in any detail. The Oklahoma City experiments were vastly larger in scope, seeking to measure the boom’s effect on structures and public attitude, and to develop standards for boom prediction and insurance data.

Oklahoma City was chosen, as the region’s population was perceived to be relatively tolerant for such an experiment. The city had an economic dependency on the FAA’s Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center and Tinker Air Force Base, both of which were based there.

The sonic booms
Starting on February 3, 1964, the first sonic booms began, eight booms per day that began at 7 a.m. and ended in the afternoon. The noise was limited to 1.0 to 1.5 pound-force per square foot (48 to 72 pascal) for the first twelve weeks, then increased to 1.5 to 2.0 psf (72 to 96 pascal) for the final fourteen weeks. This range was about equal to that expected from an SST. Though eight booms per day were harsh, the peak overpressures of 2.0 psf were an order of magnitude lower than that needed to shatter glass, and are considered marginally irritating according to published standards. The Air Force used F-104 and B-58 aircraft, with the occasional F-101 and F-106.

Oklahomans initially took the tests in stride. This was chalked up to the booms being predictable and coming at specific times. An FAA-hired camera crew, filming a group of construction workers, were surprised to find that the booms signaled their lunch break.

However, in the first 14 weeks, 147 windows in the city’s two tallest buildings, the First National Bank and Liberty National Bank, were broken. By late spring, organized civic groups were already springing into action, but were rebuffed by city politicians, who asked them to show legislators their support. An attempt to lodge an injunction against the tests was denied by district court Judge Stephen Chandler, who said that the plaintiffs could not establish that they suffered any mental or physical harm and that the tests were a vital national need. A restraining order was then sought, which brought a pause to the tests on May 13 until it was decided that the court had exceeded its authority.

Pressure mounted from within. The federal Bureau of the Budget lambasted the FAA about poor experiment design, while complaints flooded into Oklahoma Senator A. S. Mike Monroney’s office. Finally, East Coast newspapers began to pick up the issue, turning on the national spotlight. On June 6 the Saturday Review published an article titled The Era of Supersonic Morality, which criticized the manner in which the FAA had targeted a city without consulting local government. By July, the Washington Post reported on the turmoil at the local and state level in Oklahoma. Oklahoma City council members were finally beginning to respond to citizen complaints and put pressure on Washington.

The pressure put a premature end to the tests. On July 30, the tests were over. An Oklahoma City Times headline reported:  Silence is deafening   Zhivko D. Angeluscheff, a prominent hearing specialist serving with the National Academy of Science, recalled:  I was witness to the fact that men were executing their brethren during six long months … with their thunder, the sonic boom, they were punishing all living creatures on earth.

The fallout

The results of the experiment, reported by NORC, were released beginning in February, 1965.[1][2][3] The FAA was displeased by the overly academic style of the report, but stressed the positive findings, saying  the overwhelming majority felt they could learn to live with the numbers and kinds of booms experienced.  Indeed, the NORC reported that 73% of subjects in the study said that they could live indefinitely with eight sonic booms per day, while 25% said that they couldn’t. About 3% of the population telephoned, sued, or wrote protest letters, but Oklahoma City surgeons and hospitals filed no complaints.

However, with the city population at 500,000, that 3% figure represented 15,000 upset individuals. At least 15,452 complaints and 4,901 claims were lodged against the U.S. government, most for cracked glass and plaster. The FAA rejected 94% of all the claims it received, fueling a rising tide of anger that soared even after the experiment’s conclusion. By 1965, Oklahoma Senator Mike Monroney had grown extremely upset over hundreds of letters from his constituents complaining about the FAA’s  cavalier manner  of dismissing claims, and began demanding frequent reports from the agency. As late as May 1966, the FAA was still attempting to respond to all of Monroney’s inquiries. The SST program lost all support from Monroney, who had initially been a key supporter.

The Oklahoma City experiments were partly to blame for weakening the FAA’s authority in sonic boom issues. After the tests, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s presidential advisory committee transferred matters of policy from the FAA to the National Academy of Science. Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall complained that the NAS did not include one environmental preservationist, and pointed out that although the Oklahoma City tests were stacked in favor of the SST, they were still extremely negative. Indeed by 1966, national grassroots campaigns against sonic booms were beginning to affect public policy.
The FAA’s poor handling of claims and its payout of only $123,000 led to a class action lawsuit against the U.S. government. On March 8, 1969, the government lost its appeal. The negative publicity associated with the tests partially influenced the 1971 cancellation of the Boeing 2707 project and led to the United States’ complete withdrawal from SST design.

References

1. ^ dtic.mil, COMMUNITY REACTIONS TO SONIC BOOMS IN THE OKLAHOMA CITY AREA
2. ^ dtic.mil, COMMUNITY REACTIONS … VOLUME 2
3. ^ dtic.mil, COMMUNITY REACTIONS … VOLUME 3

* Sonic Boom and the Supersonic Transport, Maj. Richard M. Roberds, Air University, U.S. Air Force, 1971.
* OKC endured 1,494 sonic booms in 1964, Steve Gust, Edmond Life & Leisure, 2005.[dead link]
* The Effects of Sonic Boom and Similar Impulsive Noise on Structures (PDF), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1971.
* Clipped Wings, Mel Horwitch, MIT Press, 1982.
* The SST: Here It Comes Ready or Not, Don Dwiggins, Doubleday & Company, 1968.

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma_City_sonic_boom_tests
Categories: Sound | Human experimentation in the United States | Psychology experiments | Aviation history | Aviation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma_City_sonic_boom_tests

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Operation Top Hat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Top Hat was a  local field exercise [1] conducted by the United States Army Chemical Corps in 1953. The exercise involved the use of Chemical Corps personnel to test biological and chemical warfare decontamination methods. These personnel were deliberately exposed to these contaminants, so as to test decontamination.

Contents

* 1 Background
* 2 Tests
* 3 References
* 4 Further reading

Background

In June 1953 the United States Army formally adopted guidelines regarding the use of human subjects in chemical, biological, or radiological testing and research.[1] The guidelines were adopted per an Army Chief of Staff memo (MM 385) and closely mirrored the Nuremberg Code.[1] These guidelines also required that all research projects involving human subjects receive approval from the Secretary of the Army.[1] The guidelines, however, left a loophole; they did not define what types of experiments and tests required such approval from the secretary, thus encouraging  selective compliance  with the guidelines.[1]

Tests

Under the guidelines, seven research projects involving chemical weapons and human subjects were submitted by the Chemical Corps for Secretary of the Army approval in August 1953.[1][2] One project involved vesicants, one involved phosgene, and five were experiments which involved nerve agents; all seven were approved.[1][2] Operation Top Hat, however, was not among the projects submitted to the Secretary of the Army for approval.[2]

Operation Top Hat was termed a  local field exercise  by the Army and took place from September 15–19, 1953 at the Army Chemical School at Fort McClellan, Alabama.[1][2] In a 1975 Pentagon Inspector General’s report, the military maintained Top Hat was not subject to the guidelines requiring approval because it was a  line of duty  exercise in the Chemical Corps.[2] The experiments used Chemical Corps personnel to test decontamination methods for biological and chemical weapons,[2] including sulfur mustard and nerve agents.[1] Chemical Corps personnel participating in the tests were not volunteers and were not informed of the tests.[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Pechura, Constance M. and Rall, David P. Veterans at Risk: The Health Effects of Mustard Gas and Lewisite, (Google Books), U.S. Institute of Medicine: Committee to Survey the Health Effects of Mustard Gas and Lewisite, National Academies Press, 1993, p. 379–80, (ISBN 030904832X).
2. ^ a b c d e f Moreno, Jonathan D. Undue Risk: Secret State Experiments on Humans, (Google Books), Routledge, 2001, pp. 179–80, (ISBN 0415928354).

Further reading

* Taylor, James R. and Johnson, William N. Research Report Concerning the Use of Volunteers in Chemical Agent Research, DAIG-IN 21-75, 1975, Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, Office of the Inspector General and Auditor General

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Top_Hat
Categories: Human experimentation in the United States | Chemical warfare | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | 1953 in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Top_Hat

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Abderhalden reaction
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Abderhalden reaction is a now defunct blood test for pregnancy developed by Emil Abderhalden.

In 1909 Abderhalden found that on identification of a foreign protein in the blood, the body reacts with a  defensive fermentation  (in modern terms, a protease reaction) that causes disintegration of the protein. He developed the test in 1912. This test was apparently contentious soon after its development and a significant body of work was published both in support of and refuting the test’s reliability. One such publication concluded  …the individual variations of both pregnant and non-pregnant sera make the results from both overlap so completely as to render the reaction, even with quantitative technique, absolutely indecisive for either positive or negative diagnosis of pregnancy.  (Van Slyke et al. 1915). The test’s overall unreliability led to its being superseded in 1928 by the Aschheim-Zondek test. Due to Abderhalden’s high reputation, it was not internationally acknowledged until long after his death that the underlying theory of  defensive enzymes  (Abwehrfermente) was entirely fraudulent (Deichmann & Müller-Hill 1998).

References

* Deichmann, U. & Müller-Hill, B. (1998): The fraud of Abderhalden’s enzymes. Nature 393:109-111. HTML abstract
* Firkin, B. G. & Whitworth, J. A. (1987): Dictionary of Medical Eponyms. Parthenon Publishing. ISBN 1-85070-333-7
* Van Slyke, Donald D.; Vinograd-Villchur, Mariam; and Losee, J.R. (1915): The Abderhalden Reaction. Journal of Biological Chemistry 23(1):377-406. PDF fulltext experimental evidence of the unreliability of the Abderhalden pregnancy test
* Who Named It?

v • d • e
Eponymous medical signs for reproductive system and obstetrics
Reproductive system
John Thomas sign A Prehn’s sign
Obstetrics
Braxton Hicks contraction

pregnancy (Abderhalden reaction, Chadwick sign, Goodell’s sign, Hegar’s sign, Ladin’s sign, Piskacek’s sign, Von Braun-Fernwald’s sign)

hydrops fetalis (Bart hemoglobin)
Leopold’s maneuvers A Naegele’s rule
reproductive system navs: anat female,male/physio/dev, noncongen/congen/neoplasia, symptoms+signs/eponymous, proc
obstetric navs: conditions, eponymous signs, proc

Stub icon     This medical diagnostic article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
v • d • e
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abderhalden_reaction
Categories: Scientific misconduct | Pregnancy tests | History of medicine | Medical diagnostic stubs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abderhalden_reaction

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Arsenic contamination of groundwater
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Main article: Water pollution

Arsenic contamination of groundwater is a natural occurring high concentration of arsenic in deeper levels of groundwater, which became a high-profile problem in recent years due to the use of deep tubewells for water supply in the Ganges Delta, causing serious arsenic poisoning to large numbers of people. A 2007 study found that over 137 million people in more than 70 countries are probably affected by arsenic poisoning of drinking water.[1] Arsenic contamination of ground water is found in many countries throughout the world, including the USA. [2]

Approximately 20 incidents of groundwater arsenic contamination have been reported from all over the world. [3] Of these, four major incidents were in Asia, including locations in Thailand, Taiwan, and Mainland China.[4][5] South American countries like Argentina and Chile have also been affected. There are also many locations in the United States where the groundwater contains arsenic concentrations in excess of the Environmental Protection Agency standard of 10 parts per billion adopted in 2001.

Arsenic is a carcinogen which causes many cancers including skin, lung, and bladder as well as cardiovascular disease.

Some research concludes that even at the lower concentrations, there is still a risk of arsenic contamination leading to major causes of death. A study was conducted in a contiguous six-county study area of southeastern Michigan to investigate the relationship between moderate arsenic levels and twenty-three selected disease outcomes. Disease outcomes included several types of cancer, diseases of the circulatory and respiratory system, diabetes mellitus, and kidney and liver diseases. Elevated mortality rates were observed for all diseases of the circulatory system. The researchers acknowledged a need to replicate their findings.[6]

A study preliminarily shows a relationship between arsenic exposure measured in urine and Type II diabetes. The results supported the hypothesis that low levels of exposure to inorganic arsenic in drinking water may play a role in diabetes prevalence.[7]

Arsenic in drinking water may also compromise immune function  Scientists link influenza A (H1N1) susceptibility to common levels of arsenic exposure . http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-05/mbl-sli052009.php. .

Contents

* 1 Contamination specific nations and regions
o 1.1 Bangladesh and West Bengal
o 1.2 United States
* 2 Water purification solutions
o 2.1 Small-scale water treatment
o 2.2 Large-scale water treatment
* 3 Dietary intake
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes
* 6 References
* 7 External links

Contamination specific nations and regions
Bangladesh and West Bengal

The story of the arsenic contamination of the groundwater in Bangladesh is a tragic one. Many people have died from this contamination. Diarrheal diseases have long plagued the developing world as a major cause of death, especially in children. Prior to the 1970s, Bangladesh had one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world. Ineffective water purification and sewage systems as well as periodic monsoons and flooding exacerbated these problems. As a solution, UNICEF and the World Bank advocated the use of wells to tap into deeper groundwater for a quick and inexpensive solution. Millions of wells were constructed as a result. Because of this action, infant mortality and diarrheal illness were reduced by fifty percent. However, with over 8 million wells constructed, it has been found over the last two decades that approximately one in five of these wells is now contaminated with arsenic above the government’s drinking water standard.

In the Ganges Delta, the affected wells are typically more than 20 m and less than 100 m deep. Groundwater closer to the surface typically has spent a shorter time in the ground, therefore likely absorbing a lower concentration of arsenic; water deeper than 100 m is exposed to much older sediments which have already been depleted of arsenic.[4][8]

Dipankar Chakraborti from West Bengal brought the crisis to international attention in a research paper published in The Analyst in 1995 and reported on by David Bradley (The Guardian, January 5, 1995,  Drinking the water of death ). [9][10] Beginning his investigation in West Bengal in 1988, he eventually published, in 2000, the results of a study conducted in Bangladesh, which involved the analysis of thousands of water samples as well as hair, nail and urine samples. They found 900 villages with arsenic above the government limit.

Chakraborti has criticized aid agencies, saying that they denied the problem during the 1990s while millions of tube wells were sunk. The aid agencies later hired foreign experts, who recommended treatment plants which were not appropriate to the conditions, were regularly breaking down, or were not removing the arsenic.[11]

Chakraborti says that the arsenic situation in Bangladesh and West Bengal is due to negligence. He also adds that in West Bengal water is mostly supplied from rivers. Groundwater comes from deep tubewells, which are few in number in the state. Because of the low quantity of deep tubewells, the risk of arsenic patients in West Bengal is comparatively less. [12]

According to the World Health Organisation, “In Bangladesh, West Bengal (India) and some other areas, most drinking-water used to be collected from open dug wells and ponds with little or no arsenic, but with contaminated water transmitting diseases such as diarrhoea, dysentery, typhoid, cholera and hepatitis. Programmes to provide ‘safe’ drinking-water over the past 30 years have helped to control these diseases, but in some areas they have had the unexpected side-effect of exposing the population to another health problem—arsenic.” [13] The acceptable level as defined by WHO for maximum concentrations of arsenic in safe drinking water is 0.01 mg/L. The Bangladesh government’s standard is at a slightly higher rate, at 0.05 mg/L being considered safe. WHO has defined the areas under threat: Seven of the nineteen districts of West Bengal have been reported to have ground water arsenic concentrations above 0.05 mg/L. The total population in these seven districts is over 34 million, with the number using arsenic-rich water is more than 1 million (above 0.05 mg/L). That number increases to 1.3 million when the concentration is above 0.01 mg/L. According to a British Geological Survey study in 1998 on shallow tube-wells in 61 of the 64 districts in Bangladesh, 46% of the samples were above 0.01 mg/L and 27% were above 0.050 mg/L. When combined with the estimated 1999 population, it was estimated that the number of people exposed to arsenic concentrations above 0.05 mg/L is 28-35 million and the number of those exposed to more than 0.01 mg/L is 46-57 million (BGS, 2000). [13]

Throughout Bangladesh, as tube wells get tested for concentrations of arsenic, ones which are found to have arsenic concentrations over the amount considered safe are painted red to warn residents that the water is not safe to drink.

The solution, according to Chakraborti, is “By using surface water and instituting effective withdrawal regulation. West Bengal and Bangladesh are flooded with surface water. We should first regulate proper watershed management. Treat and use available surface water, rain-water and others. The way we’re doing at present is not advisable. [12]
[edit] United States

There are many locations across the United States where the groundwater contains naturally high concentrations of arsenic. Cases of groundwater-caused acute arsenic toxicity, such as those found in Bangladesh, are unknown in the United States where the concern has focused on the role of arsenic as a carcinogen. The problem of high arsenic concentrations has been subject to greater scrutiny in recent years because of changing government standards for arsenic in drinking water.

Some locations in the United States, such as Fallon, Nevada, have long been known to have groundwater with relatively high arsenic concentrations (in excess of 0.08 mg/L).[14] Even some surface waters, such as the Verde River in Arizona, sometimes exceed 0.01 mg/L arsenic, especially during low-flow periods when the river flow is dominated by groundwater discharge.[15]

A drinking water standard of 0.05 mg/L (equal to 50 parts per billion, or ppb) arsenic was originally established in the United States by the Public Health Service in 1942. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) studied the pros and cons of lowering the arsenic Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for years in the late 1980s and 1990s. No action was taken until January 2001, when the Clinton administration in its final weeks promulgated a new standard of 0.01 mg/L (10 ppb) to take effect January 2006.[16] The incoming Bush administration suspended the midnight regulation, but after some months of study, the new EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman approved the new 10 ppb arsenic standard and its original effective date of January 2006.[17]

Many public water supply systems across the United States obtained their water supply from groundwater that had met the old 50 ppb arsenic standard but exceeded the new 10 ppb MCL. These utilities searched for either an alternative supply or an inexpensive treatment method to remove the arsenic from their water. In Arizona, an estimated 35% of water-supply wells were put out of compliance by the new regulation; in California, the percentage was 38%.[18]

The proper arsenic MCL continues to be debated. Some have argued that the 10 ppb federal standard is still too high, while others have argued that 10 ppb is needlessly strict. Individual states are able to establish lower arsenic limits; New Jersey has done so, setting a maximum of 0.005 mg/L for arsenic in drinking water.[19]

A study of private water wells in the Appalachian mountains found that 6% of the wells had arsenic above the US MCL of 0.010 mg/L.[20].

Water purification solutions
Small-scale water treatment

Chakraborti claims that arsenic removal plants (ARPs) installed in Bangladesh by UNDP and WHO were a colossal waste of funds due to breakdowns, inconvenient placements and lack of quality control.[12]

A simpler and less expensive form of arsenic removal is known as the Sono arsenic filter, using 3 pitchers containing cast iron turnings and sand in the first pitcher and wood activated carbon and sand in the second.[21] Plastic buckets can also be used as filter containers.[22] It is claimed that thousands of these systems are in use can last for years while avoiding the toxic waste disposal problem inherent to conventional arsenic removal plants. Although novel, this filter has not been certified by any sanitary standards such as NSF, ANSI, WQA and does not avoid toxic waste disposal similar to any other iron removal process.

In the United States small  under the sink  units have been used to remove arsenic from drinking water. This option is called  point of use  treatment. The most common types of domestic treatment use the technologies of adsorption (using media such as Bayoxide E33, GFH, or titanium dioxide) or reverse osmosis. Ion exchange and activated alumina have been considered but not commonly used.

Large-scale water treatment

In some places, such as the United States, all the water supplied to residences by water utilities must meet primary (health-based) drinking water standards. This may necessitate large-scale treatment systems to remove arsenic from the water supply. The effectiveness of any method depends on the chemical makeup of a particular water supply. The aqueous chemistry of arsenic is complex, and may affect the removal rate that can be achieved by a particular process.

Some large utilities with multiple water supply wells could shut down those wells with high arsenic concentrations, and produce only from wells or surface water sources that meet the arsenic standard. Other utilities, however, especially small utilities with only a few wells, may have no available water supply that meets the arsenic standard.

Coagulation/filtration removes arsenic by coprecipitation and adsorption using iron coagulants. Coagulation/filtration using alum is already used by some utilities to remove suspended solids and may be adjusted to remove arsenic.

Iron oxide adsorption filters the water through a granular medium containing ferric oxide. Ferric oxide has a high affinity for adsorbing dissolved metals such as arsenic. The iron oxide medium eventually becomes saturated, and must be replaced.

Activated alumina is another filter medium known to effectively remove dissolved arsenic. It has also been used to remove undesirably high concentrations of fluoride.

Ion Exchange has long been used as a water-softening process, although usually on a single-home basis. It can also be effective in removing arsenic with a net ionic charge. (Note that arsenic oxide, As2O3, is a common form of arsenic in groundwater that is soluble, but has no net charge.)

Both Reverse osmosis and electrodialysis (also called electrodialysis reversal) can remove arsenic with a net ionic charge. (Note that arsenic oxide, As2O3, is a common form of arsenic in groundwater that is soluble, but has no net charge.) Some utilities presently use one of these methods to reduce total dissolved solids and therefore improve taste. A problem with both methods is the production of high-salinity waste water, called brine, or concentrate, which then must be disposed of.

A new solution to this pressing problem is the Subterranean Arsenic Removal (SAR) technology where aerated groundwater is being recharged back into the aquifer to create an oxidation zone which will bind the iron & arsenic. The oxidation zone will boost up the activity of the arsenic oxidizing micro-organisms which can enzymatically oxidize arsenic from +3 to +5 state. Seven such plants have been installed in rural West Bengal and they are delivering 3000 lt arsenic & iron free water everyday to the rural people. The first community water treatment plant based on SAR technology was set up near Kolkata by a team of European and Indian engineers led by Dr. Bhaskar Sen Gupta of Queen’s University Belfast. This technology is expected to provide a long term solution to arsenic contamination in groundwater and is targeted towards treatment of the aquifer as a whole. Also, Germany has used this technology for the past hundred years to remove iron effectively from groundwater without any negetive effect. SAR Technology

Dietary intake

Researchers from Bangladesh and the United Kingdom have recently claimed that dietary intake of arsenic adds a significant amount to total intake, where contaminated water is used for irrigation.[23] [24][25]

See also

* Arsenic poisoning
* Grainger challenge
* Groundwater
* Water pollution

Notes

1. ^  Arsenic in drinking water seen as threat . Associated Press. 2007-08-30. http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2007-08-30-553404631_x.htm,.
2. ^ Twarakavi, N. K. C., Kaluarachchi, J. J. (2006).  Arsenic in the shallow ground waters of conterminous United States: assessment, health risks, and costs for MCL compliance . Journal of American Water Resources Association 42 (2): 275–294. doi:10.1111/j.1752-1688.2006.tb03838.x. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118632836/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0.
3. ^ Mukherjee A., Sengupta M. K., Hossain M. A. (2006).  Arsenic contamination in groundwater: A global perspective with emphasis on the Asian scenario . Journal of Health Population and Nutrition 24 (2): 142–163. http://202.136.7.26/images/jhpn242_Arsenic-contamination.pdf.
4. ^ a b The UNESCO Courier, Bangladesh’s arsenic poisoning: who is to blame?
5. ^ Chowdhury U. K., Biswas B. K., Chowdhury T. R. (2000).  Groundwater arsenic contamination in Bangladesh and West Bengal, India . Environmental Health Perspectives 108 (4): 393–397. doi:10.2307/3454378. http://www.ehponline.org/members/2000/108p393-397chowdhury/chowdhury-full.html.
6. ^ , Jaymie R. Meliker, Arsenic in drinking water and cerebrovascular disease, diabetes mellitus, and kidney disease in Michigan: a standardized mortality ratio analysis Environmental Health Magazine. Volume 2:4. 2007. Accessed 9 Sept. 2008.
7. ^ Ana Navas-Acien,  Arsenic Exposure and Prevalence of Type 2 Diabetes in US Adults,  Journal of American Medical Association, v.300, n.7 (August 2008).
8. ^ Singh A. K. (2006).  Chemistry of arsenic in groundwater of Ganges-Brahmaputra river basin . Current Science 91 (5): 599–606. http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/sep102006/599.pdf.
9. ^ Amit Chatterjee, Dipankar Das, Badal K. Mandal, Tarit Roy Chowdhury, Gautam Samanta and Dipankar Chakraborti (1995).  Arsenic in ground water in six districts of West Bengal, India: the biggest arsenic calamity in the world. Part I. Arsenic species in drinking water and urine of the affected people . Analyst 120: 643–651. doi:10.1039/AN9952000643.
10. ^ Dipankar Das, Amit Chatterjee, Badal K. Mandal, Gautam Samanta, Dipankar Chakraborti and Bhabatosh Chanda (1995).  Arsenic in ground water in six districts of West Bengal, India: the biggest arsenic calamity in the world. Part 2. Arsenic concentration in drinking water, hair, nails, urine, skin-scale and liver tissue (biopsy) of the affected people . Analyst 120: 917–925. doi:10.1039/AN9952000917.
11. ^ New Scientist, Interview: Drinking at the west’s toxic well31 May 2006.
12. ^ a b c The Times of India, ‘Use surface water. Stop digging’, interview, 26 Sep, 2004.
13. ^ a b World Health Organization, Arsenic in Drinking Water, accessed 5 Feb 2007.
14. ^ Frederick Rubel Jr. and Steven W. Hathaway (1985) Pilot Study for removal of arsenic from drinking water at the Fallon, Nevada, Naval Air Station, Environmental Protection Agency, EPA/600/S2-85/094.
15. ^ M. Taqueer A. Qureshi (1995) Sources of Arsenic in the Verde River and Salt River Watersheds, Arizona, M.S. thesis, Arizona State University, Tempe.
16. ^ The history of arsenic regulation, Southwest Hydrology, May/June 2002, p.16.
17. ^ EPA announces arsenic standard for drinking water of 10 parts per billion, EPA press release, 10/31/2001.
18. ^ Alison Bohlen (2002) States move forward to meet new arsenic standard, Southwest Hydrology, May/June 2002, p.18-19.
19. ^ Megan A. Ferguson and others, Lowering the detection limit for arsenic: implications for a future practical quantitation limit, American Water Works Association Journal, Aug. 2007, p.92-98.
20. ^ John G. Shiber,  Arsenic in domestic well water and health in Central Appalachia, USA
21. ^ Evaluation of Performance of Sono 3-Kolshi Filter for Arsenic Removal from Groundwater Using Zero Valent Iron Through Laboratory and Field StudiesPDF (272 KiB)
22. ^ SONO ARSENIC FILTER FROM BANGLADESH – 1PDF (102 KiB) – pictures with descriptions.
23. ^ Mustak Hossain (2006-07-13).  Toxic rice harvested in southwestern Bangladesh . SciDev.Net. http://www.scidev.net/News/index.cfm?fuseaction=readNews&itemid=2975&language=1.
24. ^ Williams, P.N. (2006).  Increase in Rice Grain Arsenic for Regions of Bangladesh Irrigating Paddies with Elevated Arsenic in Groundwaters . Environ. Sci. Technol 40 (16): 4903–4908. doi:10.1021/es060222i.
25. ^ *Raghvan T.  Screening of Rice Cultivars for Grain Arsenic Concentration and Speciation . American Society of Agronomy Proceding.

References

* Smedley PL, Kinniburgh DG (2002).  A review of the source, behaviour and distribution of arsenic in natural waters . Applied Geochemistry 17 (5): 517–568. doi:10.1016/S0883-2927(02)00018-5.
* Nickson RT, McArthur JM, Ravenscroft P (2000).  Mechanism of arsenic release to groundwater, Bangladesh and West Bengal . Applied Geochemistry 15 (4): 403–413. doi:10.1016/S0883-2927(99)00086-4.
* Korte N. E., Fernando Q. (1991).  A Review of Arsenic(III) in Groundwater . Critical Reviews in Environmental Control 21 (1): 1–39.
* Smith AH, Lingas EO, Rahman M (2000).  Contamination of drinking-water by arsenic in Bangladesh: a public health emergency . Bulletin of the World Health Organization 78 (9): 1093–1103. http://www.scielosp.org/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0042-96862000000900005&lng=en&nrm=iso.
* Harvey CF, Swartz CH, Badruzzaman ABM (2002).  Arsenic mobility and groundwater extraction in Bangladesh . Science 298 (5598): 1602–1606. doi:10.1126/science.1076978. PMID 12446905.
* Raghvan T.  Screening of Rice Cultivars for Grain Arsenic Concentration and Speciation . American Society of Agronomy Proceding.
* Hossain MF (2006).  Arsenic contamination in Bangladesh – An overview . Agriculture Ecosystem & Environment 113 (1-4): 1–16. doi:10.1016/j.agee.2005.08.034.

External links

* ATSDR – Case Studies in Environmental Medicine: Arsenic Toxicity
* Arsenic in groundwater IGRAC International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre
* Arsenic in Groundwater: A World Problem – IAH publication, Netherlands National Chapter, 2008
* SOS-Arsenic.net – information and awareness raising site, focused on Bangladesh.
* Contamination of drinking-water by arsenic in Bangladesh: a public health emergency – at SOS-Arsenic.net
* Subterranean Arsenic Treatment Technology in West Bengal
* http://www.wbphed.gov.in – Arsenic Scenario of West Bengal
* Drinking Death in Groundwater: Arsenic Contamination as a Threat to Water Security for Bangladesh, ACDIS Occasional Paper by Mustafa Moinuddin

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenic_contamination_of_groundwater
Categories: Water pollution | Water chemistry | Aquifers | Water-borne diseases | Arsenic | Environment of Bangladesh | Health in Bangladesh | Health disasters

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenic_contamination_of_groundwater

***

Arsenic poisoning
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Arsenic poisoning
Classification and external resources
ICD-10     T57.0
ICD-9     985.1
eMedicine     emerg/42
MeSH     [1]
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Arsenic poisoning kills by allosteric inhibition of essential metabolic enzymes, leading to death from multi-system organ failure. It primarily inhibits enzymes that require lipoic acid as a cofactor, such as pyruvate and alpha-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase. Because of this, substrates before the dehydrogenase steps accumulate, such as pyruvate (and lactate). It particularly affects the brain, causing neurological disturbances and death.

Contents

* 1 Toxicity
* 2 Pathophysiology
* 3 Diagnosis
* 4 Treatment
* 5 Unintentional poisoning
o 5.1 Occupational Exposures
o 5.2 Arsenicosis: chronic arsenic poisoning from drinking water
* 6 Intentional poisoning
* 7 Famous victims (known and alleged)
o 7.1 Francesco I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
o 7.2 George III of Great Britain
o 7.3 Napoleon Bonaparte
o 7.4 Charles Francis Hall
o 7.5 Huo Yuan Jia
o 7.6 Clare Boothe Luce
o 7.7 Impressionist painters
o 7.8 Phar Lap
* 8 See also
* 9 Footnotes
* 10 External links

Toxicity

The toxicity of arsenic and its compounds is highly variable.[1](citation does not accurately reflect information in previous statement). Organic forms appear to have a lower toxicity than inorganic forms of arsenic. Research has shown that arsenites (trivalent forms) have a higher acute toxicity than arsenates (pentavalent forms).[2] The acute minimal lethal dose of arsenic in adults is estimated to be 70 to 200 mg or 1 mg/kg/day.[3] Most reported arsenic poisonings are not caused by elemental arsenic, but by one of arsenics compounds, especially arsenic trioxide, which is approximately 500 times more toxic than pure arsenic.[citation needed] Symptoms include violent stomach pains in the region of the bowels; tenderness and pressure; retching; excessive saliva production; vomiting; sense of dryness and tightness in the throat; thirst; hoarseness and difficulty of speech; the matter vomited, greenish or yellowish, sometimes streaked with blood; diarrhea; tenesmus; sometimes excoriation of the anus; urinary organs occasionally affected with violent burning pains and suppression; convulsions and cramps; clammy sweats; lividity of the extremities; countenance collapsed; eyes red and sparkling; delirium; death. Some of these symptoms may be absent where the poisoning results from inhalation, as of arseniuretted hydrogen.

Symptoms of arsenic poisoning start with mild headaches and can progress to lightheadedness and usually, if untreated, will result in death.

Arsenic poisoning can lead to a variety of problems, from skin cancer to keratoses of the feet.

Chronic exposure to inorganic arsenic may lead to cutaneous hyperpigmentation.[4]:859

Pathophysiology
Main article: Arsenic toxicity

Arsenic disrupts ATP production through several mechanisms. At the level of the citric acid cycle, arsenic inhibits pyruvate dehydrogenase and by competing with phosphate it uncouples oxidative phosphorylation, thus inhibiting energy-linked reduction of NAD+, mitochondrial respiration, and ATP synthesis. Hydrogen peroxide production is also increased, which might form reactive oxygen species and oxidative stress. These metabolic interferences lead to death from multi-system organ failure, probably from necrotic cell death, not apoptosis. A post mortem reveals brick red colored mucosa, due to severe hemorrhage. Although arsenic causes toxicity, it can also play a protective role.[5]

Diagnosis

There are tests available to diagnose poisoning by measuring arsenic in blood, urine, hair, and fingernails. The urine test is the most reliable test for arsenic exposure within the last few days. Urine testing needs to be done within 24–48 hours for an accurate analysis of an acute exposure. Tests on hair and fingernails can measure exposure to high levels of arsenic over the past 6–12 months. These tests can determine if one has been exposed to above-average levels of arsenic. They cannot predict, however, whether the arsenic levels in the body will affect health.[6]

Hair is a potential bioindicator for arsenic exposure due to its ability to store trace elements from blood. Incorporated elements maintain their position during growth of hair. Thus for a temporal estimation of exposure, an assay of hair composition needs to be carried out with a singe hair which is not possible with older techniques requiring homogenization and dissolution of several strands of hair. This type of biomonitoring has been achieved with newer microanalytical techniques like Synchroton radiation based X ray fluorescence (SXRF) spectroscopy and Microparticle induced X ray emission (PIXE).The highly focused and intense beams study small spots on biological samples allowing analysis to micro level along with the chemical speciation. In a study, this method has been used to follow arsenic level before, during and after treatment with Arsenious oxide in patients with Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia.[7].

Treatment

Chemical and synthetic methods are now used to treat arsenic poisoning. Dimercaprol and dimercaptosuccinic acid are chelating agents which sequester the arsenic away from blood proteins and are used in treating acute arsenic poisoning. The most important side-effect is hypertension. Dimercaprol is considerably more toxic than succimer.[8]

In the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology, Keya Chaudhuri of the Indian Institute of Chemical Biology in Kolkata, and her colleagues reported giving rats daily doses of arsenic in their water, in levels equivalent to those found in groundwater in Bangladesh and West Bengal. Those rats which were also fed garlic extracts had 40 percent less arsenic in their blood and liver, and passed 45 percent more arsenic in their urine. The conclusion is that sulfur-containing substances in garlic scavenge arsenic from tissues and blood. The presentation concludes that people in areas at risk of arsenic contamination in the water supply should eat one to three cloves of garlic per day as a preventative. [9][10][11]

Unintentional poisoning

In addition to its use as a poison, arsenic was used medicinally for centuries and was used extensively to treat syphilis before penicillin was introduced. Arsenic was replaced as a therapeutic agent by sulfa drugs and then by antibiotics. Arsenic was also an ingredient in many tonics (or  patent medicines ). In addition, during the Victorian era, some women used a mixture of vinegar, chalk, and arsenic applied topically to whiten their skin. The use of arsenic was intended to prevent aging and creasing of the skin, but some arsenic was inevitably absorbed into the blood stream.

Some pigments, most notably the popular Emerald Green (known also under several other names), were based on arsenic compounds. Overexposure to these pigments was a frequent cause of accidental poisoning of artists and craftsmen.

Occupational Exposures

Industries that use inorganic arsenic and its compounds include wood preservation, glass production, nonferrous metal alloys, and electronic semiconductor manufacturing. Inorganic arsenic is also found in coke oven emissions associated with the smelter industry.[12]

Occupational exposure to arsenic may occur with copper or lead smelting and wood treatment, among workers involved in the production or application of pesticides containing organic arsenicals. Humans are exposed to arsenic through air, drinking water, and food (meat, fish, and poultry); this food is usually the largest source of arsenic. Arsenic was also found in wine if arsenic pesticides are used in the vineyard. Arsenic is well absorbed by oral and inhalation routes, widely distributed and excreted in urine; most of a single, low-level dose is excreted within a few days after consuming any form of inorganic arsenic. Remains of arsenic in nails and hair can be detected years after the exposure.

Arsenicosis: chronic arsenic poisoning from drinking water
Main article: Arsenic contamination of groundwater

Chronic arsenic poisoning results from drinking water with high levels of arsenic over a long period of time. This may occur due to arsenic contamination of groundwater.[13] The World Health Organization recommends a limit of 0.01 mg/L (10ppb) of arsenic in drinking water. This recommendation was established based on the limit of detection of available testing equipment at the time of publication of the WHO water quality guidelines. More recent findings show that consumption of water with levels as low as 0.00017 mg/L (0.17ppb) over long periods of time can lead to arsenicosis.[citation needed]

Intentional poisoning

Arsenic became a favorite murder weapon of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, particularly among ruling classes in Italy, notably the Borgias. Because the symptoms are similar to those of cholera, which was common at the time, arsenic poisoning often went undetected. By the 19th C., it had acquired the nickname  inheritance powder,  perhaps because impatient heirs were known or suspected to use it to ensure or accelerate their inheritances.

In ancient Korea, and particularly in Joseon Dynasty, arsenic-sulfur compounds have been used as a major ingredient of sayak (??; ??), which was a poison cocktail used in capital punishment of high-profile political figures and members of the royal family.[14]  Due to social and political prominence of the condemned, many of these events were well-documented, often in the Annals of Joseon Dynasty; they are sometimes portrayed in historical television miniseries because of their dramatic nature.[15]

On April 27, 2003, sixteen members of the Gustaf Adolph Lutheran Church in New Sweden, Maine, became ill following the church coffee hour; one died a short time later. Investigation revealed that the coffee had been heavily laced with arsenic. As of the 2005 publication of Christine Ellen Young’s A Bitter Brew, no one had been formally charged with the crime. However, the Discovery Health channel (date?) reported that Daniel Bondeson, who was found with bullet wounds to his chest at a farm, wrote a note saying that he was responsible for the poisoning. He succumbed to the injuries while undergoing surgery.

Murder mystery stories often feature arsenic poisoning, although they commonly omit the more disagreeable symptoms.

Famous victims (known and alleged)

Arsenic poisoning, accidental or deliberate, has been implicated in the illness and death of a number of prominent people throughout history.

Francesco I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany

Recent forensic evidence uncovered by Italian scientists suggests that Francesco and his wife were poisoned possibly by his brother and successor Fernando.[16]

George III of Great Britain

George III’s (1738 – 1820) personal health was a concern throughout his long reign. He suffered from periodic episodes of physical and mental illness, five of them disabling enough to require the King to withdraw from his duties. In 1969, researchers asserted that the episodes of madness and other physical symptoms were characteristic of the disease porphyria, which was also identified in members of his immediate and extended family. In addition, a 2004 study of samples of the King’s hair[17] revealed extremely high levels of arsenic, which is a possible trigger of disease symptoms. A 2005 article in the medical journal The Lancet[18] suggested the source of the arsenic could be the antimony used as a consistent element of the King’s medical treatment. The two minerals are often found in the same ground, and mineral extraction at the time was not precise enough to eliminate arsenic from compounds containing antimony.
Napoleon Bonaparte

It has been theorized that Napoleon Bonaparte (1769 – 1821) suffered and died from arsenic poisoning during his imprisonment on the island of Saint Helena. Forensic samples of his hair did show high levels, 13 times the normal amount, of the element. This, however, does not prove deliberate poisoning by Napoleon’s enemies: copper arsenite has been used as a pigment in some wallpapers, and microbiological liberation of the arsenic into the immediate environment would be possible. The case is equivocal in the absence of clearly authenticated samples of the wallpaper. As Napoleon’s body lay for nearly 20 years in a grave on the island, before being moved to its present resting place in Paris, arsenic from the soil could not have polluted the sample as the arsenic was found within his hair, which can only be possible when the arsenic was already in the body. Even without contaminated wallpaper or soil, commercial use of arsenic at the time provided many other routes by which Napoleon could have consumed enough arsenic to leave this forensic trace.

Charles Francis Hall

American explorer Charles Francis Hall (1821–1871) died unexpectedly during his third Arctic expedition aboard the ship Polaris. After returning to the ship from a sledging expedition Hall drank a cup of coffee and fell violently ill.[19] He collapsed in what was described as a fit. He suffered from vomiting and delirium for the next week, then seemed to improve for a few days. He accused several of the ship’s company, including ship’s physician Dr. Emil Bessels with whom he had longstanding disagreements, of having poisoned him.[19] Shortly thereafter, Hall again began suffering the same symptoms, died, and was taken ashore for burial. Following the expedition’s return a US Navy investigation ruled that Hall had died from apoplexy.[20]

In 1968, however, Hall’s biographer Chauncey C. Loomis, a professor at Dartmouth College, traveled to Greenland to exhume Hall’s body. Due to the permafrost, Hall’s body, flag shroud, clothing and coffin were remarkably well preserved. Tissue samples of bone, fingernails and hair showed that Hall died of poisoning from large doses of arsenic in the last two weeks of his life,[21] consistent with the symptoms party members reported. It is possible that Hall dosed himself with quack medicines which included the poison, but it is more likely that he was murdered by Dr. Bessels or one of the other members of the expedition.[22]

Huo Yuan Jia

Huo Yuan Jia made his name as a Chinese martial artist. There was rumour that he was poisoned in 1910 during his fight with the Japanese, who accused China and the Chinese of being the  sick man of Asia . His death was not due to the fight but of his chronic illness.

Clare Boothe Luce

A later case of arsenic poisoning is that of Clare Boothe Luce, (1903 – 1987) the American ambassador to Italy 1953–1956. Although she did not die from her poisoning, she suffered an increasing variety of physical and psychological symptoms until arsenic poisoning was diagnosed, and its source traced to the old, arsenic-laden flaking paint on the ceiling of her bedroom. Another source (see below) explains her poisoning as resulting from eating food contaminated by flaking of the ceiling of the embassy dining room.

Impressionist painters

Emerald Green, a pigment frequently used by Impressionist painters, is based on arsenic. Cezanne developed severe diabetes, which is a symptom of chronic arsenic poisoning. Monet’s blindness and Van Gogh’s neurological disorders could have been partially due to their use of Emerald Green. Poisoning by other commonly used substances, including liquor and absinthe, lead pigments, mercury-based Vermilion, and solvents such as turpentine, could also be a factor in these cases.

Phar Lap

75 years after his death in 1932, forensic scientists determined the famous and largely successful Australian racehorse Phar Lap died after ingesting a massive dose of arsenic.[23]

See also

* Forensic toxicology
* 2007 Peruvian meteorite event – a meteorite impact that is believed to have caused arsenic poisoning.
* James Marsh was a chemist, who invented the Marsh test for detecting arsenic.
* Arsine is a compound of Arsenic that is highly toxic and dangerously flammable.

Footnotes

1. ^ Mathieu D, Mathieu-Nolf M, Germain-Alonso M, Neviere R, Furon D, Wattel F (1992).  Massive arsenic poisoning–effect of hemodialysis and dimercaprol on arsenic kinetics . Intensive Care Med 18 (1): 47–50. doi:10.1007/BF01706427. PMID 1578049.
2. ^ Kingston RL, Hall S, Sioris L (1993).  Clinical observations and medical outcome in 149 cases of arsenate ant killer ingestion . J. Toxicol. Clin. Toxicol. 31 (4): 581–91. PMID 8254700.
3. ^ Dart, RC (2004). Medical toxicology. Philadelphia: Williams & Wilkins. pp. 1393–1401. ISBN 0-7817-2845-2.
4. ^ James, William; Berger, Timothy; Elston, Dirk (2005). Andrews’ Diseases of the Skin: Clinical Dermatology. (10th ed.). Saunders. ISBN 0721629210.
5. ^ Klaassen, Curtis; Watkins, John (2003). Casarett and Doull’s Essentials of Toxicology. McGraw-Hill. pp. 512. ISBN 978-0071389143.
6. ^  ToxFAQs for Arsenic . Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/tfacts2.html. Retrieved 2009-01-06.
7. ^ *Nicolis, I (2009),  Arsenite medicinal use, metabolism, pharmacokinetics and monitoring in human hair , Biochimie. [Epub ahead of print] (Jun 13) }
8. ^ Dimercaprol Drug Information, Professional
9. ^  Food and Chemical Toxicology – Elsevier . http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/237/description#description++. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
10. ^  Garlic combats arsenic poisoning – health – 14 January 2008 – New Scientist . http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19726385.100-garlic-combats-arsenic-poisoning.html. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
11. ^  ScienceDirect – Food and Chemical Toxicology : In vitro and in vivo reduction of sodium arsenite induced toxicity by aqueous garlic extract . http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6P-4PT0Y7V-2&_user=961305&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000049425&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=961305&md5=b0917537375df1e9de7fe4f4f897af03. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
12. ^  OSHA Arsenic . United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration. http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/arsenic/index.html. Retrieved 2007-10-08.
13. ^ WHO Water-related diseases
14. ^ ??? ‘??’ ??
15. ^ ???, ‘?? ?’ ???? ???? ?? ?? ??
16. ^ Mari F, Polettini A, Lippi D, Bertol E (December 2006).  The mysterious death of Francesco I de’ Medici and Bianca Cappello: an arsenic murder? . BMJ 333 (7582): 1299–301. doi:10.1136/bmj.38996.682234.AE. PMID 17185715. PMC: 1761188. http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/333/7582/1299.
17. ^ BBC NEWS | Health | King George III: Mad or misunderstood?
18. ^ Madness of King George Linked to Arsenic – AOL News
19. ^ a b Mowat Farley. ‘The Polar Passion: The Quest for the North Pole’. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1967, p. 124
20. ^ Parry, Richard. ‘Trial By Ice: The True Story of Murder and Survival on the 1871 Polaris Expedition’. New York: Ballantine Books, 2001, p. 293
21. ^ Fleming, Fergus. ‘Ninety Degrees North: The Quest for the North Pole’. New York: Grove Press, 2001, p. 142
22. ^ Chauncey Loomis.  Charles Francis Hall 1821–1871 . http://pubs.aina.ucalgary.ca/arctic/Arctic35-3-442.pdf.
23. ^  Phar Lap ‘died from arsenic poisoning’ . The Age. 19 June 2008. http://news.theage.com.au/national/phar-lap-died-from-arsenic-poisoning-20080619-2t3m.html. Retrieved 2008-01-09.

External links

* Arsenic poisoning at the Open Directory Project
* Subterranean Arsenic Removal Technology in West Bengal

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Drug overdoses

nervous system

Salicylate A Paracetamol A Opioids A Benzodiazepines A TCAs A Anticholinesterase
cardiovascular system

Digoxin toxicity A Dipyridamole
Vitamins

Vitamin A A Vitamin D A Vitamin E
Biological
(including venom,
toxin,
food poisoning)
Fish/seafood

Shellfish poisoning (Paralytic shellfish poisoning, Diarrheal shellfish poisoning, Amnesic shellfish poisoning, Neurotoxic shellfish poisoning) A Ciguatera A Ichthyoallyeinotoxism A Scombroid A Haff disease
Other vertebrates

snake venom (Alpha-Bungarotoxin, Ancrod, Batroxobin)
amphibian venom: Batrachotoxin A Bombesin A Bufotenin A Physalaemin
birds/quail: Coturnism
Arthropods

arthropod venom: Bee sting/bee venom (Apamin, Melittin) A spider venom (Latrotoxin/Latrodectism) A scorpion venom (Charybdotoxin)
Tick paralysis
Poisonous plants/
derivatives

Mushroom poisoning A Lathyrism A Ergotism A Strychnine poisoning A Cinchonism  A Locoism (Pea struck)

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenic_poisoning
Categories: Arsenic | Disturbances of human pigmentation | Element toxicology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenic_poisoning

***
Spring Valley, Washington, D.C.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Map of Washington, D.C., with Spring Valley in red.

Spring Valley is an affluent neighborhood in northwest Washington, D.C., known for its large homes and tree-lined streets.

The neighborhood houses the main campus of American University at 4400 Massachusetts Avenue, as well as Wesley Theological Seminary at 4500 Massachusetts Avenue. Nebraska Avenue and Loughboro Road are to its south, Dalecarlia Parkway is to its west, and Massachusetts Avenue is to its northeast. Paradoxically, the neighborhood to the northeast is called American University Park, even though the bulk of the main campus is located in Spring Valley.

Spring Valley’s residents include notable media personalities (e.g., Ann Compton, Tim Russert, Jim Vance), lawyers (e.g., United States Attorney General Eric Holder, Brendan Sullivan), politicians, corporate officers, and elite Washington society (e.g., Washington Nationals principal owners Ed and Debra Cohen). Richard Nixon lived in Spring Valley before becoming President; his immediate predecessor, Lyndon B. Johnson, after becoming Vice President under John F. Kennedy, purchased a three-story mansion named Les Ormes (The Elms) in Spring Valley that had previously been the home of socialite and ambassador Perle Mesta[1]. George H.W. Bush also lived in the neighborhood prior to his White House years.

During World War I Spring Valley was an undeveloped area that the army used for testing chemical weapons. During excavations for new construction workers found unexploded ordnance, and scientists have found high levels of arsenic in the soil. The Army Corps of Engineers has undergone extensive testing and clean-up efforts in select parts of Spring Valley, a process that has been going on for years.
South Korean embassy residence on Glenbrook Road

Several embassy residences are located in the neighborhood, such as the ambassador’s houses of South Korea, Bahrain, Qatar, and Yemen. Spring Valley’s median home sale price in 2007 was US$2.725 and in 2008 $3.022 million.[2]

v • d • e
Neighborhoods of the District of Columbia

Adams Morgan A American University Park A Anacostia A Arboretum A Barnaby Woods A Barney Circle A Barry Farm A Bellevue A Benning Heights A Benning Ridge A Benning A Berkley A Bloomingdale A Brentwood A Brightwood A Brightwood Park A Brookland A Buena Vista A Burleith A Burrville A Capitol Hill A Capitol View A Carver Langston A Cathedral Heights A Central Northeast/Mahaning Heights A Chevy Chase A Chinatown A Civic Betterment A Cleveland Park A Colonial Village A Colony Hill A Columbia Heights A Congress Heights A Crestwood A Deanwood A Douglass A Downtown A Dupont Circle A Dupont Park A Eastland Gardens A Eckington A Edgewood A Embassy Row A Fairfax Village A Fairlawn A Foggy Bottom A Forest Hills A Fort Davis A Fort Dupont A Fort Lincoln A Fort Stevens Ridge A Fort Totten A Foxhall A Friendship Heights A Garfield Heights A Gateway A Georgetown A Glover Park A Good Hope A Greenway A Hawthorne A Hillbrook A Hillcrest A Ivy City A Judiciary Square A Kalorama A Kenilworth A Kent A Kingman Park A Knox Hill A Langdon A Lanier Heights A LeDroit Park A Lincoln Heights A Logan Circle A Manor Park A Marshall Heights A Massachusetts Heights A Mayfair A McLean Gardens A Michigan Park A Mount Pleasant A Mount Vernon Square A Navy Yard/Near Southeast A Naylor Gardens A Near Northeast A NoMa A North Cleveland Park A North Michigan Park A North Portal Estates A Northeast Boundary A Observatory Circle A The Palisades A Park Naylor A Park View A Penn Branch A Penn Quarter A Petworth A Pleasant Hill A Pleasant Plains A Potomac Heights A Queens Chapel A Randle Highlands A Reed-Cooke A Riggs Park A River Terrace A Rock Creek Gardens A Shaw A Shepherd Park A Shipley Terrace A Sixteenth Street Heights A Skyland A Southwest Federal Center A Southwest Waterfront A Spring Valley A Stronghold/Metropolis View A Sursum Corda A Swampoodle A Takoma A Tenleytown A Trinidad A Truxton Circle A Twining A University Heights A Wakefield A Washington Highlands A Wesley Heights A West End A Woodland A Woodland-Normanstone Terrace A Woodley Park A Woodridge
US capitol icon.png

Coordinates: 38E56?25?N 77E05?48?W? / ?38.94018EN 77.09677EW? / 38.94018; -77.09677
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_Valley,_Washington,_D.C.
Categories: Neighborhoods in Washington, D.C.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_Valley,_Washington,_D.C.

***

D.C. Tour Offers Fewer Monuments, More Munitions – washingtonpost.com
Kent Slowinski leads a tour of the Spring Valley World War I munitions site in Northwest Washington, which the Army Corps of Engineers has been working for …
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/…/AR2009092001961.html

Current Site Information, Washington, D.C. Army Chemical Munitions …
Thirty nine monitoring wells have been installed near the Dalecarlia reservoir, adjacent to waste and munition disposal sites in the Spring Valley …
http://www.epa.gov/reg3hwmd/npl/DCD983971136.htm

***

Washington, D.C. Army Chemical Munitions (Spring Valley)
Current Site Information
EPA Region 3 (Mid-Atlantic)
Delaware
New Castle County
2 miles southwest of the City of New Castle
EPA ID# DCD983971136
1st Congressional District

Last Update: January 2009
Other Names
Spring Valley
Current Site Status

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) provides minutes of the latest partnering, Remediation Advisory Board (RAB) and community meetings on their web site accessible on the website link below. The Army Corps also routinely updates this website with project progress reports and notifications of future meetings and events. The Restoration Advisory Board (the local community group) meetings are held on the second Tuesday of each month (except December and August) and are open to the public with public comment solicited at the end of each session.

The USACE completed excavation of a a munitions pit on a residential property adjacent to, and owned by the American University. USACE is completing test trenching and arsenic contaminated soil removal at this and the adjoining property. All work at these two properties is expected to be complete in the fall of 2009. USACE is planning for destruction of recovered chemical and conventional munitions.

The USACE has sampled approximately 1,500 for arsenic to date. Twenty seven additional properties were added to the site in 2006 based on a review of real estate records. Sampling of these properties and land owned by the District within the site is complete. EPA and the District Department of Environment are issuing comfort letters to property owners where sampling and any required remediation has been completed. USACE is attempting to gain access to all properties not previously sampled (approximately 10), and 5 properties where sampling revealed arsenic above 20ppm, the site cleanup goal.

In September of 2005 ATSDR issued a Health Consultation for the Spring Valley Site. ATSDR recommended additional sampling of soil, groundwater and air in specific locations within the Spring Valley Site. The DC Council approved funding for a health study and a contract was awarded to Johns Hopkins for that study, and a report was released in 2007. The report concludes that the health of Spring Valley residents is good; better than National averages and consistent with a reference community with similar demographics. Additional DC funding may be allocated for follow-on work in FY’2010.

In late 2003 perchlorate was discovered in groundwater at the site. A groundwater study is underway. Thirty nine monitoring wells have been installed near the Dalecarlia reservoir, adjacent to waste and munition disposal sites in the Spring Valley neighborhood and in other selected locations. Groundwater sampling data collected between 2005 and 2007 has identified two locations in the site where groundwater is contaminated with perchlorate, and one location where groundwater is contaminated with arsenic at elevated levels. The groundwater study continues in 2009 and 2010 with installation of additional monitoring wells including four deep wells and another round of well and surface water sampling.

District Of Columbia Council held a Public Roundtable in May 2009 to discuss issues at the site. EPA testified at the Roundtable. In June of 2009 the Congressional ‘COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM, Subcommittee on Federal Workforce, Postal Service and the District of Columbia’ held a hearing on the site. Members of the public, Army, EPA, District Department of Environment, GAO, and American University provided testimony and answered questions.

RAB meetings over the past year have focused the arsenic clean-up; disposal of recovered munitions, chemical sampling other than arsenic, completing site work and pursuit of additional funding to accelerate the cleanup. For more detailed information and updates on RAB issues, public meetings, and background, please access USACE’s web site by clicking on the Spring Valley internet site below:

The Army maintains a Spring Valley internet site.
Site Description

Spring Valley is located in the Northwest section of the District of Columbia, including the American University. During WWI this area was known as the American University Experimental Station and Camp Leach, a 660-acre facility used as a research and test center for chemical weapons. The experimental station and chemical laboratories were located on American University property.

In January, 1993 a contractor who was digging a utility trench unearthed World War I munitions in the Spring Valley area of the District of Columbia. During further investigations, munitions were discovered in pits located on the Korean Ambassador property, adjacent to American University and additional pits were also found on the adjacent residential property. The pit excavation and other work at the Korean property has been completed. An additional pit on the adjacent residence found numerous additional munitions and the work has not been completed yet. That work began in 2007 and was completed in 2009.

Arsenic-contaminated soil has been removed from the Child Development Center play area on American University. Soil removal actions have been completed on several American University Lots and at approximately 90 residential properties. Approximately 50 residential properties still require soil removal. All soil removal at residential properties should be complete in 2009. Soil remediation at Federal and District owned property is scheduled for 2010.

The site-wide soil cleanup standard for arsenic has been finalized at 20 ppm by EPA, the Army Corps of Engineers and the DC Health Department. The Mayor’s Science Advisory Panel has approved this standard. The arsenic contamination is the result of chemical warfare research carried out at the American University Experimental Station during WWI.

The Army Corps of Engineers budget for this site is approximately $11 million dollars per year. Site work is expected to continue thru 2011.

The USACE has completed excavation of lab waste and debris in an area near the boundary of the American University known as Lot 18. Numerous empty (scrap) munition and several intact bottles were removed from the site. One of the bottles was found to contain a small amount of Lewisite, a blister agent used at the site; a second bottle was found to contain mustard gas. Other chemical agent degradation products have been found in sealed containers. The USACE began excavation of additional lab debris in an adjacent area of the American University in 2008 and will complete the action in 2009.

The USACE intends to destroy recovered munitions currently stored at the site in 2009.

Site Responsibility
USACE is the lead agency at this site.

NPL Listing History
Not listed on the NPL.
Threats and Contaminants
The primary threats at the site are buried munitions and elevated arsenic in site soils and threats posed by buried munitions and lab waste.

Contaminant descriptions and risk factors are available from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, an arm of the CDC.
Cleanup Progress
The pit excavation and other work at the Korean property has been completed. An additional pit on the adjacent residence is currently being addressed. Arsenic contaminated soil has been removed from the Child Development Center play area on American University. Soil removal actions on several American University Lots and at approximately 70 homes have been completed. The site-wide soil cleanup standard for arsenic has been finalized at 20 parts per million (ppm) by EPA, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Washington DC Health Department. The Mayor’s Science Advisory Panel has approved this standard. The American University intramural fields have been returned to the University and are back in use and the University is preparing to reoccupy the Child Development Center. To date the Army Corps of Engineers has spent over $160 million on investigation and removal work. Also see the Spring Valley web address above.
Contacts
Contact Us
Administrative Record Locations

Region 3 | Mid-Atlantic Cleanup | Mid-Atlantic Superfund |EPA Home | EPA Superfund Homepage

http://www.epa.gov/reg3hwmd/npl/DCD983971136.htm

***

Perchlorate
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The structure and dimensions of the perchlorate ion
A space-filling model of the perchlorate ion

Perchlorates are the salts derived from perchloric acid (HClO4). They occur both naturally and through manufacturing. They have been used as a medicine for more than 50 years to treat thyroid gland disorders. They are also used as an oxidizer in rocket fuel and explosives and can be found in airbags and fireworks. Both potassium perchlorate (KClO4) and ammonium perchlorate (NH4ClO4) are used extensively within the pyrotechnics industry, and ammonium perchlorate is also a component of solid rocket fuel. Lithium perchlorate, which decomposes exothermically to give oxygen, is used in oxygen  candles  on spacecraft, submarines and in other esoteric situations where a reliable backup or supplementary oxygen supply is needed. Most perchlorate salts are soluble in water.[1]

Contents

* 1 Chemical definition
* 2 Reactivity as an oxidant
* 3 Use
o 3.1 Oxidizer
o 3.2 Medical applications
* 4 Production
o 4.1 Natural formation of perchlorates
o 4.2 Industrial production
* 5 Environmental presence
* 6 Health effects
* 7 Biological functions
* 8 Discovery of perchlorate on Mars
* 9 Perchlorate-free product development
* 10 Types of perchlorates
* 11 Other oxyanions
* 12 References
* 13 External links

Chemical definition

The chemical notation for the perchlorate ion is Cl O4- . The ion has a molecular mass of 99.45 amu.

A perchlorate (compound) is a compound containing this group, with chlorine in oxidation state +7.

Reactivity as an oxidant

The perchlorate ion is the least reactive oxidizer of the generalized chlorates. This is apparently paradoxical, since higher oxidation numbers are expected to be progressively stronger oxidizers, and less stable. Perchlorate does in fact have the highest redox potential and is least stable thermodynamically, but the central chlorine is a closed shell atom and well protected by the four oxygens. Hence, perchlorate reacts sluggishly. Most perchlorate compounds, especially salts of electropositive metals such as sodium perchlorate or potassium perchlorate, are slow to react unless heated. This property is useful in many applications, such as flares, where the device should not explode, or even catch fire spontaneously.

Mixtures of perchlorates with organic compounds are more reactive. Although they do not usually catch fire or explode unless heated, there are a number of exceptions. Large amounts of improperly stored ammonium perchlorate led to the PEPCON disaster, in which an explosion destroyed one of the two large scale production plants for ammonium perchlorate in the US.

Use
Oxidizer

The high oxygen content and the high stability of perchlorates make them ideal oxidizers for fireworks and airbags and as key compounds in solid rocket fuel. The solid rocket boosters of the space shuttle contain 350 metric tons of ammonium perchlorate each.

Medical applications

Perchlorate has been used as a medication to treat hyperthyroidism since the 1950s.[2] At very high doses (70,000–300,000 ppb) the administration of potassium perchlorate was considered the standard of care in the United States, and remains the approved pharmacologic intervention for many countries. In the early 1960s, potassium perchlorate was implicated in the development of aplastic anemia—a condition where the bone marrow fails to produce new blood cells in sufficient quantity—in thirteen patients, seven of whom died.[3] Subsequent investigations have indicated the connection between administration of potassium perchlorate and development of aplastic anemia to be  equivocable at best , which means that the benefit of treatment, if it is the only known treatment, outweighs the risk, and it appeared a contaminant poisoned the 13.[4]

Production
Natural formation of perchlorates

There are several well-documented mechanisms for natural formation of perchlorate. Involving ozone or hydroxyl radicals as oxidizer for sodium chloride from the sea and are somewhat similar to the formation processes of iodates also present in the atmosphere.

As most perchlorates are readily soluble in water, an accumulation of perchlorates in the environment only occurs in arid areas with little or no rainfall. It is known since the beginning of the 20th century that the Atacama Desert not only contains large amounts of nitrates but also trace amounts of perchlorates. The concentration varies but is in the mg/kg range. The dry southwest of the United States also shows accumulation of perchlorates. With the use of nitrates from the Atacama Desert, so called Chile saltpeter as fertilizer the chlorates were also distributed into the environment. As the Chile saltpeter was mostly substituted by nitrates produced by the Haber Bosch process, which contains no perchlorates this source of perchlorates nearly vanished.

In 2006 a mechanism for the formation of perchlorates was proposed which is particularly apropos to the discovery of perchlorate at the Mars Phoenix lander site. It was shown that soils with high concentrations of natural salts could have some of their chloride converted to perchlorate in the presence of sunlight and/or ultraviolet light. The mechanism was reproduced in the lab using chloride rich soils from Death Valley.[5]

Industrial production

Perchlorates are either produced by electrolysis of chloride salts or by the neutralisation of perchloric acid, which is produced by electrolysis of chlorine, with ammonia or other base.

The electrolysis involves the following reactions:

3 Cl2 + 6 OH- ? 5 Cl- + ClO3- + 3 H2O
ClO3- + H2O ? ClO4- + 2 H+

The industrial scale synthesis for sodium perchlorates starts from sodium chloride. If the electrolysis is not done with the method described at chlorine, but a mixing of the chlorine evolved and the sodium hydroxide is allowed, the reaction mentioned above takes place. The hypochlorite and the chlorate are intermediates in this process.

Environmental presence

Low levels of perchlorate have been detected in both drinking water and groundwater in 35 states in the US according to the Environmental Protection Agency. In 2004, the chemical was also found in cow’s milk in the area with an average level of 1.3 parts per billion ( ppb  or :g/L), which may have entered the cows through feeding on crops that had exposure to water containing perchlorates.[6] According to the Impact Area Groundwater Study Program, the chemical has been detected as high as 5 :g/L in Massachusetts, well over the state regulation of 2 :g/L[7].

In some places, perchlorate is detected because of contamination from industrial sites that use or manufacture it. In other places, there is no clear source of perchlorate. In those areas it may be naturally occurring, or could be present because of the use of Chilean fertilizers, which were imported to the U.S. by the hundreds of tons in the early 19th century. One recent area of research has even suggested that perchlorate can be created when lightning strikes a body of water, and perchlorates are created as a byproduct of chlorine generators used in swimming pool chlorination systems.[8]

Fireworks are also a source of perchlorate in lakes.[9]

As of April 2007, the EPA has not yet determined whether perchlorate is present at sufficient levels in the environment to require a nationwide regulation on how much should be allowed in drinking water.[10] In 2005, U.S. EPA issued a recommended Drinking Water Equivalent Level (DWEL) for perchlorate of 24.5 :g/L. In early 2006, EPA issued a “Cleanup Guidance” for this same amount. Both the DWEL and the Cleanup Guidance were based on a thorough review of the existing research by the National Academy of Science (NAS). This followed numerous other studies, including one which suggested human breast milk had an average of 10.5 :g/L of perchlorate.[11] Both the Pentagon and some environmental groups have voiced questions about the NAS report, but no credible science has emerged to challenge the NAS findings. In February 2008, U.S. Food and Drug Administration said that U.S. toddlers on average are being exposed to more than half of the U.S. EPA’s safe dose from food alone[12]. In March 2009, a Centers for Disease Control study found 15 brands of infant formula contaminated with perchlorate. Combined with existing perchlorate drinking water contamination, infants could be at risk for exposure to perchlorate above the levels considered safe by E.P.A.[13]

The US Environmental Protection Agency has issued substantial guidance and analysis concerning the impacts of perchlorate on the environment as well as drinking water. [1] California has also issued guidance regarding perchlorate use. [2]

Several states have enacted drinking water standard for perchlorate including Massachusetts in 2006. California’s legislature enacted AB 826, the Perchlorate Contamination Prevention Act of 2003, requiring California’s Department of Toxic Substance Control (DTSC) to adopt regulations specifying best management practices for perchlorate and perchlorate-containing substances. The Perchlorate Best Management Practices were adopted on December 31, 2005 and became operative on July 1, 2006. [3] California issued drinking water standards in 2007. Several other states, including Arizona, Maryland, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, and Texas have established non-enforceable, advisory levels for perchlorate.

Courts have been called upon to take action with regard to perchlorate. For example, in 2003, a federal district court in California found that Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) applied because perchlorate is ignitable and therefore a “characteristic” hazardous waste. (see Castaic Lake Water Agency v. Whittaker, 272 F. Supp. 2d 1053, 1059-61 (C.D. Cal. 2003)).

One example of perchlorate related problems was found at the Olin Flare Facility, Morgan Hill, California – Perchlorate contamination beneath a former flare manufacturing plant in California was first discovered in 2000, several years after the plant had closed. The plant had used potassium perchlorate as one of the ingredients during its 40 years of operation. By late 2003, the state of California and the Santa Clara Valley Water District had confirmed a groundwater plume currently extending over nine miles through residential and agricultural communities.

The Regional Water Quality Control Board and the Santa Clara Valley Water District have engaged in a major outreach effort that has received extensive press and community response. A well testing program is underway for approximately 1,200 residential, municipal, and agricultural wells in the area. Large ion exchange treatment units are operating in three public water supply systems that include seven municipal wells where perchlorate has been detected. The potentially responsible parties, Olin Corporation and Standard Fuse Incorporated, are supplying bottled water to nearly 800 households with private wells. The Regional Water Quality Control Board is overseeing potentially responsible party (PRP) cleanup efforts.[4]

The two production sites of PEPCON and Kerr McGee in Henderson, Nevada, which were the biggest producers until the explosion of PEPCON in 1988 and the closure of the Kerr McGee plant in 1998, leaked significant amounts of perchlorates into the Las Vegas Wash and from there into Lake Mead and the Colorado River.

The disposal of unused rocket motors and ammunition has led to contamination by perchlorates of several military installations.

Health effects

Perchlorate adversly affects human health by interfering with iodide uptake into the thyroid gland. In adults, the thyroid gland helps regulate the metabolism by releasing hormones, while in children, the thyroid helps in proper development. Perchlorate is becoming a serious threat to human health and water resources.[14]

The NAS found that perchlorate only affects the thyroid gland. It is not stored in the body, it is not metabolized, and any effects of perchlorate on the thyroid gland are fully reversible once exposure stops.[15] There has been some concern on perchlorate’s effects on fetuses, newborns and children, but several peer-reviewed studies on children and newborns also provide reason to believe that low levels of perchlorate do not pose a threat to these populations.[citation needed] On October 1, 2004, the American Thyroid Association (ATA) reported that perchlorate may not be as harmful to newborns, pregnant women and other adults as previously thought.[16]

A study involving healthy adult volunteers determined that at levels above 0.007 milligrams per kilogram per day (mg/(kgAd)), perchlorate can temporarily inhibit the thyroid gland’s ability to absorb iodine from the bloodstream ( iodide uptake inhibition , thus perchlorate is a known goitrogen).[17] The EPA converted this dose into a reference dose of 0.0007 mg/(kgAd) by dividing this level by the standard intraspecies uncertainty factor of 10. The agency then calculated a  drinking water equivalent level  of 24.5 ppb by assuming a person weighs 70 kilograms (154 pounds) and consumes 2 liters (68 ounces) of drinking water per day over a lifetime.[18] Thus, 25 ppb was set as the recommended drinking water standard (the DWEL). For that reason, most media reports call this the  safe  level of exposure. The NAS report also stated additional research would be helpful, but emphasized that the existing database on perchlorate was sufficient to make its reference dose recommendation and ensure it would be protective for everyone.[citation needed]

Recent research, however, has shown inhibition of iodide uptake in the thyroids of women at much lower levels, levels attainable from normally contaminated water and milk.[19]

Biological functions

Several phylogenetically diverse proteobacteria have been found, which can use perchlorate as an electron acceptor. [20]

Discovery of perchlorate on Mars

NASA reports that:  Within the last month [July 2008], two samples have been analyzed by the Wet Chemistry Lab (WCL) of the lander’s Microscopy, Electrochemistry, and Conductivity Analyzer, or MECA, suggesting one of the soil constituents may be perchlorate….

The salts formed from perchlorates discovered at the Phoenix landing site act as “anti-freeze” and have the potential to be found in a liquid water solution under the temperature and pressure conditions on present-day Mars, say professor Vincent F. Chevrier and graduate students Jennifer Hanley and Travis S. Altheide of the University of Arkansas. Their research is published in the May 2009 issue of Geophysical Research Letters.

The extreme temperatures found on Mars typically lead to either crystallization or evaporation of water, making it difficult to imagine that water could be found in liquid form. However, salts have been shown to lower the freezing point of water—which is why street crews use salt on the roads to melt ice, Hanley said. Some salts, like perchlorates, lower the freezing point substantially. It turns out that the temperature for the liquid phase of magnesium perchlorate—206 kelvins—is a temperature found on Mars at the Phoenix landing site. Based on temperature findings from the Phoenix lander, conditions would allow this perchlorate solution to be present in liquid form for a few hours each day during the summer.

The source of the perchlorate has not yet been evaluated fully, and may represent possible extra-Martian (Earth-sourced) contamination via the Phoenix lander itself. Nevertheless, the ultrapure hydrazine used in the Phoenix retro rockets make this type of contamination unlikely. In addition, perchlorate found below the surface is more highly concentrated than would be expected from contamination during Earth launch operations. [21]

In a statement issued after the discovery of perchlorate on Mars (see above), NASA declared, among other things, that perchlorates are found naturally on Earth at such places as Chile’s hyper-arid Atacama Desert.[22]

New Scientist magazine on 18 Feb. 2009 reported that the perchlorates detected by the lander were most likely sodium or magnesium perchlorate which could form briny solutions with freezing points of -37 EC and -72 EC respectively.
Perchlorate-free product development

In response to concerns regarding perchlorate, efforts have been undertaken to produce substitutes for products using perchlorate. For example, efforts to create perchlorate-free flares include both spectrally balanced decoy and colored flare compositions which included nitrate or oxide oxidizers. Because nitrate oxidizers are less reactive than perchlorate oxidizers, high-energy fuels have used to compensate for this energy shortfall. Some of these high-energy fuels were produced using mechanical alloying technology.

Types of perchlorates

* Ammonium perchlorate, NH4ClO4
* Caesium perchlorate, CsClO4
* Lithium perchlorate, LiClO4
* Magnesium perchlorate, Mg(ClO4)2
* Perchloric acid, HClO4
* Potassium perchlorate, KClO4
* Rubidium perchlorate, RbClO4
* Silver perchlorate, AgClO4
* Sodium perchlorate, NaClO4

Other oxyanions

Using Stock naming, if a Roman numeral in brackets follows the word  chlorate , this indicates the oxyanion contains chlorine in the indicated oxidation state, namely:
Common name     Stock name     Oxidation state     Formula
Hypochlorite     Chlorate(I)     +1     ClO-
Chlorite     Chlorate(III)     +3     ClO2-
Chlorate     Chlorate(V)     +5     ClO3-
Perchlorate     Chlorate(VII)     +7     ClO4-

Using this convention,  chlorate  means any chlorine oxyanion. Commonly,  chlorate  refers only to the oxyanion where chlorine is in the +5 oxidation state.

References

1. ^ Draft Toxicological Profile for Perchlorates, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, September, 2005.
2. ^ Godley, A. F.; Stanbury, J. B. (1954).  Preliminary experience in the treatment of hyperthyroidism with potassium perchlorate . J Clin Endocrinol Metab 14: 70–78. PMID 13130654.
3. ^ National Research Council (2005).  Perchlorate and the thyroid . Health implications of perchlorate ingestion. Washington, D.C: National Academies Press. pp. 7. ISBN 0-309-09568-9. http://books.google.com/books?id=EMX4ZTF6pusC&pg=PA7&lpg=PA7.  Retrieved on April 3, 2009 through Google Book Search.
4. ^ Clark, JJJ (2000).  Toxicology of perchlorate . in Urbansky ET (ed.). Perchlorate in the environment. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers. pp. 19–20. ISBN 978-0-306-46389-1. http://books.google.com/books?id=aN1nV174zVIC&pg=PA19.  Retrieved on April 3, 2009 through Google Book Search.
5. ^ Miller, Glen..  Photooxidation of chloride to perchlorate in the presence of desert soils and titanium dioxide . American Chemical Society. March 29, 2006
6. ^ Associated Press.  Toxic chemical found in California milk . MSNBC. June 22, 2004.
7. ^ http://www.mass.gov/dep/water/dwstand.pdf
8. ^ William E. Motzer (2001).  Perchlorate: Problems, Detection, and Solutions . Environmental Forensics 2 (4): 301–311. doi:10.1006/enfo.2001.0059.
9. ^ Fireworks Displays Linked To Perchlorate Contamination In Lakes
10. ^ EPA Press Release  EPA Issues Determination on 11 Contaminants  April 4, 2007
11. ^ McKee, Maggie.  Perchlorate found in breast milk across US . New Scientist. February 23, 2005
12. ^ Perchlorate In Food
13. ^  CDC Scientists Find Rocket Fuel Chemical In Infant Formula.  Anila Jacob, M.D., M.P.H.. Environmental Working Group. 2 April 2009.
14. ^ California Department of Toxic Substances Control Jan 26, 2008
15. ^ J. Wolff (1998).  Perchlorate and the Thyroid Gland . Pharmacological Reviews 50 (1): 89–105.
16. ^ American Thyroid Association (1 October 2004).  Various Levels of Perchlorate Exposure Found Not to Be Harmful to Newborns, Pregnant Women, and Other Adults . Press release. http://www.thyroid.org/professionals/publications/news/04_10_01_perchlorate.html.
17. ^ Greer, M.A., Goodman, G., Pleuss, R.C., Greer, S.E. (2002).  Health effect assessment for environmental perchlorate contamination: The dose response for inhibition of thyroidal radioiodide uptake in humans  (free online). Environmental Health Perspectives 110 (9): 927–937. http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2002/110p927-937greer/abstract.html.
18. ^ US EPA Memorandum Jan 26, 2006
19. ^ Benjamin C. Blount, James L. Pirkle, John D. Osterloh, Liza Valentin-Blasini, and Kathleen L. Caldwell (2006).  Urinary Perchlorate and Thyroid Hormone Levels in Adolescent and Adult Men and Women Living in the United States . Environmental Health Perspectives 114 (12). doi:10.1289/ehp.9466.
20. ^ John D. Coates, Laurie A. Achenbach (2004).  Microbial perchlorate reduction: rocket-fuelled metabolism . Nature Reviews Microbiology 2: 569–580. doi:10.1038/nrmicro926.
21. ^ Miles O’Brien and Kate Tobin (2008-08-04).  Toxin in soil may mean no life on Mars . CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/08/04/nasa.mars/index.html. Retrieved 2008-08-05.
22. ^ Phoenix Mars Team Opens Window on Scientific Process, NASA web site, August 5, 2008.

External links

* NAS Report: The Health Effects of Perchlorate Ingestion
* Facts and truth about perchlorate (Sponsored by the chemical companies that produce it)
* NRDC’s criticism of NAS report
* Environment California report (Executive Summary with link to full text)
* Macho Moms: Perchlorate pollutant masculinizes fish: Science News Online, Aug. 12, 2006
* New Scientist Space Blog: Phoenix discovery may be bad for Mars life
*  State Threatening To Sue Military Over Water Pollution , Associated Press, May 19, 2003.
*  Health Effects Of Perchlorate From Spent Rocket , SpaceDaily.com, July 11, 2002.
* = Dept of Defense, Dept of Energy, and US Environmental Protection Agency’s Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program, Elimination of Perchlorate Oxidizers from Pyrotechnic Flare Compositions, 2009

v • d • e
Thyroid therapy (H03)
Thyroid hormones
Levothyroxine sodium# A Liothyronine sodium A Tiratricol A Thyroid gland preparations
Antithyroid preparations
Sodium-iodide symporter inhibitor

Perchlorate (Potassium perchlorate) A Pertechnetate (Sodium pertechnetate)
Thyroid peroxidase inhibitors (thioamide)

Thiouracils: Methylthiouracil A Propylthiouracil# A Benzylthiouracil
Sulfur-containing imidazole derivatives: Carbimazole A Thiamazole
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Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perchlorate
Categories: Perchlorates | Oxoanions | Pyrotechnic oxidizers | Non-coordinating anions

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perchlorate

***

Nuclear Smuggling Incidents Increasing, Agency Warns

Wednesday, October 03, 2001

More than 20 attempts at smuggling nuclear materials have been confirmed this year, according to Jane’s Information Group Foreign Report.  The incidents this year, in addition to more than 370 which have occurred in the last seven years — including 15 incidents involving plutonium or weapon-grade uranium — have prompted the International Atomic Energy Agency to step up its programs to improve the physical security of nuclear materials.

A collaborative law enforcement program under IAEA leadership was started earlier this year to help with the smuggling problem.  In conjunction with the World Customs Organization, Interpol and the FBI, the IAEA program will seek better information exchanges between law enforcement agencies as well as training programs for police and customs organizations (Foreign Report, Oct. 4).

Even more IAEA action is needed to prevent nuclear materials from falling into terrorist hands, according to two nonproliferation specialists writing in Arms Control Today.  George Bunn and Fritz Steinhausler write that  adoption of stronger physical protection standards against these threats is essential, and the sooner the better.

The two supported a recent decision by IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei to convene a meeting of experts to draft a new amendment to the 1980 Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, which currently only applies to nuclear materials in transit.

The new amendment should add  some sort of verification or reporting requirement,  Bunn and Steinhausler said, adding that the convention should apply to domestic facilities and include measures on preventing sabotage (Bunn/Steinhausler, Arms Control Today, Oct. 2001).

http://www.unwire.org/unwire/20011003/19010_story.asp

***

NUCLEAR SMUGGLING CASE DEEPENS GEORGIAN-RUSSIAN TENSIONS
By Richard Weitz (04/05/2007 issue of the CACI Analyst)

Revelations in January 2007 about the details of a recent smuggling incident in the Republic of Georgia have intensified concerns about the security of nuclear materials in the South Caucasus. Although the initial effect of the case has been to sharpen tensions between Russia and Georgia, over the long-term it could result in enhanced nonproliferation cooperation in the region. Indeed, the only two seizures of Highly Enriched Uranium in recent years have taken place in Georgia, indicating the need for greater involvement by the international community in countering WMD smuggling in the South Caucasus.

BACKGROUND: On January 25, 2007, a Georgian court sentenced a citizen of the Russian region of North Ossetia to eight years in prison for attempting to sell 100 grams of weapons-grade Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) for $1 million on the black market. The authorities had detained Oleg Khintsagov for almost a year following his arrest in February 1, 2006, in a complex multinational sting operation that eventually involved the CIA, the FBI, and the U.S. Department of Energy. The Georgian government provided details about the case only after the court reached its verdict.

Although the court also sentenced three Georgian citizens to between four and six years in prison, the immediate effect of the new revelations surrounding the case was to worsen the already problematic relationship between Russia and Georgia. The Russian Ambassador to Georgia, Vyacheslav Kovalenko, had only just returned to Tbilisi after having been absent for four months following revelations about alleged Russian espionage activity in Georgia. The two countries have also experienced acute bilateral disputes over Georgian efforts to join NATO, Russian economic sanctions on Georgia, and Russian support for the two remaining separatist governmentsâ ”in Abkhazia and South Ossetiaâ ”on Georgian territory.
The Georgian authorities have offered different reasons why they delayed providing details about the case until now. Some Georgian officials said they needed time to investigate the incident thoroughly. At least one Georgian legislator said the United States had requested a temporary media blackout. At a press conference announcing the verdict, however, Georgian Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili implied that his government had decided to publicize the case because it had lost patience waiting for greater Russian cooperation in investigating the incident.

Russian officials insisted they have cooperated fully with the investigation. Some attributed the delay to a Georgian attempt, supported by some U.S. officials, to release the information at the most opportune time for embarrassing the Russian government. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, â œI hope very much that this is not an attempted political provocation.â   Lavrov asserted that experts from Russiaâ ™s Federal Security Service (FSB) and Federal Atomic Energy Agency (Rosatom) had interrogated Khintsagov, but he â œcould say nothing coherent.â

A representative of the Office of the Russian Prosecutor General told the ITAR-TASS news agency that the Georgian Prosecutor Generalâ ™s Office had asked for legal assistance in investigating Khintsagov. He claimed, however, that the Georgian authorities had failed to respond to the Russian governmentâ ™s request for copies of the materials Russia needed to launch an investigation. Under Russian law, it is illegal for unauthorized personnel to acquire, store, or sell radioactive materials.

Several influential Russians speculated that Georgian and American officials had colluded to exploit the incident to damage Russiaâ ™s reputation as a responsible steward of sensitive nuclear materials. Konstantin Zatulin, director of the Institute of CIS Countries and a deputy in the Duma, noted the resemblance between the Khintsagov incident and the case of former Russian security agent Alexander Litvinenko, killed with radioactive polonium also widely thought to have originated in Russia: â œI see only one reason to again return to the theme of mysterious Russian spies who are transporting uranium and plutonium and other such substances all over the world.â

Andrei Cherkasenko, chairman of the board of AtomPromResursy, a Russian manufacturer of nuclear power equipment, explicitly accused Georgian and American officials of deliberately timing the release of the information about the Khintsagov case to coincide with Russian President Vladimir Putinâ ™s visit to India, where he signed a memorandum of intent to construct four additional Russian nuclear power plants. Russian, American, and other foreign companies are expected to compete vigorously to sell nuclear equipment to India if the Nuclear Suppliers Group authorizes such sales, a decision expected to occur sometime this year.

Whatever the reason for the timing, the Georgian government did cite the smuggling incident to reaffirm its call for the deployment of international observer missions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, including along the Georgian-Russian border, to supplement or replace the Russian peacekeeping forces there. After meeting with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili on February 26, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said EU governments might deploy peacekeepers in Georgia provided the mission had a clear and achievable objective. Publicizing the arrest of uranium smugglers operating in the breakaway regions supports the Georgian argument that neither the local authorities nor Russian peacekeepers have proven able to secure the territories from serious nonproliferation threats and dangerous criminal networks.

In the past, Russian officials as well as both regionsâ ™ unrecognized separatist governments have rejected proposals for deploying permanent observer missions from non-CIS countries on their territories. Murat Dzhoyev, the South Ossetian de facto governmentâ ™s designated foreign minister, dismissed claims that his autonomous region had become a transit zone for nuclear trafficking as â œlaughable.â   His office issued a formal statement accusing Georgia of engineering the scandal to discredit the South Ossetian government. The separatist authorities in Abkhazia also denounced the timing of the Georgian announcement, hinting that Tbilisi sought to influence UN Security Council deliberations by spreading alarm about the security situation in Georgiaâ ™s separatist regions. In mid-February 2006, the â œforeign ministersâ   of Abkhazia and South Ossetia conferred in Moscow with their counterpart from the separatist region of Transnistria on how to strengthen their autonomous positions.

Representatives of the Russian Federal Customs Service also expressed skepticism that the material in Khintsagovâ ™s possession came from Russia. They insist that the Russian government has installed very effective Russian-made â œYantarâ   radiation monitoring equipment along its southern borders and other trafficking routes that would have detected any smuggled radioactive materials. Georgian officials subsequently revealed that Khintsagov smuggled the uranium across a border checkpoint near Kazbegi, a remote town in eastern Georgia where radiation detection devices might have been less advanced than those deployed at more heavily used transit points.

IMPLICATIONS: The Khintsagov incident underscores the potential nonproliferation threats associated with the anarchic conditions existing in the breakaway regions in the South Caucasus and the other â œfrozen conflictâ   regions of the former Soviet Union. The weak law enforcement and porous borders in both Abkhazia and South Ossetia (which permit easy transit with neighboring Russian regions as well as into Georgia) facilitate trafficking in nuclear materials as well as more conventional forms of contraband (e.g., narcotics, counterfeit currency, persons).

Although the Georgian government has made a number of efforts to enhance the safety and security of the nuclear materials under its control, especially after Georgia joined the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in February 1997, the country remains especially vulnerable to nuclear trafficking through its territory. Besides the lack of effective political authority in the two separatist regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia., foreign governments and nonproliferation experts have expressed concern about the level of corruption in Georgian law enforcement agencies, the growing strength of transnational criminal organizations in the South Caucasus, and the republicâ ™s pivotal location at the crossroads between Europe, Russia, Asia, and the Middle East.
In June 2003, Georgian authorities apprehended Garik Dadayan, an Armenian national, in the border town of Sadakhlo for attempting to smuggle 170 grams of weapons-grade HEU across Georgiaâ ™s borders with Armenia and Azerbaijan. Smuggling had become rampant in the region after relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan deteriorated following their war over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. Dadayan told investigators that he had acquired the material from intermediaries of Russian and other nationalities in Vladikavkaz, the same North Ossetian city where Khintsagov resided. Georgian authorities concluded that the HEU originated in Novosibirsk. According to the media, however, the FSB sent a confidential letter in May 2006 to the Georgian authorities asserting that Russian experts had concluded that the uranium smuggled by Dadayan and Khintsagov were produced at separate times and  seriously differ in composition.

CONCLUSIONS: The two cases demonstrate the vulnerability of the South Caucasus, especially Georgia, to the smuggling of nuclear materials. According to IAEA, of the 481 occurrences of nuclear smuggling reported between May 2002 and early 2006, only the Dadayan incident involved weapons-grade nuclear material. The Khintsagov case now falls into that category. The international community clearly needs to adopt urgent measures to shore up its nonproliferation defenses in the region. Priorities include improving WMD detection capabilities, extending best practices into private industry, and strengthening the rule of law throughout Georgian territory.

AUTHORâ ™S BIO: Richard Weitz is Senior Fellow and Director for Project Management at the Hudson Institute.
» printer friendly version
http://www.cacianalyst.org/newsite/?q=node/4583

***

Nuclear Terrorism Incidents

compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last updated 28 September 2003

Nuclear terrorism–acts of violence (political and non-political) involving radioactive materials, assaults on nuclear facilities, and thefts of nuclear warheads

* 3 Jan 1961: United States–criticality accident at SL-1 test reactor kills 3; according to reports, the excursion was a murder-suicide by the worker who extracted a control rod.
* 1966-1977: Europe–10 terrorist incidents against European nuclear installations.2
* before 1974: Austria–Radioisotope indium-113 applied to a railroad car.3
* 1974-1986: United States–32 acts of intentional damage or suspected sabotage at domestic nuclear facilities.4
* 1974-1985: Total of nearly 100 instances that involved response by NEST.5
* 1974-1980: United States–total of about 80 instances of nuclear threats deemed credible; only two prompted NEST deployment.6
* 15 Aug 1975: France–Two bombs exploded at Mt. d’Arree NPS in Brittany: one at far end of canal between plant and cooling lake, the other damaging a air chimney for plant buildings in the compound. The reactor was shut down temporarily for inspection.7
* 12 May 1976: Maine–Two bombs exploded in the headquarters of the Central Maine Power Company in Augusta; a Fred Hampton Unit of the People’s Forces claimed responsibility and demanded end to expansion of nuclear powerplants.8
* 10 Oct 1977: Oregon–Bomb exploded next to visitor center at Trojan NPS, with Environmental Assault Unit of the New World Liberation Front claiming responsibility.9
* 18 Dec 1977: Spain–4 ETA terrorists attack guard post at Lemoniz NPS, with one terrorist killed; ETA later claimed to have planned to blow up the reactors.10
* 17 Mar 1978: Spain–Bomb exploded in steam generator of Lemoniz NPS killing 2 construction workers and injuring 14, ten minutes after ETA phone call warned of bomb; damage amounted to $6,000,000.11
* 1979: France–Environmental terrorists cause $20 million in damages at a nuclear plant.12
* 1979: Virginia–2 plant operator trainees entered fuel storage building at Surry NPS and damaged four new fuel assemblies by pouring sodium hydroxide on them.13
* Jan 1979: North Carolina–An employee of a GE subcontractor sent extortion letter with sample of uranium dioxide to general manager of GE nuclear faility in Wilmington. Individual had stolen two 5-gallon containers of uranium dioxide and threatened to disperse them in unnamed U.S. city unless he received $100,000 ransom. He was arrested and sentenced to 15 years.14
* 13 Jun 1979: Spain–Two ETA guerrillas planted bomb in turbine room of Lemoniz NPS which was later detonated 25 minutes after a warning call. One worker who did not evacuate was killed; a tank containing 5,000 liters of oil was ignited and turbine components were moderately damaged. The ETA claimed responsibility on 16 June.15
* 11 Nov 1979: Spain–5 ETA guerrillas entered Equipos Nucleares (Nuclear Instruments) factory in Maliano, planted explosives and kidnapped the 10 guards on duty; guards were released near Santander-Vizcaya border. Charges exploded after midnight, causing $6,000,000 in damage mostly to one end of main factory building. ETA claimed responsibility on 13 November.16
* before 1980: France–Radioactive graphite fuel element plugs placed under driver’s seat of a car; victim sustained 25-30 rad dose to his spinal bone marrow and 400-500 rads to his testes. Perpetrator was tried and convicted of poisoning by radiation, fined $1,000, and served 9 months in prison.17
* 1981: New York–fuel oil filter drains were closed on backup diesel power generators at Nine Mile Point Unit 1, apparently intentionally, preventing their startup.18
* 1981: Ohio–water valve was found shut, apparently intentionally, at Beaver Valley NPS, leaving high-pressure portion of emergency cooling system disabled.19
* 1982: France–Five rockets fired into Creys-Malville nuclear facility, causing minor damage.20
* Aug 1982: New Jersey–values were found closed on backup diesel generator at Salem Unit II NPS, apparently intentionally, which would prevent generator start-up.21
* 1983: West Germany–Four West Germans gain forced entry to a Pershing missile site and attempt to destroy a missile with crowbars.22
* 12 Nov 1984: Missouri–Four Catholic peace activists of the Silo Pruning Hooks entered Minuteman ICBM site near Higginsville and did over $10,000 worth of damage to equipment with a jack hammer; all were arrested and charged with destruction of federal property.23
* Apr 1985: New York–Credible claim emerged that New York City’s water reservoirs had been contaminated with plutonium; testing detected femtocurie levels of plutonium in the water.24
* Jun 1985: Arizona–Report of intentional tampering with water valves at Palo Verde NPS.25
* after 1987: Pennsylvania–Mentally ill man drives his station wagon through the fence at Three Mile Island nuclear power plant and wanders on foot for a period of time before being captured.26
* 28 Nov 1987: California–Bomb exploded at 1:30 A.M. in parking lot of Sandia National Laboratories (next to LLNL); 32 hours later a caller claimed responsibility for the Nuclear Liberation Front, although link was unconfirmed.27
* Feb 1990: Azerbaijan–Azerbeijani rebels unsuccessfully attacked a Soviet military depot near Baku where nuclear weapons are stored; Soviet troops were sent to secure the base.28
* Jan 1992: Iran–Egyptian newspaper claimed Iran had bought three Soviet nuclear warheads from Kazakhstan for $150 million; Kazakhstan denied the report. In April Russian intelligence reported Iran had obtained at least two warheads from Kazakhstan; in July a Kazakh official said the three reportedly missing warheads were in test shafts at the Kazakh test site; in September a U.S. congressional task force alleged Iran had obtained 4 Soviet warheads (including 2 operational): two 40 kt SRBM warheads, one 50 kt NGB, and one 0.1 kt AFAP. By 1994 Russia said the warheads were accounted for; Israeli officials suggest the warheads were borrowed for disassembly and reverse engineering.29
* Mar 1992: Commonwealth of Independent States–Reportedly, box of radioactive material stolen from Pridniestroviye, Transdnestr; thieves threatened to blow up the material if fighting in Moldova was not stopped.30
* 1993: Russia–A radioactive substance was planted in the chair of Vladimir Kaplun, director of a Russian packing company; over several weeks Kaplun contracted radiation sickness and died.31
* Nov 1993: Russia–Two nuclear warheads reportedly stolen by two employees of the Zlatoust-36 Instrument Building Plant near Chelyabinsk, a weapons assembly facility; weapons recovered in a nearby residential garage and the employees arrested shortly afterwards.32
* Mar 1994: Russia–At SS-25 ICBM site at Barnaul in Siberia, a Russian soldier opens fire with sub-machine gun and kills commander and two other soldiers; other soldiers could not return fire because they would have had to fire towards the SS-25; the soldier was persuaded to surrender after three hours, having taking refuge in an armoured vehicle.33
* 23 Nov 1995: Russia–Shamil Basayev, Chechen rebel commander, directs television news crew to a parcel of cesium-137 buried in Izmailovsky Park, eastern Moscow; parcel reportedly posed no threat and was removed. Parcel weighed 32 kg, contained 10-50 mCi, and was part of a hospital x-ray machine taken in a prior raid.34
* Dec 1995: France–Saboteurs put salt into a cooling contour of one of the Blayais nuclear power reactors.35
* 9 Jan 1996: Russia–Chechen fighters attack a Russian military airfield at Kizlyar unsucessfully, then temporarily take about 2,000 civilian hostages.36
* Jun 1996: New York–several individuals arrested in plot to kill Republican officials; seized weapons included radioactive materials.37
* after 1996: Russia–Gunman barracades himself in a nuclear submarine and holds police at bay for several hours.38
* May 1997: Russia–Aleksandr Lebed claims privately and later publicly that a number of Soviet ADMs disguised as suitcases are missing; his claims are affirmed by some but no concrete evidence emerges.39
* Nov 1997: Russia–Several threats to sabotage submarine nuclear reactors are made by one or more Murmansk shipyard workers in demanding back pay they are owed.40
* 19 Aug 1999: United States–Andris Blakis spread phosphorous-32 on the chair of a co-worker in Los Angeles, CA, causing a dose to the co-worker of a few tenths of a rem; Blakis was arrested and charged.41
* 6-8 Jun 2000: Japan–Tsugio Uchinishi sent letters laced with monazite (a thorium-containing mineral) to 10 government offices in Tokyo in protest of illegal uranium exports to North Korea.42
* 20 Dec 2000: Japan–A man scattered a small amount of iodine-125 at a subway ticket gate in Osaka; the man was arrested, and no injuries resulted.43
* 2001: worldwide–6 incidents involving terrorism with nuclear or radiological materials.44

NOTES:

2. Denton, p. 152.
3. Mullen, pp. 242, 246.
4. Denton, p. 152.
5. ITFPNT, p. 17.
6. Gates, p. 402.
7. Kellen, pp. 123-124.
8. Kellen, p. 124.
9. Kellen, p. 124.
10. Kellen, p. 124.
11. Kellen, p. 125.
12. Denton, p. 152.
13. Hirsch, p. 212.
14. Hirsch, p. 212.
15. Kellen, p. 126.
16. Kellen, pp. 126-127.
17. Mullen, pp. 242, 246.
18. Hirsch, p. 211.
19. Hirsch, p. 211.
20. Denton, p. 152.
21. Hirsch, p. 212.
22. Denton, p. 153.
23.  Missile Protesters,  p. 4.
24. Mullen, p. 243; Spector, 1985, p. 5.
25. The Washington Post, p. A5a.
26.
27. Hoffman, p. 1.
28. High Frontier, April 1990, p. 2, and July 1991, p. 5.
29. Potter, pp. 125-148; Hedges, p. A10.
30. Potter, p. 135.
31. Lee, p.
32. Lee, p. 124.
33. Jane’s, p. 15.
34. Lee, pp. 135-136; FAS, 27 March 1996.
35. Bukharin, p. 8.
36. Bukharin, p. 10; Lieven, pp. 137-138.
37.
38.
39. Parrish.
40. Bellona, 9 Nov. 1997.
41. Center for Nonproliferation Studies, on line.
42. Center for Nonproliferation Studies, on line.
43. Center for Nonproliferation Studies, on line.
44. Center for Nonproliferation Studies, on line.

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(excerpt from Nuclear Terrorism and Related Incidents, version 5)
2000-2002, 2003 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 28 September 2003.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/wrjp1855.html

***

Russia: Are Suitcase Nukes on the Loose? The Story Behind the Controversy

Scott Parrish and John Lepingwell
Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Monterey Institute of International Studies
November 1997

General Aleksandr Lebed’s recent allegation that some former Soviet suitcase size nuclear weapons may be missing has generated a storm of negative media commentary in Moscow and concern and unease in Washington. Even though many contradictory reports have been published, some patterns are discernable that provide important clues to unraveling the story of the  suitcase nukes.

In a meeting with a US Congressional delegation in May 1997, and again in an interview broadcast on 60 Minutes on 7 September 1997, Lebed claimed that the Soviet Union created perhaps one hundred atomic demolition munitions (ADMs), or atomic land mines. These low-yield (circa 1 kiloton) devices were to be used by special forces for wartime sabotage and thus were small, portable, and not equipped with standard safety devices to prevent unauthorized detonation. According to Lebed, some of the ADMs were deployed in the former Soviet republics, and might not have been returned to Russia after the Soviet Union’s collapse. During his short tenure as Secretary of the Russian Security Council, Lebed started an investigation into the whereabouts of these weapons, but was fired by President Yeltsin before the investigation was completed.

Lebed’s statements are not the first indication that the Soviet Union built ADMs, or that some might have gone astray. In January 1996, the Monterey Institute’s Center for Nonproliferation Studies received information from a Russian presidential advisor that an unspecified number of ADMs had been manufactured in the 1970s for the KGB. Indeed, in the wake of Lebed’s charges, former Russian presidential advisor Aleksey Yablokov told a US Congressional subcommittee on 2 October 1997 that he was  absolutely sure  that ADMs had been built in the 1970s for the KGB’s special forces, and that these weapons were not included in the Russian Ministry of Defense nuclear weapons inventory nor covered by its accounting and control systems. Even earlier, in the summer of 1995, the Russian press published several articles claiming that Chechen separatists had either obtained, or tried to obtain, small nuclear weapons. Lebed’s claims are thus not completely new, but they are noteworthy because he was in a position to gain access to information on such weapons.

Official Russian reactions to Lebed’s statements were negative and derisory. Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin termed Lebed’s allegations  absolute absurdity,  while a presidential spokesman said  such superfantasies can only be the product of a diseased imagination.  But as the official denials continued, they became increasingly self-contradictory and less credible. Some Russian military and atomic energy officials denied that the Soviet Union had ever created ADMs, and even stated that such weapons were either technically impossible, or prohibitively expensive. Others admitted that such weapons might have existed, but that they were all accounted for and under strict control. All agreed, however, that Lebed’s claims were motivated by his desire to regain the political limelight and prepare for a future presidential campaign.
The official denials may well have been orchestrated and coordinated to impugn Lebed’s reputation and reliability. If so, they were poorly conceived and raised more questions than they answered. Seemingly authoritative statements by Russian officials that portable ADMs are technically infeasible are belied by the fact that the United States built hundreds of them during the 1960s. The Soviet Union certainly had the technical capability to create portable ADMs, and may well have had military requirements to do so. Soviet strategy included diversionary actions and special force operations behind enemy lines, and ADMs might well have been stockpiled for use in a nuclear war. Certainly, if the United States developed and deployed ADMs it would be unusual for the Soviet Union not to follow suit. Thus, the claims that the Soviet Union did not produce ADMs are not convincing.

The claim that all nuclear weapons are accounted for is perhaps more credible, but is impossible to confirm. The misleading statements on the technical feasibility of ADMs do not bolster confidence in the claims that all Russian nuclear weapons are securely stored. However, most reports of the loss or theft of nuclear weapons have turned out to be based on weak evidence. The articles on nuclear theft that appeared in the Russian press in mid-1995 were apparently partly based on a report in the extreme right-wing Russian newspaper Zavtra (which in turn evidently was inspired by an article in the Russian-language edition of Soldier of Fortune, which claimed that suitcase nukes were smuggled through Lithuania to Iraq and possibly other countries). Zavtra’s correspondent claimed to have met with a former Chechen  agent  who participated in the diversion of two suitcase-size nuclear weapons to Chechnya in 1992. To bolster its claim, Zavtra published the technical details of the devices. However, the technical details appear to be inaccurate, and weaken, rather than strengthen, the report’s credibility. After publishing the article, the Zavtra correspondent was abducted, beaten, and threatened with death if he pursued the story. But after reporting the abduction, Zavtra retracted the original article, claiming that the meeting with the agent, and the subsequent beating, had been perpetrated by Chechen agents who hoped that rumors of nuclear weapons in Chechnya would strengthen Chechnya’s hand in negotiations with Moscow. Nevertheless, the original article triggered a string of media reports and speculation concerning nuclear weapons in Chechnya, eventually prompting an explicit denial of the story by Chechen military leader Shamil Basayev. Thus, while there have been a number of reports of the smuggling of portable nuclear weapons, the most publicized reports do not seem to be based on firm evidence, and have been propounded by sources of dubious reliability.

Lebed’s charges have therefore not been adequately dismissed by his critics, nor fully substantiated by his supporters. The claims that the Soviet Union never built ADMs ring hollow, but neither is there any solid evidence indicating the loss or diversion of such weapons. This does not mean that the threat of diversion does not exist, though. The social, political, and economic stresses that wrack Russia provide strong incentives for military  insiders  to steal nuclear weapons. While organizing such a theft would be extremely difficult, the consequences of a successful theft would be disastrous. Increasing security at nuclear weapons facilities, and especially at civilian nuclear facilities with weapons-grade fissile material, must therefore be at the forefront of the US-Russian security agenda. Increased work in this regard may help to ensure that stories of weapons or fissile material diversion remain fiction, and do not become fact.

Dr. Scott Parrish is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies.

Dr. John Lepingwell is Senior Scholar in Residence and Manager of the NIS Nuclear Profiles Database, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies.

A longer version of this article, with full citations, is also available. An article on  Less Well-Known Cases of Nuclear Terrorism and Nuclear Diversion in the Former Soviet Union,  written in August 1997, by CNS Director William Potter is also available in the database.  Many of the reports referred to in the longer article are also abstracted in the CNS Illicit Transactions Involving Nuclear Materials from the Former Soviet Union database, available on the CNS Web Site or via CD-ROM.   For more information on the CNS Databases and subscriptions, please contact CNS Database Marketing Manager Gary Ackerman at (831) 647-6545 or by email at Gary.Ackerman@miis.edu.

Comments or questions? E-mail Cristina Chuen at MIIS CNS: Cristina.ChuenATmiis.edu

CNSThis material is produced independently for NTI by the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of and has not been independently verified by NTI or its directors, officers, employees, agents. 2002 by MIIS.
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http://www.nti.org/db/nisprofs/over/lebedst.htm

***

Project 112
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Project 112 was a biological and chemical weapons experimentation project conducted by the US Army from 1962 to 1973. The project started under John F. Kennedy’s administration, and was authorized by his Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, as part of a total review of the US military. The name of the project refers to its number in the review process. Every branch of the armed services contributed funding and staff to the project.

Experiments were planned and conducted by the Deseret Test Center at Fort Douglas, Utah. They were designed to test the effects of biological weapons and chemical weapons on service personnel. They involved unknowing test subjects, and took place on land and at sea via tests conducted upon unwitting US Naval vessels. The existence of the project (along with the related Project SHAD) was categorically denied by the military until May 2000, when a CBS Evening News investigative report produced dramatic revelations about the tests. This report caused the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs to launch an extensive investigation of the experiments, and reveal to the affected personnel their exposure to toxins.

External links

* Project SHAD at the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, includes pocket guides and Q&A
* Force Protection and Readiness information page for SHAD (Project 112)
* GAO

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_112
Categories: Clinical research | Biological warfare | Bioethics | Military projects | Chemical warfare | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_112

***

Project SHAD
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Project SHAD stands for Project Shipboard Hazard and Defense, a series of Cold War-era tests by the United States Department of Defense of biological weapons and chemical weapons. Exposures of uninformed and unwilling humans during the testing to the test substances, particularly the exposure to United States military personnel then in service, has added controversy to recent revelations of the project.

Contents

* 1 History
* 2 Declassification
* 3 See also
* 4 Notes
* 5 References
* 6 External links

History

Project SHAD was part of a larger effort by the Department of Defense called Project 112. The Project began in 1962 during John F. Kennedy’s administration, and it is largely believed that neither Kennedy nor subsequent Presidents knew of Project 112 or SHAD.[citation needed] However, Robert McNamara, Kennedy’s Secretary of Defense, did know of and approved these tests. There is also some evidence that demonstrates local governments were involved with these tests, though it is unclear how exactly they aided with Project SHAD.

The official statement on Project SHAD’s purpose was  …to identify U.S. war ships vulnerabilities to attacks with biological or chemical warfare agents and to develop procedures to respond to such attacks while maintaining a warfighting capability.  134 tests were planned initially, but only 46 tests were actually completed. In these tests, chemical and biological agents were introduced to military personnel, who were at the time ignorant that they were involved in such an experiment. Nerve agents and chemicals include, but are not limited to, VX nerve gas, Tabun gas, Sarin, Soman, and the marker chemicals zinc sulfide, cadmium sulfide, and QNB. Biologics include Bacillus globigii, Coxiella burnetti (which causes Q fever), and Francisella tularensis (which causes tularemia or ‘rabbit fever’).

Declassification

Revelations concerning Project SHAD were first exposed by Independent Producer and Investigative Journalist Eric Longabardi of TeleMedia News Productions, now based in Los Angeles, CA. Longabardi’s 6-year investigation into the still secret program began in early 1994. It ultimately resulted in a series of investigative reports produced by him, which were broadcast on the CBS Evening News in May 2000. After the broadcast of these exclusive reports, the Pentagon and Veteran’s Administration opened their own on going investigations into the long classified program. In 2002, Congressional hearings on Project SHAD, in both the Senate and House, further shed media attention on the still classified program. In 2002, a class action federal lawsuit was filed on behalf of the US Navy sailors exposed in the testing. Additional actions, including a multi-year medical study was conducted by National Academy of Sciences/Institute of Medicine to assess the potential medical harm caused to the thousands of unwitting US Navy sailors, civilians, and others who were exposed in the secret testing. The results of that study were finally released in May 2007.

28 fact sheets have been released, focusing on the Deseret Test Center in Dugway, Utah, which was built entirely for Project SHAD and was closed after the Project was finished in 1973.

The US Department of Defense (DoD) has come under great scrutiny because those that were involved with Project 112 and SHAD were unaware of any tests being done. No effort was made to ensure the informed consent of the military personnel. Until 1998, the Department of Defense stated officially that Project SHAD did not exist. Because the DoD refused to acknowledge the program, surviving test subjects have been unable to obtain disability payments for health issues related to the project. US Representative Mike Thompson said of the program and the DoD’s effort to conceal it,  They told me – they said, but don’t worry about it, we only used simulants. And my first thought was, well, you’ve lied to these guys for 40 years, you’ve lied to me for a couple of years. It would be a real leap of faith for me to believe that now you’re telling me the truth. [1]

The Department of Veterans Affairs has commenced a three-year study comparing known SHAD-affected veterans to veterans of similar ages who were not involved in any way with SHAD or Project 112. The study cost approximately US$3 million, and results are being compiled for future release.

See also

* Operation Whitecoat

Notes

1. ^ Martin, David,  Retired Navy Officer Seeks Justice , CBS News, June 12, 2008.

References

* United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Armed Services. Subcommittee on Personnel,  The Department of Defense’s inquiry into Project 112/Shipboard Hazard and Defense (SHAD) tests: hearing before the Subcommittee on Personnel of the Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, One Hundred Seventh Congress, second session, October 10, 2002,  United States Congress, S. hrg. 107–810 (2003), 1–39.
* United States. Congress. House. Report, “Health care for veterans of Project 112/Project SHAD Act of 2003: report (to accompany H.R. 2433),” United States Congress, Report/108th Congress, 1st session, House of Representatives, 108–213, 1–19.
* United States. Congress. House. Committee on Veterans’ Affairs. Subcommittee on Health, “Military operations aspects of SHAD and Project 112: hearing before the Subcommittee on Health of the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, House of Representatives, One Hundred Seventh Congress, second session, October 9, 2002”, 107th Congress, 2nd session, 107–43, 1–19.

External links

* Columbia Journalism Review, Laurels November/December 2000
* Vietnam Veteran’s of America – The Veteran December2000/January 2001
* http://archive.vva.org/TheVeteran/2002_01/hazardous.htm
* Project SHAD at the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, includes pocket guides and Q&A
* Force Protection and Readiness information page for SHAD (Project 112)
* Vietnam Veterans of America
* GAO

v • d • e
United States chemical weapons program
Agents and chemicals
3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate (BZ) A Chlorine A Methylphosphonyl difluoride (DF) A Phosgene A QL A Sarin (GB) A Sulfur mustard (HD) A VX
Weapons
Bigeye bomb A M1 chemical mine A M104 155mm Cartridge A M110 155mm Cartridge A M121/A1 155mm Cartridge A M125 bomblet A M134 bomblet A M138 bomblet A M139 bomblet A M2 mortar A M23 chemical mine A M34 cluster bomb A M360 105mm Cartridge A M426 8-inch shell A M43 BZ cluster bomb A M44 generator cluster A M55 rocket A M60 105mm Cartridge A M687 155mm Cartridge A XM-736 8-inch projectile A MC-1 bomb A M47 bomb A Weteye bomb
Operations and testing
Dugway sheep incident A Edgewood Arsenal experiments A MKULTRA A Operation CHASE A Operation Geranium A Operation LAC A Operation Red Hat A Operation Steel Box A Operation Ranch Hand A Operation Top Hat A Project 112 A Project SHAD
Facilities
Anniston Army Depot A Anniston Chemical Activity A Blue Grass Army Depot A Deseret Chemical Depot A Edgewood Chemical Activity A Hawthorne Army Depot A Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System A Newport Chemical Depot A Pine Bluff Chemical Activity A Pueblo Chemical Depot A Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility A Umatilla Chemical Depot
Units and formations
1st Gas Regiment A U.S. Army Chemical Corps A Chemical mortar battalion
Equipment
Chemical Agent Identification Set A M93 Fox A MOPP A People sniffer
Related topics
Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory A Chlorine bombings in Iraq A Herbicidal warfare A List of topics A Poison gas in World War I A Tyler poison gas plot
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAD
Categories: Clinical research | Biological warfare | Bioethics | Military projects | United States Department of Defense | Human experimentation in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAD

***

Walter Reed
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the U.S. army surgeon. For other people and things with the name Walter Reed, see Walter Reed (disambiguation).
Walter Reed

Walter Reed
Born     September 13, 1851(1851-09-13)
Belroi, Virginia, U.S.
Died     November 23, 1902 (aged 51)
Washington, DC
Alma mater     University of Virginia
New York University
Johns Hopkins University
Occupation     Physician in U.S. army
Spouse(s)     Emilie Lawrence (m. 1876) «start: (1876-04-26)» Marriage: Emilie Lawrence to Walter Reed  Location: (linkback:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Reed)
Children     one son and daughter, one adopted Indian daughter
Parents     Lemuel Sutton Reed and Pharaba White

Major Walter Reed, M.D., (September 13, 1851 – November 23, 1902) was a U.S. Army physician who in 1900 led the team which postulated and confirmed the theory that yellow fever is transmitted by mosquitoes, rather than by direct contact. This insight gave impetus to the new fields of epidemiology and biomedicine and most immediately allowed the resumption and completion of work on the Panama Canal (1904–14) by the United States.

Contents

* 1 Biography
* 2 Legacy
* 3 References
o 3.1 Citations
o 3.2 Other sources
* 4 External links

Biography

Walter Reed was born in Belroi, Virginia and moved to Lebanon, Missouri, an unincorporated community in Laclede County, to Lemuel Sutton Reed (a Methodist minister) and Pharaba White.
Walter Reed Birthplace

After two year-long classes at the University of Virginia, Reed completed the M.D. degree in 1869, at the age of 17. He then enrolled at the New York University’s Bellevue Hospital Medical College in Manhattan, New York, where he obtained a second M.D. in 1870. After interning at several New York City hospitals, he worked for the New York Board of Health until 1875. He married Emilie (born Emily) Lawrence on April 26, 1876 and took her west with him. Later, Emilie would give birth to a son and a daughter and the couple would adopt an Indian girl while posted in frontier camps.[1]

With his youth apparently limiting his influence, Reed joined the U.S. Army Medical Corps, both for its professional opportunities and the modest financial security it could provide. He spent much of his Army career until 1893 at difficult postings in the American West, at one point, looking after several hundred Apache Indians, including Geronimo. During one of his last tours, he completed advanced coursework in pathology and bacteriology in the Johns Hopkins University Hospital Pathology Laboratory.

Reed joined the faculty of the newly-opened Army Medical School in Washington, D.C. in 1893, where he held the professorship of Bacteriology and Clinical Microscopy. In addition to his teaching responsibilities, he actively pursued medical research projects and served as the curator of the Army Medical Museum, which later became the National Museum of Health and Medicine (NMHM).

Reed first traveled to Cuba in 1899 to study disease in U.S. Army encampments there. Yellow fever became a problem for the Army during the Spanish-American War, felling thousands of soldiers in Cuba.

In May 1900, Reed, a major, returned to Cuba when he was appointed head of the Army board charged by Surgeon General George Miller Sternberg to examine tropical diseases including yellow fever. Sternberg was one of the founders of bacteriology during this time of great advances in medicine due to widespread acceptance of Louis Pasteur’s germ theory of disease as well as the methods of studying bacteria developed by Robert Koch.

During Reed’s tenure with the US Army Yellow Fever Commission in Cuba, the board confirmed both the transmission by mosquitoes and disproved the common belief that yellow fever could be transmitted by clothing and bedding soiled by the body fluids and excrement of yellow fever sufferers – articles known as fomites.

The board conducted many of its dramatic series of experiments at Camp Lazear, named in November 1900 for Reed’s assistant and friend Jesse William Lazear who had died two months earlier of yellow fever while a member of the Commission.

The risky but fruitful research work was done with human volunteers, including some of the medical personnel such as Lazear and Clara Maass who allowed themselves to be deliberately infected. The research work with the disease under Reed’s leadership was largely responsible for stemming the mortality rates from yellow fever during the building of the Panama Canal, something that had confounded the French attempts to build in that region only 30 years earlier.

Although Dr. Reed received much of the credit in history books for  beating  yellow fever, Reed himself credited Dr. Carlos Finlay with the discovery of the yellow fever vector, and thus how it might be controlled. Dr. Reed often cited Finlay’s papers in his own articles and gave him credit for the discovery, even in his personal correspondence [2]

Following Reed’s return from Cuba in 1901, he continued to speak and publish on yellow fever. He received honorary degrees from Harvard and the University of Michigan in recognition of his seminal work.

In November 1902, Reed’s appendix ruptured; he died on November 23, 1902, of the resulting peritonitis, at age 51. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Legacy

Reed’s breakthrough in yellow fever research is widely considered a milestone in biomedicine, opening new vistas of research and humanitarianism.

* Walter Reed General Hospital (WRGH), Washington, D.C. was opened on May 1, 1909, seven years after his death.
* Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) opened in 1977 as the successor to WRGH; it is the world-wide tertiary care medical center for the U.S. Army and is utilized by congressmen and presidents.
* Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR), near Washington, DC, is the largest biomedical research facility administered by the DoD.
* Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, a new hospital complex to be constructed on the grounds of the National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland by 2011.
* Riverside Walter Reed Hospital in Gloucester, Virginia (near Reed’s birthplace) opened on September 13, 1977.

* Walter Reed Medal (1912 to present) was awarded posthumously to Reed for his yellow fever work.
* Walter Reed Middle School, North Hollywood, California is named in Reed’s honor.

* Reed was portrayed dramatically by actor Lewis Stone in a 1938 Hollywood movie, Yellow Jack (from a 1934 play). The same storyline was again presented in television episodes (both titled “Yellow Jack”) of Celanese Theatre (1952) and of Producers’ Showcase (1955), in the latter of which Reed was portrayed by actor Broderick Crawford.
* A song,  Walter Reed , was released by Michael Penn and tells of a soldier’s desire to be taken to Walter Reed Medical Center.
* PBS’s American Experience series broadcast a 2006 episode, The Great Fever, on the Reed yellow fever campaign.
* Philip S. Hench Walter Reed Yellow Fever Collection at the University of Virginia Health Sciences Library
* Walter Reed Army Medical Center Firefighters Washington D.C. IAFF F151

References
Citations

1. ^ Crosby, Molly Caldwell (2006). The American Plague:The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, the Epidemic that Shaped Our History, p. 134. New York: Berkley Books. ISBN 0-425-21202-5
2. ^ Pierce J.R., J, Writer. 2005. Yellow Jack: How Yellow Fever Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered its Deadly Secrets. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0-471-47261-1

Other sources

* Bean, William B., Walter Reed: A Biography, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1982.
* Bean, William B., “Walter Reed and Yellow Fever,” JAMA 250.5 (August 5, 1983): 659–62.
* Pierce J.R., J, Writer. 2005. Yellow Jack: How Yellow Fever Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered its Deadly Secrets. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0-471-47261-1

External links

* Video: Reed Medical Pioneers Biography on Health.mil – The Military Health System provides a look at the life and work of Walter Reed.
* WRAMC Website Reed History
* WRAIR Website Reed History
* University of Virginia, Philip S. Hench – Walter Reed Yellow Fever Collection: Walter Reed Biography

* Walter Reed at Find a Grave

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Reed
Categories: 1851 births | 1902 deaths | Burials at Arlington National Cemetery | Congressional Gold Medal recipients | American entomologists | American Methodists | People from Virginia | Military physicians | University of Virginia alumni | Deaths from peritonitis | Human experimentation in the United States | United States Army Medical Corps officers

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Reed

***

David Orlikow
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

David Orlikow (April 20, 1918 – January 19, 1998) was a Canadian politician, and a long-serving member of the Canadian House of Commons. He represented the riding of Winnipeg North from 1962 to 1988 as a member of the New Democratic Party.

Contents

* 1 Family
* 2 Municipal politics
* 3 Manitoba Legislature
* 4 Federal politics
* 5 Suing the CIA
* 6 References

Family

Orlikow was the son of Louis Orlikow and Sarah Cherniack. He was related to Saul Cherniack, also a prominent Manitoba politician and a cabinet minister in the provincial government of Edward Schreyer.

He was educated at the University of Manitoba, and worked as a labour educator and pharmacist. Orlikow married Velma (Val) Kane on June 1, 1946. They had one daughter, Leslie.[1]

His brother Lionel was also a trustee on the Winnipeg school board from 1988 to 1998.[2] When Lionel Orlikow retired, he was succeeded by his son John, now a Winnipeg City Councillor.[2]

Municipal politics

He served as a trustee on the Winnipeg School Board from 1945 to 1951, and was an alderman in the city of Winnipeg from 1951 to 1959. He also served on the board of directors for Winnipeg’s John Howard & Elizabeth Fry Society from 1958 to 1961, and was a board member of the Welfare Council of Greater Winnipeg in 1958.

Orlikow was also involved with the Jewish Labour Society and the Canadian Labour Congress. He helped to organize a steelworkers’ union in the northern Manitoba town of Thompson, after INCO set up operations in the area. Other organizations of which Orlikow was involved included the Union Centre and the Manitoba Society of Seniors.

Orlikow was a founding member of the NDP and a lifetime member of the CCF/NDP. In 1961, Orlikow took part in Manitoba CCF’s transition to the New Democratic Party.

Manitoba Legislature

In the provincial election of 1958, Orlikow was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba for the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation in the north-end Winnipeg constituency of St. John’s. He defeated his Progressive Conservative and Liberal-Progressive opponents by a significant margin. He was re-elected in the 1959 election, by the reduced margin of 251 votes over Progressive Conservative opponent Dan Zaharia. David Orlikow was an NDP MLA from June 16, 1958 to May 1962.

Orlikow maintained an interest in the Manitoba NDP after switching to federal politics. In 1968-69, he helped facilitate the party’s transition of leadership from Russell Paulley to Edward Schreyer.

The Manitoba Legistlature paid tribute to Orlikow on Thursday June 25, 1998.[3]
Judy Wasylycia-Leis, whose riding, both as an MLA and an MP included much of the area earlier represented by Orlikow, recalled the advice and information she used to receive from Orlikow and his many phone calls. Wasylycia-Leis’s provincial counterparts NDP MLAs Dave Chomiak and Doug Martindale also admitted to being among those on the receiving end of those phone calls.

According to Doug Martindale, Orlikow “never really retired” from politics in that Orlikow was always researching various issues and providing the information he gathered to various Manitoba NDP MLAs and MPs. Orlikow was a frequent visiter to the Manitoba Legislature’s library and, even when hospitalized, he managed to transform his hospital room into a mini office. During the last week of his life, Orlikow was researching the financial impact of smoking on the health care system, and what types of lawsuits he figured the Federal and Provincial governments should launch against the tobacco industry to recover some of the cost.

Federal politics

Orlikow resigned his legislative seat in May 1962 to run for the Canadian House of Commons. He was elected in Winnipeg North in the federal election of 1962, defeating Liberal Paul Parashin by just under 4,000 votes. He defeated Parashin again by a narrower margin in the 1963 election, but increased his majority to nearly 10,000 votes in the election of 1965.

He came close to losing his seat in the  Trudeaumania  election of 1968, defeating Liberal Cecil Semchyshyn by only 963 votes. After this, he was returned by safe majorities in the elections of 1972 and 1974, 1979, 1980 and 1984.

There was a provincial swing against the NDP in the federal election of 1988, and Orlikow unexpectedly lost the Winnipeg North riding to Liberal Rey Pagtakhan by fewer than 2,000 votes. After a twenty-six year career in the Commons, Orlikow was genuinely surprised by the result. Orlikow was an NDP MP from June 18, 1962 to November 21, 1988.

Throughout his career, Orlikow fought for progressive policies in fields such as immigration, refugees, social justice and labour. During the 1980s, he sought reforms to Canada’s Bank Act which would have required banks to invest a portion of their money in local development projects. In the very last week of his life, he was researching ways for the federal and provincial governments to recover monies from tobacco companies for the social costs of cigarette use.

After his death in January 1998, former staffer Dan O’Connor wrote the following elegy:

David was always on the side of the ordinary person. He was relentless in the pursuit of justice from big government or big business. The most important job in his office was the individual case work, and he didn’t trust it to anyone else. He made every phone call and wrote every letter. [4]

The Canadian House of Commons paid tribute to Orlikow on February 4, 1998.

Suing the CIA

During the 1950s, Velma Orlikow was a patient at the Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal at a time when the American Central Intelligence Agency was conducting its notorious MK-ULTRA brainwashing experiments at the facility. She was unwittingly dosed with LSD and was exposed to brainwashing tapes. Along with eight other former patients, she later sued the CIA for mistreatment and won.[5]

Early in 1979, Orlikow called office of barristers Joseph Rauh and Jim Turner after reading New York Times story concerning CIA involvement in Ewen Cameron’s research. The Tuesday, August 2, 1977 story, written by Nicholas Horrock, was entitied  Private Institutions Used In CIA Effort To Control Behavior.  Horrock’s article referred to the work of John Marks whose documentation of CIA activities, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, was used in what was to be referred to as the Orlikow, et al. v. United States case.[6] The other plaintiffs eventually included Jean-Charles Page, Robert Logie, Rita Zimmerman, Louis Weinstein, Janine Huard, Lyvia Stadler, Mary Morrow, and Mrs. Florence Langleben. The CIA settled in 1988. Velma died in 1990.

Near the end of his life, David Orlikow encouraged NDP MPs such as Svend Robinson to seek government compensation for the Allan Institute’s victims, and for their families.
References

1. ^ [1].
2. ^ a b  His decades of service touched many . Winnipeg Free Press, December 12, 2008.
3. ^ [2]
4. ^ [3]
5. ^ [4]
6. ^ [5]

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Orlikow
Categories: 1918 births | 1998 deaths | Manitoba CCF MLAs | Manitoba New Democratic Party MLAs | Members of the Canadian House of Commons from Manitoba | New Democratic Party of Canada MPs | Canadian Jews | United Steelworkers | MKULTRA | Devices to alter consciousness | History of the United States government | Central Intelligence Agency operations | Psychedelic research | LSD | Medical research | Military history of the United States | Military psychiatry | Mind control | 1953 establishments | Secret government programs | Human experimentation in the United States | Investigations and hearings of the United States Congress | Code names

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Orlikow

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Eugene Saenger
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dr. Eugene Saenger (March 5, 1917 – September 30, 2007)[1] was an American university professor and physician. A graduate of Harvard University,[1] Saenger was a pioneer in radiation research and nuclear medicine.[2]

He is perhaps best known for the controversial radiation experiments he conducted on human cancer patients during the 1960s and early 70s. In 1994, he was sued by families of the patients. In 1999, a $3.6 million settlement was approved.[2]

Notes

1. ^ a b Thomas H. Maugh,  Eugene Saenger, 90; pioneer in radiation research ,Los Angeles Times, October 6, 2007
2. ^ a b Peggy O’Farrell.  Radiology guru Saenger dies . Cincinnati Enquirer. http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071004/NEWS01/710040398/1077/COL02. Retrieved 2007-10-04.

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Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Saenger
Categories: 1917 births | 2007 deaths | American academics | Harvard University alumni | Human experimentation in the United States | Radiation health effects researchers | Radiologists | United States medical biography stubs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Saenger

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Richard Seed
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Richard Seed, a nuclear physicist from Chicago, is best known for forcing a national debate on human cloning in the late 1990s. On December 5, 1997, Harvard graduate Richard Seed announced that he planned to clone a human being before any federal laws could be enacted to ban the process. Seed’s announcement added fuel to the raging ethical debate on human cloning that had been sparked by Ian Wilmut’s creation of Dolly the sheep, the first clone obtained from adult cells. Seed’s plans were to use the same technique used by the Scottish team. Seed’s announcement went against President Clinton’s 1997 proposal for a voluntary private moratorium against human cloning.

In the media frenzy that followed, the story of a 69 year old eccentric, and maverick scientist emerged, but Seed possessed impressive credentials and was not dismissed immediately. While virtually no mainstream scientist believed Seed would succeed, there began a subtle shift in attitudes after Seed made his announcement. Seed put into words what many scientists were thinking, and few were surprised to hear soon after that a team in South Korea claimed to have begun work on human cloning.

Richard Seed graduated cum laude from Harvard and received a Ph.D. in physics in 1953. His interests soon shifted to the new frontier of biomedicine. In the 1970s Seed co-founded a company that commercialized a technique for transferring embryos in cattle. Later, he and his brother, Chicago surgeon Randolph Seed, started another company, Fertility & Genetics Research Inc., to help infertile women conceive children using the same technique. His efforts were published in The Lancet and The Journal of the American Medical Association, whose 1984 article reported the birth of a healthy child in the year prior, making Richard Seed the first to successfully transplant a human embryo from one woman to a surrogate mother who suffered from infertility problems. But the procedure was cumbersome—it involved flushing embryos out of the uterus of the egg donor—and was soon eclipsed by in-vitro fertilization. Ultimately the venture failed.

Unemployed at the time of his announcement to clone the first human, Seed was reported to have dabbled in ill-fated ventures in the past. He claimed at one time to have commitments for $800,000 toward a goal of $2.5 million needed to clone the first human before 2000. Seed first said that he was going to make little baby clones for infertile couples. Later, “to defuse criticism that I’m taking advantage of desperate women –he announced that he would first clone himself. Still later he announced that he would re-create his wife Gloria.

God made man in his own image,  he told National Public Radio correspondent Joe Palca in December 1997 .  God intended for man to become one with God. Cloning, is the first serious step in becoming one with God.  In a later interview on CNN, Seed elaborated:  Man,  he said,  will develop the technology and the science and the capability to have an indefinite life span.

Seed is retired and living in the Chicago area. He is now a director of a son’s company.

References

* Bonnicksen, Andrea L. 2002. Crafting a Cloning Policy: From Dolly to Stem Cells. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
* http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/24/us/eccentric-s-hubris-set-off-global-frenzy-over-cloning.html
* http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/science/jan-june98/cloning_1-8.html
* http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/1998/Jan/hour1_010998.html
* http://www.cnn.com/TECH/9801/07/cloning.folo/

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Seed
Categories: Living people | People from Chicago, Illinois | Human experimentation in the United States | Cloning

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Seed

***

Stanford prison experiment
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Stanford prison experiment was a study of the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prison guard. The experiment was conducted in 1971 by a team of researchers led by Psychology Professor Philip Zimbardo at Stanford University. Twenty-four undergraduates were selected out of 70 to play the roles of both guards and prisoners and live in a mock prison in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. Those selected were chosen for their lack of psychological issues, crime history, and medical disabilities, in order to obtain a representative sample. Roles were assigned based on a coin toss.[1]

Prisoners and guards rapidly adapted to their roles, stepping beyond the boundaries of what had been predicted and leading to dangerous and psychologically damaging situations. One-third of the guards were judged to have exhibited  genuine  sadistic tendencies, while many prisoners were emotionally traumatized and two had to be removed from the experiment early. After being confronted by Christina Maslach, a graduate student in psychology whom he was dating,[2] and realizing that he had been passively allowing unethical acts to be performed under his direct supervision, Zimbardo concluded that both prisoners and guards had become too grossly absorbed in their roles and terminated the experiment after six days.[3]

Ethical concerns surrounding the famous experiment often draw comparisons to the Milgram experiment, which was conducted in 1961 at Yale University by Stanley Milgram, Zimbardo’s former college friend. Tom Peters and Robert H. Waterman Jr wrote in 1981 that the Milgram experiment and the Stanford prison experiment were frightening in their implications about the danger which lurks in the darker side of human nature.[4]

Contents

* 1 Goals and methods
* 2 Results
* 3 Conclusions
* 4 Criticism of the experiment
* 5 Comparisons to Abu Ghraib
* 6 Similar incidents
o 6.1 BBC Prison Study
o 6.2 Experiments in the US
* 7 In multimedia
* 8 See also
* 9 Footnotes
* 10 References
* 11 External links

Goals and methods

Zimbardo and his team set out to test the idea that the inherent personality traits of prisoners and guards were summarily key to understanding abusive prison situations. Participants were recruited and told they would participate in a two-week  prison simulation.  Of the 70 respondents, Zimbardo and his team selected the 24 males whom they deemed to be the most psychologically stable and healthy. These participants were predominantly white and middle-class.

The  prison  itself was in the basement of Stanford’s Jordan Hall, which had been converted into a mock jail. An undergraduate research assistant was the  warden  and Zimbardo the  superintendent . Zimbardo set up a number of specific conditions on the participants which he hoped would promote disorientation, depersonalisation and deindividualisation.

The researchers provided weapons — wooden batons — and clothing that simulated that of a prison guard — khaki shirt and pants from a local military surplus store. They were also given mirrored sunglasses to prevent eye contact.

Prisoners wore ill-fitting smocks and stocking caps, rendering them constantly uncomfortable. Guards called prisoners by their assigned numbers, sewn on their uniforms, instead of by name. A chain around their ankles reminded them of their roles as prisoners.

The researchers held an  orientation  session for guards the day before the experiment, during which they were told that they could not physically harm the prisoners. In The Stanford Prison Study video, quoted in Haslam & Reicher, 2003, Zimbardo is seen telling the guards,  You can create in the prisoners feelings of boredom, a sense of fear to some degree, you can create a notion of arbitrariness that their life is totally controlled by us, by the system, you, me, and they’ll have no privacy… We’re going to take away their individuality in various ways. In general what all this leads to is a sense of powerlessness. That is, in this situation we’ll have all the power and they’ll have none.

The participants chosen to play the part of prisoners were  arrested  at their homes and  charged  with armed robbery. The local Palo Alto police department assisted Zimbardo with the arrests and conducted full booking procedures on the prisoners, which included fingerprinting and taking mug shots. At the prison, they were transported to the mock prison where they were strip-searched and given their new identities.

Results

The experiment quickly grew out of hand. Prisoners suffered — and accepted — sadistic and humiliating treatment from the guards. The high level of stress progressively led them from rebellion to inhibition. By the experiment’s end, many showed severe emotional disturbances.
After a relatively uneventful first day, a riot broke out on the second day. The guards volunteered to work extra hours and worked together to break the prisoner revolt, attacking the prisoners with fire extinguishers without supervision from the research staff.

A false rumor spread that one of the prisoners, who asked to leave the experiment, would lead companions to free the rest of the prisoners. The guards dismantled the prison and moved the inmates to another secure location. When no breakout attempt occurred, the guards were angry about having to rebuild the prison, so they took it out on the prisoners.

Guards forced the prisoners to count off repeatedly as a way to learn their prison numbers, and to reinforce the idea that this was their new identity. Guards soon used these prisoner counts as another method to harass the prisoners, using physical punishment such as protracted exercise for errors in the prisoner count. Sanitary conditions declined rapidly, made worse by the guards refusing to allow some prisoners to urinate or defecate. As punishment, the guards would not let the prisoners empty the sanitation bucket. Mattresses were a valued item in the spartan prison, so the guards would punish prisoners by removing their mattresses, leaving them to sleep on concrete. Some prisoners were forced to go nude as a method of degradation, and some were subjected to sexual humiliation, including simulated homosexual sex.

Zimbardo cited his own absorption in the experiment he guided, and in which he actively participated as Prison Superintendent. On the fourth day, some prisoners were talking about trying to escape. Zimbardo and the guards attempted to move the prisoners to the more secure local police station, but officials there said they could no longer participate in Zimbardo’s experiment.

Several guards became increasingly cruel as the experiment continued. Experimenters said that approximately one-third of the guards exhibited genuine sadistic tendencies. Most of the guards were upset when the experiment concluded early.

Zimbardo argued that the prisoner participants had internalized their roles, based on the fact that some had stated that they would accept parole even with the attached condition of forfeiting all of their experiment-participation pay. Yet, when their parole applications were all denied, none of the prisoner participants quit the experiment. Zimbardo argued they had no reason for continued participation in the experiment after having lost all monetary compensation, yet they did, because they had internalized the prisoner identity, they thought themselves prisoners, hence, they stayed.

Prisoner No. 416, a newly admitted stand-by prisoner, expressed concern over the treatment of the other prisoners. The guards responded with more abuse. When he refused to eat his sausages, saying he was on a hunger strike, guards confined him in a closet and called it solitary confinement.[5] The guards used this incident to turn the other prisoners against No. 416, saying the only way he would be released from solitary confinement was if they gave up their blankets and slept on their bare mattresses, which all but one refused to do.

Zimbardo concluded the experiment early when Christina Maslach, a graduate student he was then dating (and later married), objected to the appalling conditions of the prison after she was introduced to the experiment to conduct interviews. Zimbardo noted that of more than fifty outside persons who had seen the prison, Maslach was the only one who questioned its morality. After only six days of a planned two weeks’ duration, the Stanford Prison experiment was shut down.
Conclusions

The Stanford experiment ended on August 20, 1971, only six days after it began instead of the fourteen it was supposed to have lasted. The experiment’s result has been argued to demonstrate the impressionability and obedience of people when provided with a legitimizing ideology and social and institutional support. It is also used to illustrate cognitive dissonance theory and the power of authority.

In psychology, the results of the experiment are said to support situational attribution of behaviour rather than dispositional attribution. In other words, it seemed the situation caused the participants’ behaviour, rather than anything inherent in their individual personalities. In this way, it is compatible with the results of the also-famous Milgram experiment, in which ordinary people fulfilled orders to administer what appeared to be damaging electric shocks to a confederate of the experimenter. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, a book by Malcolm Gladwell, addresses this experiment.

Shortly after the study had been completed, there were bloody revolts at both the San Quentin and Attica prison facilities, and Zimbardo reported his findings on the experiment to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary.

Criticism of the experiment

The experiment was widely criticized as being unethical and unscientific. Current ethical standards of psychology would not permit such a study to be conducted today. The study would violate the Ethics Code of the American Psychological Association, the Canadian Code of Conduct for Research Involving Humans, and the Belmont Report. Critics including Erich Fromm challenged how readily the results of the experiment could be generalized. Fromm specifically writes about how the personality of an individual does in fact affect behavior when imprisoned (using historical examples from the Nazi concentration camps). This runs counter to the study’s conclusion that the prison situation itself controls the individual’s behavior. Fromm also argues that the amount of sadism in the  normal  subjects could not be determined with the methods employed to screen them.

Because it was a field experiment, it was impossible to keep traditional scientific controls. Dr Zimbardo was not merely a neutral observer, but influenced the direction of the experiment as its  superintendent . Conclusions and observations drawn by the experimenters were largely subjective and anecdotal, and the experiment would be difficult for other researchers to reproduce.

Some of the experiment’s critics argued that participants based their behavior on how they were expected to behave, or modelled it after stereotypes they already had about the behavior of prisoners and guards. In other words, the participants were merely engaging in role-playing. Another problem with the experiment was certain guards, such as  John Wayne , changed their behavior because of wanting to conform to the behavior that they thought Zimbardo was trying to elicit. In response, Zimbardo claimed that even if there was role-playing initially, participants internalized these roles as the experiment continued.

Additionally, it was criticized on the basis of ecological validity. Many of the conditions imposed in the experiment were arbitrary and may not have correlated with actual prison conditions, including blindfolding incoming  prisoners , not allowing them to wear underwear, not allowing them to look out of windows and not allowing them to use their names. Zimbardo argued that prison is a confusing and dehumanizing experience and that it was necessary to enact these procedures to put the  prisoners  in the proper frame of mind; however, it is difficult to know how similar the effects were to an actual prison, and the experiment’s methods would be difficult to reproduce exactly so that others could test them.

Some said that the study was too deterministic: reports described significant differences in the cruelty of the guards, the worst of whom came to be nicknamed  John Wayne.  (This guard alleges he started the escalation of events between  guards  and  prisoners  after he began to emulate a character from the Paul Newman film Cool Hand Luke. He further intensified his actions because he was nicknamed  John Wayne  though he was trying to mimic actor Strother Martin who played the role of the sadistic  Captain  in the movie.[6]) Most of the other guards were kinder and often did favors for prisoners. Zimbardo made no attempt to explain or account for these differences.

Also, it has been argued that selection bias may have played a role in the results. Researchers from Western Kentucky University recruited students for a study using an advertisement similar to the one used in the Stanford Prison Experiment, with and without the words  prison life.  It was found that students volunteering for a prison life study possessed dispositions toward abusive behavior.

Additionally, the sample size was very small, with only twenty-four participants taking part over a relatively short period of time. This reality means that it is difficult to generalize across a wider scale.

Comparisons to Abu Ghraib

When the Abu Ghraib military prisoner torture and abuse scandal was published in March 2004, many observers immediately were struck by its similarities to the Stanford Prison experiment — among them, Philip Zimbardo, who paid close attention to the details of the story. He was dismayed by official military and government efforts shifting the blame for the torture and abuses in the Abu Ghraib American military prison on to  a few bad apples  rather than acknowledging it as possibly systemic problems of a formally established military incarceration system.

Eventually, Zimbardo became involved with the defense team of lawyers representing Abu Ghraib prison guard Staff Sergeant Ivan  Chip  Frederick. He had full access to all investigation and background reports, testifying as an expert witness in SSG Frederick’s court martial, which resulted in an eight-year prison sentence for Frederick in October 2004.
Zimbardo drew on the knowledge he gained from participating in the Frederick case to write The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil (Random House, 2007), dealing with the striking similarities between the Stanford Prison Experiment and the Abu Ghraib abuses.[5]

Similar incidents
BBC Prison Study

Alex Haslam and Steve Reicher, psychologists from the University of Exeter and University of St Andrews, conducted the BBC Prison Study in 2002,[7] a partial replication of the experiment with the assistance of the BBC, who broadcast scenes from the study in a documentary program called The Experiment. Their results and conclusions differed from Zimbardo’s and led to a number of publications on tyranny, stress and leadership. Moreover, unlike results from the SPE, these were published in leading academic journals such as British Journal of Social Psychology, Journal of Applied Psychology, Social Psychology Quarterly.

While their procedure was not a direct replication of Zimbardo’s, their study does cast further doubt on the generality of his conclusions. Specifically, it questions the notion that people slip mindlessly into role and the idea that the dynamics of evil are in any way banal. Their research also points to the importance of leadership in the emergence of tyranny (of the form displayed by Zimbardo when briefing guards in the Stanford experiment).[8] [9]

Experiments in the US

The Third Wave was a 1967 recreation of Nazi Germany by high school teacher Ron Jones in Palo Alto, California.

In April 2007, it was reported that high school students in Waxahachie, Texas who were participating in a role-playing exercise fell into a similar abusive pattern of behavior as exhibited in the original experiment.[10]

In multimedia

* In 1992, Quiet Rage: The Stanford Prison Experiment, a documentary about the experiment, was made available via the Stanford Prison Experiment website. The documentary was written by Zimbardo and directed and produced by Ken Musen.[11]
* In 1977, Italian director Carlo Tuzii adapted the story of the experiment to an Italian environment, and Italian students and made a film out of his adaptation, called La Gabbia (The Cage). In the film,  prisoners  and  guards  were all together in a huge room, parted in two halves by a row of iron bars in the middle, and with a small window in each half.
* The Wave, a novel by Todd Strasser based on the incident
o  The Wave , a short film based on the incident
o The Wave, a 2008 feature film based on the incident
* The novel Black Box by Mario Giordano, inspired by the experiment, was adapted to cinema in 2001 by German director Oliver Hirschbiegel into the movie Das Experiment.
* A 30 minute 2002 BBC documentary produced and directed by Kim Duke.
* Breathing Room, a 2008 horror film
*  Not for Nothing , Episode 4 of Season 2 of the fictional US television series Life, was loosely based on the Stanford prison experiment.
* A film about the experiment, entitled The Stanford Prison Experiment, is in production by Maverick Films. It was written by Christopher McQuarrie and Tim Talbott. It is said to feature actors Channing Tatum, Cam Gigandet, Paul Dano, Ryan Phillippe, Giovanni Ribisi, Benjamin McKenzie, Charlie Hunnam, Kieran Culkin, Jesse Eisenberg, and Dylan Purcell, and is slotted for release in 2011.
* In the episode  My Big Fat Greek Rush Week  of the TV series Veronica Mars, Wallace and Logan take part in an experiment that is similar to the Stanford Prison Experiment.

See also

* Archives of the History of American Psychology, facility that has in its collection prison gowns used in the experiment and other items, including a door from a jail cell.
* Milgram experiment on obedience to authority
* Peer pressure
* Lord of the Flies, a 1954 novel by William Golding, in which a group of youths degrade into dictatorship
* The Dispossessed, a 1974 novel by Ursula K. Le Guin, in which the protagonist Shevek took the part of a jail guard in a childhood game with very similar conditions and outcome
* Infinite Ryvius, a 1999 animated series by Sunrise, in which 500 young people in an isolated environment go through several power regimes with different levels of oppressiveness and brutality
* Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse
*  When I Was Ming the Merciless , a science fiction short story by Gene Wolfe, discusses an experiment similar to the Stanford Prison Experiment.
* Banality of Evil

Footnotes

1. ^ Slideshow on official site
2. ^ Stanford University News Service – The Standard Prison Experiment
3. ^ Stanford Prison Experiment – Conclusion
4. ^ Peters, Thomas, J.,, Waterman, Robert. H.,  In Search of Excellence , 1981. Cf. p.78 and onward.
5. ^ a b The Lucifer Effect website
6. ^  John Wayne  (name withheld). Interview.  The Science of Evil.  Primetime. Basic Instincts. KATU. 3 Jan. 2007.
7. ^ The BBC Prison Study
8. ^ Interview at The Guardian
9. ^ Interview at OffTheTelly
10. ^  Holocaust Lesson Gets Out Of Hand , Sydney Morning Herald, 11 April 2007.
11. ^ Justice videos

References

* Carnahan, C. & McFarland, S. (2007). Revisiting the Stanford Prison Experiment: Could Participant Self-Selection Have Led to the Cruelty? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 33, No. 5, 603-614.
* Haney, C., Banks, W. C., & Zimbardo, P. G. (1973). Study of prisoners and guards in a simulated prison. Naval Research Reviews, 9, 1–17. Washington, DC: Office of Naval Research
* Haney, C., Banks, W. C., & Zimbardo, P. G. (1973). Interpersonal dynamics in a simulated prison. International Journal of Criminology and Penology, 1, 69–97.
* Haslam, S. Alexander & Reicher, Stephen (2003). Beyond Stanford: Questioning a role-based explanation of tyranny. Dialogue (Bulletin of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology), 18, 22–25.
* Musen, K. & Zimbardo, P. G. (1991). Quiet rage: The Stanford prison study. Videorecording. Stanford, CA: Psychology Dept., Stanford University.
* Reicher, Stephen., & Haslam, S. Alexander. (2006). Rethinking the psychology of tyranny: The BBC Prison Study. British Journal of Social Psychology, 45, 1–40.
* Zimbardo, P. G. (1971). The power and pathology of imprisonment. Congressional Record. (Serial No. 15, 1971-10-25). Hearings before Subcommittee No. 3, of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session on Corrections, Part II, Prisons, Prison Reform and Prisoner’s Rights: California. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
* Zimbardo, P. G (2007) Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. Interview transcript.  Democracy Now  , March 30, 2007. Accessed March 31, 2007

External links

* Official Site
* Summary of the experiment
* Zimbardo, P. (2007). From Heavens to Hells to Heroes. In-Mind Magazine.
* Fromm’s criticism of the experiment
* The official website of the BBC Prison Study
* The Experiment (IMDb) — German movie (Das Experiment) from 2001 inspired by the Stanford Experiment
* The Lie of the Stanford Prison Experiment — Criticism from Carlo Prescott, ex-con and consultant/assistant for the experiment
* The Artificial Prison of the Human Mind Article with Comments.
* Philip Zimbardo on Democracy Now  March 30 2007
* Philip Zimbardo on The Daily Show, March, 2007

Abu Ghraib and the experiment:

* BBC News: Is it in anyone to abuse a captive?
* BBC News: Why everyone’s not a torturer
* Ronald Hilton: US soldiers’ bad behavior and Stanford Prison Experiment
* Slate.com: Situationist Ethics: The Stanford Prison Experiment doesn’t explain Abu Ghraib, by William Saletan
* IMDb: Untitled Stanford Prison Experiment Project
* VIDEO: Talk to MIT re: new book: The Lucifer Effect
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment
Categories: 1971 in the United States | Imprisonment and detention | Social psychology | Group processes | Psychology experiments | Stanford University | Human experimentation in the United States | Academic scandals | 1971 in science | Research ethics | History of psychology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment

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Stateville Penitentiary Malaria Study
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Stateville Penitentiary malaria study was a controlled study of the effects of malaria on the prisoners of Stateville Penitentiary near Joliet, Illinois. The study was conducted by the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago in conjunction with the United States Army and the State Department. The study is notable for its impacts on the Nuremberg Medical Trial and subsequent medical experimentation on prisoners.

Contents

* 1 Malaria
* 2 Malaria Research Project
* 3 Nuremberg medical trial
* 4 Effect on prisoner experimentation
* 5 See also
* 6 References
* 7 External links

Malaria

As the United States military fought battles in the Pacific theater during World War II, malaria and other tropical diseases hindered their efforts. The need for human subjects to test new antimalarial drugs was met by taking the research into the prison system.

Malaria Research Project

The Malaria Research Project was primarily conducted on a floor of the prison hospital in the Stateville Penitentiary. The study aimed to understand the effect of various antimalarial drugs on relapses of malaria, primarily from the 8-aminoquinoline group of compounds. The study marked the first human test of the antimalarial drug primaquine[1]. For the experiment, doctors from the University of Chicago bred Anopheles quadrimaculatus mosquitoes. The mosquitoes were infected with a plasmodium vivax malaria strain that was isolated from a military patient.

In the study, each patient received bites from 10 infected mosquitoes[2]. 441 inmates volunteered for the study. Infamous murderer Nathan Leopold participated in the study and later wrote about his experiences in his autobiography, Life Plus 99 Years[3]. Over the course of the experiments, one prisoner died, suffering a heart attack after several bouts of fever. The researchers insisted that the death was unrelated to their research[4]. The experiments gained much media attention and praise. Malaria research continued at Stateville Penitentiary for 29 years.

Nuremberg medical trial

In 1946, during the Nuremberg Medical Trial, defense attorneys argued that, ethically, there was no difference between research conducted in American prisons and the experiments that took place in Nazi concentration camps. The malaria study was specifically mentioned. Andrew Conway Ivy, medical researcher and vice president of the University of Illinois, served as a witness and consultant for the prosecution. Ivy encouraged Illinois Governor Dwight H. Green to form a committee to analyze the ethics of prison research. Green appointed Ivy to be chair of the committee and, though the committee never met, it produced the Green report. The report justified the experimentation on the Stateville prisoners. Ivy’s testimony at the Medical Trial asserted that the Stateville malaria research was  an example of human experiments which were ideal because of their conformity [with the highest ethical standards of human experimentation].  The trial resulted in the formation of the Nuremberg Code, a set of principles concerning human experimentation. The code includes principles such as informed consent and the absence of coercion.

Effect on prisoner experimentation

Public opposition to medical experimentation on prisoners was scant during the war. The Green Report was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association and opened the door for legal, ethical experimentation on prisoners in the United States. The medical community in the United States largely regarded the Nuremberg Code to be applicable to war criminals and not to the practices of U.S. researchers.
See also

* Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments
* Research Involving Prisoners

References

1. ^ Clinical Treatment of Malaria, Alf S. Alving, M.D.
2. ^ Procedures Used at Stateville Penitentiary for the Testing of Potential Antimalarial Agents
3. ^ Time Magazine, April 7, 1958
4. ^ Strangers at the Bedside: A history of how law and bioethics transformed medical decision making, David J. Rothman

External links

* They were cheap and available: Prisoners as research subjects in twentieth century America, Allen M. Hornblum

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateville_Penitentiary_Malaria_Study
Categories: Infectious diseases | Human experimentation in the United States | Clinical trials

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stateville_Penitentiary_Malaria_Study

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Operation Whitecoat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Whitecoat was the name given to a secret operation carried out by the US Army during the period 1954-1973, which included conducting medical experiments on volunteers nicknamed  White Coats . The volunteers, all conscientious objectors and many members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, consented to the research before participating. The stated purpose of the experiments was to defend troops and civilians against biological weapons, and it was believed that the Soviet Union was engaged in similar activities.

Contents

* 1 Experiments
o 1.1 Results
* 2 US accountability office report
* 3 Long term health effects
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes
* 6 External links

Experiments
Over 2300 U.S. Army soldiers, most of which were trained medics, contributed to the experiment by allowing themselves to be infected with viruses and bacteria that were considered likely choices for a biological attack. Whitecoat volunteers were exposed to Q fever, yellow fever, Rift Valley fever, Hepatitis A, Yersinia pestis (Plague), tularemia (rabbit fever), and Venezuelan equine encephalitis and other diseases. Also referred to as  white coats [1] they were then treated for the illness to determine the effectiveness of antibiotics and vaccines against the agent. Some soldiers were given two weeks of leave in exchange for being used as a test subject. These experiments took place at Fort Detrick which is a US Army research center located outside Washington, D.C.[2]

This experiment is a good example of the proper employment of informed consent as dictated by the Nuremberg Code. The volunteers were allowed to consult with outside sources such as family and clergy members before deciding to participate. The participants were required to sign consent forms after discussing the risks and treatments with a medical officer. Of the soldiers that were approached about participating, 20% declined.[3] Much of the testing remains classified and Fort Detrick allows no visitors. Not even ex-soldiers who were exposed as part of the tests can visit.

Results

Many of the vaccines that protect against bio-warfare agents were first tested on humans in Operation Whitecoat.[4]

According to USAMRIID, the Whitecoat operation contributed to vaccines approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for yellow fever and hepatitis; investigational drugs for Q fever, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, Rift Valley fever, and tularemia. USAMRIID also states that Operation Whitecoat helped develop biological safety equipment including hooded safety cabinets, decontamination procedures, fermentors, incubators, centrifuges, and particle sizers.[5]

US accountability office report

The United States Government Accountability Office issued a report on September 28, 1994, which stated that between 1940 and 1974, the United States Department of Defense and other national security agencies studied hundreds of thousands of human subjects in tests and experiments involving hazardous substances.

A quote from the study:
“     Many experiments that tested various biological agents on human subjects, referred to as Operation Whitecoat, were carried out at Fort Detrick, Maryland, in the 1950s. The human subjects originally consisted of volunteer enlisted men. However, after the enlisted men staged a sitdown strike to obtain more information about the dangers of the biological tests, Seventh-day Adventists who were conscientious objectors were recruited for the studies.[6]     ”

Long term health effects

No Whitecoats died during the tests, nor are there any known post-test deaths attributable to the experiments.[1] The Army only has addresses for 1000 of the 2300 people known to have volunteered.[4] Only about 500 (23%) of the whitecoats have been surveyed and the military chose not to fund blood tests.[1] A handful of respondents claim to have lingering health effects[4], and at least one subject claims to have serious health problems as a result of the experiments.[1]

See also

* US Senate Report on chemical weapons
* Project SHAD
* Tuskegee Syphilis Study
* US Biological Weapon Testing

Notes

1. ^ a b c d  Operation Whitecoat . PBS Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly. 2003-09-24. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week708/cover.html. Retrieved 2007-03-09.
2. ^  Hidden history of US germ testing . BBC. February 13 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/file_on_4/4701196.stm.
3. ^ Stephenson, Jeffery; Arthur Anderson (2007).  Ethical and Legal Dilemmas in Biodefense Research  (pdf). http://www.bordeninstitute.army.mil/published_volumes/biological_warfare/BW-ch24.pdf. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
4. ^ a b c Snyder, David; staff researcher Bobbye Pratt (2003-05-06).  The Front Lines of Biowarfare . Washington Post. http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/Bioter/frontlinesbiowarfare.html. Retrieved 2007-03-16.
5. ^ Linden, Caree (2005-06).  USAMRIID Celebrates 50 Years of Science . U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. http://www.armymedicine.army.mil/news/mercury/05-06/usamriid.cfm. Retrieved 2007-03-16.
6. ^  Staff Report prepared for the committee on veterans’ affairs December 8, 1994 John D. Rockefeller IV, West Virginia, Chairman. . http://www.gulfweb.org/bigdoc/rockrep.cfm. Retrieved 2006-07-30.

External links

* The Living Weapon, chapter 8 about Operation Whitecoat, from the American Experience documentary video
* Adventist Volunteers Lauded on  Operation Whitecoat  Anniversary – Adventist News Network
* O’Neal, Glenn (December 19, 2001).  The risks of Operation Whitecoat  (subscription required). USA Today. http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/bioterrorism/2001-12-20-whitecoat-sidebar.htm.
* Linden, Caree Vander United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases celebrates 50-year research tradition March 3, 2005  Operation Whitecoat served as a model for the ethical use of human subjects in research

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Whitecoat
Categories: Clinical research | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Seventh-day Adventist history | Human experimentation in the United States | Biological warfare

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Whitecoat

***

180px-Chemical_agent_protection.jpg

A Swedish Army soldier wearing a chemical agent protective suit (C-vätskeskydd) and his protection mask (skyddsmask 90).

(From)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_weapons#United_States_Senate_Report

***

450px-Chemical_agent_protection.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Chemical_agent_protection.jpg

Description     Chemical agent protection.jpg

A chemical agent protective suit and a protection mask worn by a Swedish Army soldier.
Date

9 September 2003.
Source

Photo taken by myself, User:Johan Elisson.
Author

User:Johan Elisson.
Permission
(Reusing this image)

See licensing below.

***

United States biological weapons program
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from US Biological Weapon Testing)

The United States biological weapons program officially began in the spring 1943 on orders from U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt. Research continued following World War II as the U.S. built up a large stockpile of biological agents and weapons. Throughout its history the program was secret. It became controversial when it was later revealed that laboratory and field testing (some of the latter using simulants on non-consenting individuals) had been common. The official policy of the United States was first to deter the use of bio-weapons against U.S. forces and secondarily to retaliate if deterrence failed. There exists no evidence that the U.S. ever used biological agents against an enemy in the field (see below for alleged uses).

In 1969, President Richard Nixon ended all offensive (i.e., non-defensive) aspects of the U.S. bio-weapons program. In 1975 the U.S. finally ratified both the 1925 Geneva Protocol and the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) — these are international treaties outlawing biological warfare. Recent U.S. biodefense programs, however, have raised concerns that it may be pursuing research that is outlawed by the BWC.

Contents

* 1 History
o 1.1 Early history (1918-41)
o 1.2 World War II (1941-45)
o 1.3 Cold War (1946-69)
o 1.4 End of the program (1969-73)
* 2 Budget history
* 3 Geneva Protocol and BWC
* 4 Post-1969 bio-defense program
* 5 Agents and weapons
* 6 Alleged use
o 6.1 Cuba
o 6.2 Korean War
* 7 Experimentation and testing
o 7.1 Entomological testing
o 7.2 Experiments on consenting individuals
o 7.3 Experiments on non-consenting individuals
o 7.4 GAO Report
* 8 See also
* 9 Notes
* 10 References
* 11 External links

History
Early history (1918-41)

The United States’ first interest in any form of biological warfare came at the close of World War I. The only agent the U.S. tested was the toxin, ricin.[1] The U.S. conducted tests concerning two methods of ricin dissemination, the first, involved adhering the toxin to shrapnel for delivery by artillery shell, which was successful.[1] The other method, delivering an aerosol cloud of ricin, proved less successful.[1] Neither delivery method was perfected before the war in Europe ended.[1]

In the early 1920s suggestions that the U.S. begin a biological weapons program were coming from within the Chemical Warfare Service (CWS).[1] Chief of the CWS, Amos Fries, decided that such a program would not be  profitable  for the U.S.[1] Japan’s Shiro Ishii began promoting BW during the 1920s and toured biological research facilities worldwide, including in the United States.[1] Though Ishii concluded that the U.S. was developing a bio-weapons programs he was incorrect.[1] In fact, Ishii concluded that all major powers he visited was developing a bio-weapons program.[1] As the interwar period continued, the United States did not emphasize biological weapons development or research.[1] While the U.S. was spending very little time on BW research, its future allies and enemies in the upcoming second World War were researching the potential of BW as early as 1933.[1]

World War II (1941-45)

Despite the World War I-era interest in ricin, as World War II erupted the United States Army still maintained the position that BW was, for the most part, impractical.[2] Other nations, notably France, Japan and the United Kingdom, thought otherwise and had begun their own BW programs.[2] Thus, as late as 1942 the U.S. had no biological weapons capabilities. Initial interest in BW by the Chemical Warfare Service began in 1941.[3] That fall, U.S. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson requested that the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) undertake consideration of U.S. biological warfare.[4] He wrote to Dr. Frank B. Jewett, then president of the NAS:

Because of the dangers that might confront this country from potential enemies employing what may be broadly described as biological warfare, it seems advisable that investigations be initiated to survey the present situation and the future possibilities. I am therefore, asking if you will undertake the appointment of an appropriate committee to survey all phases of this matter. Your organization already has before it a request from The Surgeon General for the appointment of a committee by the Division of Medical Sciences of the National Research Council to examine one phase of the matter. [5]
In response the NAS formed a committee, the War Bureau of Consultants (WBC), which issued a report on the subject in February 1942.[4] The report, among other items, recommended the research and development of an offensive BW program.[4]

The British, and the research undertaken by the WBC, pressured the U.S. to begin BW research and development and in November 1942 U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt officially approved an American BW program.[6] In response to the information provided by the WBC, Roosevelt ordered Stimson to form the War Research Service (WRS).[4][7] Established within the Federal Security Agency, the WRS’ stated purpose was to promote  public security and health ,[7] but, in reality, the WRS was tasked with coordinating and supervising the U.S. biological warfare program.[4] In the spring of 1943 the U.S. Army Biological Warfare Laboratories were established at Fort (then Camp) Detrick in Maryland.[6] [8]

Though initially, under George Merck, the WRS contracted several universities to participate in the U.S. BW program, the program became large quickly and before long it was under the full control of the CWS.[7] By November 1943 the BW facility at Detrick was completed, in addition, the United States constructed three other facilities – a biological agent production plant at Vigo County near Terre Haute, Indiana, a field-testing site on Horn Island in Mississippi, and another field site near Granite Peak in Utah.[7] According to an official history of the period,  the elaborate security precautions taken [at Camp Detrick] were so effective that it was not until January 1946, 4 months after VJ Day, that the public learned of the wartime research in BW [9].

Cold War (1946-69)

Immediately following World War II, production of U.S. biological warfare (BW) agents went from  factory-level to laboratory-level .[10] Meanwhile, work on BW delivery systems increased.[10] By 1950 the principal U.S. bio-weapons facility was located at Camp Detrick in Maryland under the auspices of the Research and Engineering Division of the U.S. Army Chemical Corps.[11] The U.S. also maintained bio-warfare facilities at Fort Terry, an animal research facility on Plum Island.[12] From the end of World War II through the Korean War, the U.S. Army, the Chemical Corps and the U.S. Air Force all made great strides in their biological warfare programs, especially concerning delivery systems.[10]
The U.S. biological program expanded significantly during the Korean War.[13] From 1952-1954 the Chemical Corps maintained a BW research and development facility at Fort Terry on Plum Island, New York.[14] The Fort Terry facility’s focus was on anti-animal biological weapon research and development; the facility researched more than a dozen potential BW agents.[14] A facility was opened in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, Pine Bluff Arsenal and by 1954 the production of weapons-grade agents began.[13]

End of the program (1969-73)
Main article: Statement on Chemical and Biological Defense Policies and Programs

President Richard M. Nixon issued his  Statement on Chemical and Biological Defense Policies and Programs  on November 25, 1969 in a speech from Fort Detrick.[15] The statement ended, unconditionally, all U.S. offensive biological weapons programs.[16] Nixon noted that biological weapons were unreliable[16] and stated:[15]

The United States shall renounce the use of lethal biological agents and weapons, and all other methods of biological warfare. The United States will confine its biological research to defensive measures such as immunization and safety measures.

In his speech Nixon called his move  unprecedented ; and it was in fact the first review of the U.S. BW program since 1954.[17] Despite the lack of review, the BW program had increased in cost and size since 1961; when Nixon ended the program the budget was $300 million annually.[17][18] Nixon’s statement confined all biological weapons research to defensive-only and ordered the destruction of the existing U.S. biological arsenal.[19]

U.S. biological weapons stocks were destroyed over the next few years. A $12 million disposal plan was undertaken at Pine Bluff Arsenal,[20] where all U.S. anti-personnel biological agents were stored.[19] That plan was completed in May 1972 and included decontamination of facilities at Pine Bluff.[20][19] Other agents, including anti-crop agents such as wheat stem rust, were stored at Beale Air Force Base and Rocky Mountain Arsenal.[19] These anti-crop agents, along with agents at Fort Detrick used for research purposes were destroyed in March 1973.[19]

Budget history

From the onset of the U.S. biological weapons program in 1943 through the end of World War II the United States spent $400 million on BW, mostly on research and development.[21] When Nixon ended the U.S. bio-weapons program it represented the first review of the U.S. BW program since 1954.[17] Despite the lack of review, the BW program had increased in cost and size since 1961; when Nixon ended the program the budget was $300 million annually.[17][18]

Geneva Protocol and BWC

The 1925 Geneva Protocol, ratified by most major powers in the 1920s and 30s, had still not been ratified by the United States at the dawn of World War II.[16] Among the Protocol’s provisions, was a ban on bacteriological warfare.[22] The Geneva Protocol had encountered opposition in the U.S. Senate, in part due to strong lobbying against it by the Chemical Warfare Service, and it was never brought to the floor for a vote when originally introduced.[16] Regardless, on June 8, 1943 President Roosevelt affirmed a no-first-use policy for the United States concerning biological weapons.[16][22] Even with Roosevelt’s declaration opposition to the Protocol remained strong; in 1949 the Protocol was among several old treaties returned to President Harry S. Truman unratified.[16]

When Nixon ended the U.S. bio-weapons program in 1969 he also announced that he would resubmit the Geneva Protocol to the U.S. Senate.[19] This was a move Nixon was considering as early as July 1969.[19] The announcement included language that indicated the Nixon administration was moving toward an international agreement on an outright ban on bio-weapons.[19] Thus, the Nixon administration became the world’s leading anti-BW voice calling for an international treaty.[15] The Eighteen Nation Disarmament Committee was discussing a British draft of a biological weapons treaty which the United Nations General Assembly approved in 1968 and that NATO supported.[17] These arms control talks would eventually lead to the Biological Weapons Convention, the international treaty outlawing biological warfare.[23] Prior, to the Nixon announcement only Canada supported the British draft.[19] Beginning in 1972, the Soviet Union, United States and more than 100 other countries signed the BWC.[15] The United States finally ratified the Geneva Protocol in 1975.[24]

Post-1969 bio-defense program

Both the U.S. bio-weapons ban and the Biological Weapons Convention restricted any work in the area of biological warfare to defensive in nature. In reality, this gives BWC member-states wide latitude to conduct BW research because the BWC contains no provisions for monitoring of enforcement.[25][26] The treaty, essentially, is a gentlemen’s agreement amongst members backed by the long-prevailing thought that biological warfare should not be used in battle.[25]

After Nixon declared an end to the U.S. bio-weapons program debate in the Army centered around whether or not toxin weapons were included in the president’s declaration.[19] Following Nixon’s November 1969 order, scientists at Fort Detrick worked on one toxin, Staphylococcus enterotoxin type B (SEB), for several more months.[19] Nixon ended the debate when he added toxins to the bio-weapons ban in February 1970.[17] The U.S. also ran a series of experiments with anthrax, code named Project Bacchus, Project Clear Vision and Project Jefferson in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

In recent years certain critics have claimed the U.S. stance on biological warfare and the use of biological agents has differed from historical interpretations of the BWC.[27] For example, it is said that the U.S. now maintains that the Article I of the BWC (which explicitly bans bio-weapons), does not apply to  non-lethal  biological agents.[27] Previous interpretation was stated to be in line with a definition laid out in Public Law 101-298, the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989.[28] That law defined a biological agent as:[28]

any micro-organism, virus, infectious substance, or biological product that may be engineered as a result of biotechnology, or any naturally occurring or bioengineered component of any such microorganism, virus, infectious substance, or biological product, capable of causing death, disease, or other biological malfunction in a human, an animal, a plant, or another living organism; deterioration of food, water, equipment, supplies, or material of any kind…

According to the Federation of American Scientists, U.S. work on non-lethal agents exceeds limitations in the BWC.[27]

Agents and weapons

When the U.S. BW program ended in 1969 it had developed seven mass-produced, battle-ready biological weapons in the form of agents that cause: anthrax, tularemia, brucellosis, Q-fever, VEE, and botulism.[10] In addition Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B was produced as an incapacitating agent.[10] In addition to the agents that were ready to be used the U.S. program conducted research into the weaponization of more than 20 other agents. They included: smallpox, EEE and WEE, AHF, Hantavirus, BHF, Lassa fever, glanders,[29] melioidosis,[29] plague, yellow fever, psittacosis, typhus, dengue fever, Rift Valley fever (RVF), CHIKV, late blight of potato, rinderpest, Newcastle disease, bird flu, and the toxin ricin.[30]

Besides the numerous pathogens that afflict human beings, the U.S. had developed an arsenal of anti-agriculture biological agents. These included rye stem rust spores (stored at Edgewood Arsenal, 1951 – 1957), wheat stem rust spores (stored at the same facility 1962 – 1969),[11] and the causative agent of rice blast (stored at Fort Detrick 1965 – 1966).[11]

A U.S. facility at Fort Terry primarily focused on anti-animal biological agents. The first agent that was a candidate for development was foot and mouth disease (FMD).[14] Besides FMD, five other top secret BW projects were commissioned on Plum Island.[31] The other four programs researched included RVF, rinderpest, African swine fever, plus eleven miscellaneous exotic animal diseases.[31][14] The eleven miscellaneous pathogens were: Blue tongue virus, bovine influenza, bovine virus diarrhea (BVD), fowl plague, goat pneumonitis, mycobacteria,  N  virus, Newcastle disease, sheep pox, Teschers disease, and vesicular stomatitis.[14]

Work on delivery systems for the U.S. bio-weapons arsenal led to the first mass-produced biological weapon in 1952, the M33 cluster bomb.[32] The M33’s sub-munition, the pipe bomb like, cylindrical M114 bomb, was also completed and battle-ready by 1952.[1][32] Other delivery systems researched and at least partially developed during the 1950s included the E77 balloon bomb and the E86 cluster bomb.[11] The peak of U.S. biological weapons delivery system development came during the 1960s.[1] Production of cluster bomb sub-muntions began to shift from the cylindrical bomblets to spherical bomblets, which had a larger coverage area.[33] Development of the spherical E120 bomblet took place in the early 1960s[34] as did development of the M143 bomblet, similar to the chemical M139 bomblet.[1] The experimental Flettner rotor bomblet was also developed during this time period.[35] The Flettner rotor was called,  probably one of the better devices for disseminating microorganisms , by William C. Patrick III.[36]

Alleged use
Cuba

It has been rumored that the U.S. employed biological weapons against the Communist island nation of Cuba. Noam Chomsky claimed to have found proof of such covert U.S. BW in Cuba,[37] though his evidence has been disputed.[38][39] Allegations in 1962 held that CIA operatives had contaminated a shipment of sugar while it was in storage in Cuba.[40] Again, in 1962, a Canadian agricultural technician assisting the Cuban government claimed he was paid $5,000 to infect Cuban turkeys with the deadly Newcastle disease.[40][41] Though the technician later claimed he had just pocketed the money, many Cubans and some Americans believed a clandestinely administered BW agent was responsible for a subsequent outbreak of the disease in Cuban turkeys.[40] In 1971 the first serious outbreak of swine flu in the Western Hemisphere occurred in Cuba, and Cubans alleged that U.S. covert BW was responsible for this outbreak, which led to the preemptive slaughter of 500,000 pigs.[38] Evidence linking these incidents to biological warfare has not been confirmed.[38]

Accusations have continued to come out of Havana charging U.S. use of bio-weapons on the island. The Cuban government blamed the U.S. for a 1981 outbreak of dengue fever that sickened more than 300,000.[38] Dengue, a vector-borne disease usually carried by mosquitoes,[40] killed 158 people that year in Cuba, including 101 children under 15.[38] Poor relations between Cuba and the United States coupled with confirmed U.S. research into entomological warfare during the 1950s made these charges seem not implausible.[38][40] However, dengue fever occurs naturally in the region of the world where Cuba is located.[38]

Korean War

North Korean and Chinese officials leveled accusations that during the Korean War the United States engaged in biological warfare in North Korea. The claim is dated to the period of the war, and has been thoroughly denied by the U.S.[42] In 1998, Stephen Endicott and Edward Hagermann claimed that the accusations were true in their book, The United States and Biological Warfare: Secrets from the Early Cold War and Korea[43] The book received mixed reviews, some called it  bad history [44] and  appalling ,[42] while other praised the case the authors made.[44] Others have revived these claims more recently.[45]

In 1952 the Chinese and North Koreans insinuated that mysterious outbreaks of disease in North Korea and China[46] were due to U.S. biological attacks. Despite assertions that this did not occur from the International Red Cross and World Health Organization, whom the Chinese denounced as Western-biased, the Chinese government pursued an investigation by the World Peace Council.[47] A committee led by Joseph Needham gathered evidence for a report that included eyewitness testimony, and testimony from doctors as well as four American Korean War prisoners who confirmed the U.S. use of BW.[47] The U.S. government denied the accusations and their denial was generally supported by top scientists in the West.[47] In Eastern Europe, and China, North Korea it was widely believed that the accusations were true.[46]
The same year Endicotts’ book was published Kathryn Weathersby and Milton Leitenberg of the Cold War International History Project at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington released a cache of Soviet and Chinese documents which revealed the North Korean claim was an elaborate disinformation campaign.[45] In addition, a Japanese journalist claims to have seen similar evidence of a Soviet disinformation campaign and that the evidence supporting its occurrence was faked.[47]

Experimentation and testing
Entomological testing
Further information: U.S. Cold War entomological warfare program

The United States seriously researched the potential of entomological warfare (EW) during the Cold War. EW is a specific type of biological warfare which aims to use insects as weapon, either directly or through their potential to act as vectors. During the 1950s the United States conducted a series of field tests using entomological weapons. Operation Big Itch, in 1954, was designed to test munitions loaded with uninfected fleas (Xenopsylla cheopis).[48] In May 1955 over 300,000 yellow fever mosquitoes (Aedes aegypti) were dropped over parts of the U.S. state of Georgia to determine if the air-dropped mosquitoes could survive to take meals from humans.[49] The mosquito tests were known as Operation Big Buzz.[50] The U.S. engaged in at least two other EW testing programs, Operation Drop Kick and Operation May Day.[49] A 1981 Army report outlined these tests as well as multiple cost-associated issues that occurred with EW.[49]

Experiments on consenting individuals

Operation Whitecoat involved the controlled testing of many serious agents on military personnel consented to experimentation, and understood the risks involved. No deaths are known to have resulted from this program.

Experiments on non-consenting individuals

In August of 1949 a U.S. Army Special Operations Division, operating out of Fort Detrick in Maryland, set up its first test at The Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Operatives sprayed harmless bacteria into the building’s air conditioning system and observed as the microbes spread throughout the Pentagon.[51]

There were massive medical experiments that involved civilians who had not consented to participate. Often, these experiments took place in urban areas in order to test dispersion methods. Questions were raised about detrimental health effects after experiments in San Francisco, California, were followed by a spike in hospital visits; however, in 1977 the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined that there was no association between the testing and the occurrence of pneumonia or influenza.[52] The San Francisco test involved a U.S. Navy ship that sprayed Serratia marcescens from the bay; it traveled more than 30 miles.[52] One dispersion test involved laboratory personnel disguised as passengers spraying harmless bacteria in Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.[52]

Scientists tested biological pathogens, including Bacillus globigii, which were thought to be harmless, at public places such as subways. A light bulb containing Bacillus globigii was dropped on New York City’s subway system; the result was strong enough to affect people prone to illness (also known as Subway Experiment).[53] Based on the circulation measurements, thousands of people would have been killed if a dangerous microbe was released in the same manner.[52]

A jet aircraft released material over Victoria, Texas, that was monitored in the Florida Keys.[52]

GAO Report

In February, 2008, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released report GAO-08-366 titled,  Chemical and Biological Defense, DOD and VA Need to Improve Efforts to Identify and Notify Individuals Potentially Exposed during Chemical and Biological Tests.  The report stated that tens of thousands of military personnel and civilians may have been exposed to biological and chemical substances through DOD tests. In 2003, the DOD reported it had identified 5,842 military personnel and estimated 350 civilians as being potentially exposed during the testing, known as Project 112.[54]

The GAO asserts that the U.S. Department of Defense’s (DOD) 2003 decision to stop searching for people affected by the tests was premature. They also claimed that the DOD made no effort to inform civilians of exposure; furthermore, they assert that the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is not using available resources to inform veterans of possible exposure or to determine if they were deceased. After the DOD halted efforts to find those who may have been affected by the tests, non-DOD sources identified approximately 600 additional individuals who were potentially exposed during Project 112.[54] Some of the individuals were identified after the GAO reviewed records stored at the Dugway Proving Ground, others were identified by the Institute of Medicine.[55] Many of the newly identified suffer from long term illnesses that may have been caused by the biological or chemical testing.[56]

See also

* United States Army Biological Warfare Laboratories
* Soviet biological weapons program
* Iraqi biological weapons program
* Project SHAD
* Tuskegee Syphilis Study

Notes

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Smart, Jeffery K. Medical Aspects of Chemical and Biological Warfare: Chapter 2 – History of Chemical and Biological Warfare: An American Perspective, (PDF: p. 14), Borden Institute, Textbooks of Military Medicine, PDF via Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base, accessed January 3, 2009.
2. ^ a b Garrett, Laurie. Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health, (Google Books), Oxford University Press, 2003, p. 340-41, (ISBN 0198526830).
3. ^ Croddy, Weapons of Mass Destruction, p. 303.
4. ^ a b c d e Zilinskas, Raymond A. Biological Warfare, (Google Books), Lynne Rienner Publishers, Boulder, Colorado: 2000 pp. 228-30, (ISBN 1555877613).
5. ^ Covert, Norman M. (2000),  A History of Fort Detrick, Maryland , 4th Edition: 2000.
6. ^ a b Ryan, Jeffrey R. and Glarum, Jan F. Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Containing and Preventing Biological Threats, (Google Books), Butterworth-Heinemann, 2008, p. 14, (ISBN 0750684895).
7. ^ a b c d Moreno, Jonathan D.. Undue Risk: Secret State Experiments on Humans, (Google Books), Routledge, 2001, pp. 44-46, (ISBN 0415928354).
8. ^ Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Warfare, p. 63.
9. ^ Clendenin, Lt. Col. Richard M. (1968), Science and Technology at Fort Detrick, 1943-1968; Technical Information Division.
10. ^ a b c d e Croddy, Eric C. and Hart, C. Perez-Armendariz J., Chemical and Biological Warfare, (Google Books), Springer, 2002, pp. 30-31, (ISBN 0387950761).
11. ^ a b c d Whitby, Simon M. Biological Warfare Against Crops, (Google Books), Macmillan, 2002, pp. 104-08 and p. 117, (ISBN 0333920856).
12. ^ Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons, p. 96.
13. ^ a b Zubay, Geoffrey L. Agents of Bioterrorism: Pathogens and Their Weaponization, (Google Books), Columbia University Press, 2005, p. 132, (ISBN 0231133464).
14. ^ a b c d e Wheelis, Mark, et al. Deadly Cultures: Biological Weapons Since 1945, (Google Books), Harvard University Press, 2006 p. 225-228, (ISBN 0674016998).
15. ^ a b c d Miller, pp. 61-64.
16. ^ a b c d e f Graham, Thomas. Disarmament Sketches: Three Decades of Arms Control and International Law, (Google Books), University of Washington Press, 2002, pp. 21-30, (ISBN 0295982128).
17. ^ a b c d e f Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons, pp. 122-27.
18. ^ a b Cirincione, Joseph, et al. Deadly Arsenals, p. 212.
19. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Mauroni, Albert J. America’s Struggle with Chemical-Biological Weapons, (Google Books), Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000, p. 49-60, (ISBN 0275967565).
20. ^ a b Mangold, Tom. Plague Wars: The Terrifying Reality of Biological Warfare, (Google Books), Macmillan, 1999, pp. 54-57, (ISBN 0312203535).
21. ^ Guillemin, Biological Weapons, pp. 71-73.
22. ^ a b O’Brien, Neil. An American Editor in Early Revolutionary China: John William Powell and the China Weekly/monthly Review, (Google Books), Routledge, 2003, p. 217-19, (ISBN 0415944244).
23. ^ Carter, April, (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute). Success and Failure in Arms Control Negotiations, (Google Books), Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 298, (ISBN 0198291280).
24. ^  PROTOCOL FOR THE PROHIBITION OF THE USE IN WAR OF ASPHYXIATING, POISONOUS OR OTHER GASES, AND OF BACTERIOLOGICAL METHODS OF WARFARE , via Federation of American Scientists, April 29, 1975, accessed January 5, 2009.
25. ^ a b Littlewood, Jez. The Biological Weapons Convention: A Failed Revolution, (Google Books), Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2005, p. 9, (ISBN 0754638545).
26. ^ Cirincione, Joseph, et al. Deadly Arsenals, p. 35.
27. ^ a b c  Introduction to Biological Weapons , Federation of American Scientists, official site, accessed January 9, 2009.
28. ^ a b  Original U.S. Interpretation of the BWC , (PDF),Federation of American Scientists, official site, accessed January 9, 2009.
29. ^ a b The United States is known to have researched both B. mallei (the causal agent of glanders) and B. pseudomallei (the causal agent of melioidosis) from 1943-1944. Neither bacteria was weaponized. See Khardori, Bioterrorism Preparedness, p. 16.
30. ^  Chemical and Biological Weapons: Possession and Programs Past and Present , James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Middlebury College, April 9, 2002, accessed January 3, 2009.
31. ^ a b Carroll, Michael C. Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Google Books), HarperCollins, 2004, pp. 45-48, (ISBN 0060011416).
32. ^ a b Croddy, Weapons of Mass Destruction, p. 75.
33. ^ Kirby, Reid.  The CB Battlefield Legacy: Understanding the Potential Problem of Clustered CB Weapons , Army Chemical Review, pp. 25-29, July-December 2006, accessed January 5, 2009.
34. ^ Countermeasures, Chapter 6 – An Overview of Emerging Missile State Countermeasures, p. 14, accessed January 5, 2009.
35. ^ Eitzen, Edward M. Medical Aspects of Chemical and Biological Warfare: Chapter 20 – Use of Biological Weapons, (PDF: p. 6), Borden Institute, Textbooks of Military Medicine, PDF via Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base, accessed January 5, 2009.
36. ^ U.S. Public Health Service, Office of Emergency Preparedness,  Proceedings of the Seminar Responding to the Consequences of Chemical and Biological Terrorism , Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences, Bethesda, Md; July 11–14, 1995, p. 70, via LSU Law Center’s Medical and Public Health Law Site, accessed January 5, 2009.
37. ^ Chomsky, Noam. Rogue States: The Rule of Force in World Affairs, (Google Books), Pluto Press, 2000, p. 27, (ISBN 0745317081).
38. ^ a b c d e f g Levy, Barry S. and Sidel, Victor W. War and Public Health, (Google Books), American Public Health Association, 2000, pp. 110-11, (ISBN 0875530230).
39. ^ Nieto, Clara, Brandt, Chris, and Zinn, Howard. Masters of War: Latin America and United States Aggression from the Cuban Revolution Through the Clinton Years, (Google Books), Seven Stories Press, 2003, pp. 458-59, (ISBN 1583225455).
40. ^ a b c d e Blum, William. Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, (Google Books), Zed Books Ltd., 2003, p. 188-90, (ISBN 1842773690).
41. ^ It is known that the viral causal agent for Newcastle disease was researched for use as a weapon by the U.S. bio-weapons program. See:  Global Guide to Bioweapons .
42. ^ a b Regis, Ed.  Wartime Lies? , The New York Times, June 27, 1999, accessed January 7, 2009.
43. ^ Endicott, Stephen, and Hagermann, Edward. The United States and Biological Warfare: Secrets from the Early Cold War and Korea, (Google Books, relevant excerpt), Indiana University Press, 1998, pp. 75-77, (ISBN 0253334721), links accessed January 7, 2009.
44. ^ a b  Reviews of The United States and Biological Warfare: secrets of the Early Cold War and Korea , York University, compiled book review excerpts, accessed January 7, 2009.
45. ^ a b Auster, Bruce B.  Unmasking an Old Lie , U.S. News and World Report, November 16, 1998, accessed January 7, 2009.
46. ^ a b Stueck, William Whitney. The Korean War in World History, (Google Books), University Press of Kentucky, 2004, p. 83-84, (ISBN 0813123062).
47. ^ a b c d Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons, p. 99-105.
48. ^ Croddy, Weapons of Mass Destruction, p. 304.
49. ^ a b c Rose, William H.  An Evaluation of Entomological Warfare as as Potential Danger to the United States and European NATO Nations , U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, March 1981, via thesmokinggun.com, accessed January 3, 2009.
50. ^ Novick, Lloyd and Marr, John S. Public Health Issues Disaster Preparedness, (Google Books), Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2001, p. 87, (ISBN 0763725005).
51. ^  Timeline: Biological Weapons . American Experience. 2006-12-15. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/weapon/timeline/index.html. Retrieved 2007-04-09.
52. ^ a b c d e  Biological Weapons-United States . Global Security.org. http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/systems/bw.htm. Retrieved 2007-04-09.
53. ^  Hidden history of US germ testing . BBC. 2006-02-13. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/file_on_4/4701196.stm. Retrieved 08-04-2007.
54. ^ a b  Chemical and Biological Defense: DOD and VA Need to Improve Efforts to Identify and Notify Individuals Potentially Exposed during Chemical and Biological Tests . GAO-08-366. Government Accountability Office. 2008-02-28. http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-08-366. Retrieved 2008-03-17.
55. ^ LaPlante, Matthew (2008-02-29).  Report: Military lagged in contacting Utahns, others exposed to tests . Salt Lake Tribune. http://www.sltrib.com//ci_8399208. Retrieved 08-04-2007.
56. ^ LaPlante, Matthew (2008-02-28).  Report: Army still reluctant to find those affected by Utah weapons tests . Salt Lake Tribune. http://www.sltrib.com//ci_8399208. Retrieved 08-04-2007.

References

* Cirincione, Joseph, et al. Deadly Arsenals: Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Threats, (Google Books), Carnegie Endowment, 2005, (ISBN 087003216X).
* Croddy, Eric and Wirtz, James J. Weapons of Mass Destruction: An Encyclopedia of Worldwide Policy, Technology, and History, (Google Books), ABC-CLIO, 2005, (ISBN 1851094903).
*  Global Guide to Bioweapons , Nova Online –  Bioterror , PBS, accessed January 7, 2009.
* Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism, (Google Books), Columbia University Press, 2005, pp. 122-27 and p. 63, (ISBN 0231129424).
* Khardori, Nancy. Bioterrorism Preparedness: Medicine – Public Health – Policy, (Google Books), Wiley-VCH, 2006, (ISBN 3527607730).
* Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. Germs: Biological Weapons and America’s Secret War, (Google Books), Simon and Schuster, 2002, (ISBN 0684871599).

External links

*  The Living Weapon , American Experience, PBS, link to full one hour video included, accessed January 12, 2009.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

v • d • e
Military of the United States
Portal (A A MC A N A AF A CG) A Category (A A MC A N A AF A CG A PHS A NOAA) A Navbox (A A MC A N A AF A CG)
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Other Uniformed Services

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Reserves: (A A MC A N A AF A CG) A National Guard: (A A AF)
Civilian Auxiliaries

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Northern A Central A European A Pacific A Southern A Africa A Joint Forces A Special Operations A Strategic A Transportation
Structure
United States Code (Title 10 A Title 14 A Title 32) A The Pentagon A Bases A Budget A Units: (A A MC A N A AF A CG) A Logistics A Media
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Uniforms: (A A MC A N A AF A CG) A Awards & Decorations: (Inter-service A A A MC/N A AF A CG A Foreign A International A Devices) A Badges: (Identification A A A MC A N A AF A CG)
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Enlisted: (A A MC A N A AF A CG) A Warrant Officers A Officer: (A A MC A N A AF A CG A PHS A NOAA)
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All watercraft A Ships: (A A N (active) A AF A CG A MSC A NOAA) A Weapons: (N A CG) A Aircraft: (N A CG A NOAA) A Reactors
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Aircraft (active) A Aircraft Designation A Missiles A Helicopter Arms
Other

Electronics (designations) A Flags: (A A MC A N A AF A CG A Ensign A Jack A Guidons) A Food A WMDs: (Nuclear A Biological A Chemical)
Legend: A=Army, MC=Marine Corps, N=Navy, AF=Air Force, CG=Coast Guard, PHS=Public Health Service, NOAA=National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, MSC=Military Sealift Command
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_biological_weapons_program
Categories: Clinical research | Biological warfare | Bioethics | Military history of the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Biological_Weapon_Testing

***

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Biological_Weapon_Testing

***

United States Army Biological Warfare Laboratories
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The U.S. Army Biological Warfare Laboratories (USBWL) were a suite of research laboratories and pilot plant centers operating at Camp (later Fort) Detrick, Maryland, USA beginning in 1943 under the control of the U.S. Army Chemical Corps Research and Development Command. The USBWL undertook pioneering research and development into biocontainment, decontamination, gaseous sterilization, and agent production and purification for the U.S. offensive biological warfare program[1]. The Laboratories and their projects were discontinued in 1969.

Contents

* 1 History
o 1.1 Origins
o 1.2 World War II
o 1.3 Cold War
o 1.4 Disestablishment
* 2 Operations
* 3 See also
* 4 References

History

Researchers working with Class III cabinets at the USBWL, Camp Detrick, Maryland (1940s). Cabinet air was filtered and drawn by negative pressure from the room and cabinet systems.

Origins

The USBWL were created after Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson requested the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in 1941 to review the feasibility of biological warfare (BW). The following year, the NAS reported that BW might be feasible and recommended that steps be taken to reduce U.S. vulnerability to BW attack. Thereafter, the official policy of the United States was first to deter the use of BW against U.S. forces, and secondarily to retaliate if deterrence failed.

World War II

Throughout the war years, Dr Ira L. Baldwin, professor of bacteriology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, was scientific director of the Laboratories[2].

Cold War

The USBWL were the United States’ front-line defense against BW during the first half of the Cold War.

Disestablishment

In 1969, the USBWL ceased to exist when President Richard Nixon disestablished all offensive BW studies and directed the destruction of all stock piles of BW agents and munitions.

Operations

At Fort Detrick, the USBWL consisted of various labs and divisions, including:

* The Safety  S  Division, first to be activated (1943)
o Biological Protection Branch
* The Special Operations Division (1949-68), conducted hundreds of field tests of aerosolized simulants
* The Crops Division (called  Plant Sciences Laboratories  after 1966), evaluated thousands of compounds for herbicidal activity (including Agent Orange; see Herbicidal warfare)

The USBWL was also a parent facility overseeing testing and production centers elsewhere, including:

* Pine Bluff Arsenal, Arkansas
* Horn Island, Mississippi
* Dugway Proving Ground including Granite Peak Installation
* Vigo Ordnance Plant, near Terre Haute, Indiana

See also

* Building 470
* Fort Terry
* One-Million-Liter Test Sphere

References

1. ^ Martin, James W., George W. Christopher and Edward M. Eitzen (2007), “History of Biological Weapons: From Poisoned Darts to Intentional Epidemics”, In: Dembek, Zygmunt F. (2007), Medical Aspects of Biological Warfare, (Series: Textbooks of Military Medicine), Washington, DC: The Borden Institute, pg 5.
2. ^  A History of Fort Detrick, Maryland , by Norman M. Covert (4th Edition, 2000)

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Biological_Warfare_Laboratories
Categories: Former United States Army facilities | Former United States Army research facilities | Former United States Army medical research facilities | Cold War | Cold War military equipment | Cold War weapons | Biological warfare facilities

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Biological_Warfare_Laboratories

***

One-Million-Liter Test Sphere
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

One-Million-Liter Test Sphere
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Nearest city:     Frederick, Maryland
Coordinates:     39E26?3.36?N 77E25?44.52?W? / ?39.4342667EN 77.4290333EW? / 39.4342667; -77.4290333
Built/Founded:     1951
Architect:     Unknown
Governing body:     United States Army
Added to NRHP:     November 23, 1977
NRHP Reference#:     77000696 [1]

The One-Million-Liter Test Sphere, also known as the Test Sphere, the Horton Test Sphere, the Cloud Study Chamber, Building 527, and the “Eight Ball” (or “8-ball”), is a decommissioned biological warfare (BW) chamber and testing facility located on Fort Detrick, Maryland, USA. It was constructed and utilized by the U.S. Army Biological Warfare Laboratories as part of its BW research program from 1951 to 1969. It is the largest aerobiology chamber ever constructed and was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.

Contents

* 1 The structure
* 2 History
* 3 See also
* 4 References
* 5 External links

The structure

The stainless steel test sphere, a cloud chamber used to study static microbial aerosols, is a four-story high, 131-ton, other-worldly looking structure. Its one inch thick, carbon steel hull was designed to withstand the internal detonation of  hot  biological bombs without risk to outsiders. It was originally contained within a cubical brick building.

Its purpose was the study of infectious agent aerosols and testing of pathogen-filled munitions. The device was designed to allow exposure of animals and humans to carefully controlled numbers of organisms by an aerosol (inhalational) route. Live, tethered animals were inserted into the chamber along with BW bombs for exposure tests. Human volunteers breathed metered aerosols of Q fever or tularemia organisms through ports along the perimeter of the sphere.

History

Herbert G. Tanner, the head of Camp (now Fort) Detrick’s Munitions Division, had envisioned an enclosed environment where biological tests could be conducted on site, rather than at remote places like Dugway Proving Ground, Utah and Horn Island, Mississippi.

The facility was constructed during 1947 and 1948 and became operational at Camp Detrick in 1950 .

The test sphere was utilized during the Operation Whitecoat studies (1954-73), the first exposure taking place on January 25, 1955.

The test sphere has not been used since 1969, when the US offensive BW program was disestablished by President Nixon. The building housing the test sphere was destroyed by fire in 1974. However, the chamber itself was placed on the National Register of Historic Places [1] in 1977.

See also

* Aerobiology
* United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases
* United States biological weapons program
* Building 470

References

1. ^  National Register Information System . National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2006-03-15. http://www.nr.nps.gov/.

External links

* Photos of the “Eight Ball” [2][3][4]
* Ethical and Legal Dilemmas in Biodefense Research

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-Million-Liter_Test_Sphere
Categories: Former United States Army facilities | Former United States Army research facilities | Former United States Army medical research facilities | National Register of Historic Places in Maryland | Biological warfare facilities

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-Million-Liter_Test_Sphere
***

Fort Terry
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fort Terry was a coastal fortification on Plum Island, a small island just off Orient Point, New York. This strategic position afforded it a commanding view over the Atlantic entrance to the commercially vital Long Island Sound. It was established in 1897 and used intermittently through the end of World War II. In 1952 it became an anti-animal biological warfare research facility, a mission it continued under military and later, civilian control until 1969.

Contents

* 1 History
* 2 Research
* 3 Facilities and weaponry
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes
* 6 References
* 7 External links

History

Fort Terry was constructed after the federal government acquired Plum Island from A.S. Hewitt, a former mayor of New London, Connecticut.[1] Fort Terry, named for Major General Alfred Terry,[2] began operation in 1897 and was expanded several times from the time of the Spanish–American War through World War II.[3][4][1] The initial federal purchase was for 150 acres with the rest of the island turned over to the federal government in 1901.[2]

Fort Terry served as an artillery post during the Spanish–American War, and it was to attack enemy ships as they headed toward New York City.[4] The post continued to serve in that capacity throughout World War I.[4] Following the end of WWI, Fort Terry was declared surplus and put under the control of personnel at Fort H.G. Wright.[2] During World War II the post was put to use again, this time as a training facility and supply depot.[2] On the east side of Plum Island a network of trenches remains from the area’s tenure as an artillery post.[4] The fort was once again declared surplus in 1948.[3]

It served as a U.S. Army Chemical Corps facility beginning April 15, 1952.[5] As a Chemical Corps facility, it was under the control of the First Army, Fort Terry was small and focused primarily on anti-animal biological warfare (BW) research aimed at enemy livestock.[6][5] Anti-animal agents rinderpest and foot and mouth disease were the main areas of research at Fort Terry.[6] When Fort Terry was planned it was envisioned that it would be staffed by less than 20 personnel.[5] The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) took over the island in 1954[5] and began to use it as an animal disease research center. When Fort Terry was transferred to the USDA it was staffed by at least 9 military and 8 civilian employees.[5] Most of the original buildings and batteries still stand today[3] and in many cases were incorporated in one way or another into the island’s new role as a disease research center.[2] Most of the disease research done by the USDA was also focused on biological warfare until Richard Nixon ended the U.S. bio-weapons program in 1969.[2] The former Fort Terry facilities were operated, and later overseen by the USDA until responsibility for Plum Island and its security was transferred to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on June 1, 2003.[7]

Research

The original anti-animal BW mission at Fort Terry was  to establish and pursue a program of research and development of certain anti-animal BW agents.[5] The first agent that was a candidate for development was foot and mouth disease (FMD).[5] Besides FMD, five other top secret BW projects were commissioned on Plum Island.[8] The other four programs researched included Rift Valley fever (RVF), rinderpest, African swine fever, and a slew of miscellaneous exotic animal diseases.[8] Among the miscellaneous diseases were 11[9] other animal pathogens.[5] Shortly before the handover of the facility to the Department of Agriculture in 1954, Fort Terry’s mission was altered. The number of pathogens studied was reduced to two, rinderpest and FMD, and the mission was changed to  defensive  research of those two diseases.[8]

Facilities and weaponry

As an artillery post Fort Terry was heavily armed. By 1914 the fort had 11 gun batteries and the ability to extensively mine the area against submarines.[10] During World War I the post had anti-aircraft artillery installed.[10] In addition the post was home to an advanced fire regulation system as well as a position finding system.[2]

Fort Terry’s Chemical Corps installation covered three acres and included many of the amenities traditionally associated with U.S. military installations.[5] Included on the grounds were various administration buildings, laboratories, a dock, a motor pool, a commissary, a hospital, a fire station, staff housing and animal housing.[5] When the Chemical Corps took control of Fort Terry, in 1952, it required the remodeling of 18 original buildings on post.[2] The Army had been developing plans for the animal disease facility at Fort Terry since 1951.[10] A laboratory was planned for the circa 1911 Building 257, originally known as Combined Torpedo Storehouse and Cable Tanks building.[10] The lab was not completed by the time the Chemical Corps transferred the fort to the USDA but it and the rest of the remodeled buildings were eventually incorporated into the civilian facility.[2]
A 2008 DHS report recommended that the remnants of Fort Terry, its buildings and batteries, be opened to the public and preserved.[11] The Town of Southold, New York formed a Local Waterfront Revitalization Program (LWRP) which noted that many of the island’s structures, including those at Fort Terry, could qualify for listing on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places.[11]

See also

* Building 101
* Fort Detrick
* Plum Island Animal Disease Center

Notes

1. ^ a b Bleyer, Bill.  Plum Island Animal Disease Center , from Newsday, via The Baltimore Sun, April 26, 2004, accessed January 10, 2009.
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cella, Alexandra.  An Overview of Plum Island: History, Research and Effects on Long Island , Long Island Historical Journal, Fall 2003/Spring 2004, Vol. 16, Nos. 1 and 2, pp. 176-181 (194-199 in PDF), accessed January 10, 2009.
3. ^ a b c  Fort Terry , New York State Military Museum and Veterans Research Center, NYS Division of Military and Naval Affairs, accessed January 9, 2009.
4. ^ a b c d Grossman, Karl.  Target: Plum Island , The New York Times, September 11, 2005, accessed January 10, 2009.
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wheelis, Deadly Cultures, p. 225-228.
6. ^ a b Chauhan, Sharad S. Biological Weapons, (Google Books), APH Publishing Corporation, 2004, p. 197, (ISBN 8176487325).
7. ^  Combating Bioterrorism: Actions Needed to Improve Security at Plum Island Animal Disease Center , General Accounting Office, September 19, 2003, accessed January 10, 2008.
8. ^ a b c Carroll, Michael C. Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Google Books), HarperCollins, 2004, pp. 45-48, (ISBN 0060011416).
9. ^ pathogens. These were Blue tongue virus, Bovine influenza, Bovine virus diarrhea (BVD), fowl plague, goat pneumonitis, mycobacteria,  N  virus, Newcastle disease, sheep pox, Teschers disease, and vesicular stomatitis. See, Wheelis, p. 226.
10. ^ a b c d  1669-2003: A Partial History of Plum Island , United States Animal Health Association Newsletter, Vol. 30, No. 4, October 2003, pp. 5, 26, accessed January 10, 2009.
11. ^ a b  National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility Environmental Impact Statement – Scoping Report , Department of Homeland Security, February 2008, pp. 3-8 to 3-9 (pp. 27-28 in PDF), accessed January 10, 2009.

References

* Wheelis, Mark, et al. Deadly Cultures: Biological Weapons Since 1945, (Google Books), Harvard University Press, 2006, (ISBN 0674016998).

External links

* Official USDA site

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Terry
Categories: Forts in New York | Biological warfare facilities | Plum Island (New York)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Terry

***

Operation Polka Dot
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Polka Dot was a U.S. Army test of a biological cluster bomb during the early 1950s.

Operation

Operation Polka Dot was a field test of the E133 cluster bomb undertaken at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah during the early 1950s.[1][2] The operation was detailed in a July 18, 1955 U.S. Army report that also detailed Operation Trouble Maker.[1] The operation was classified  secret [2] and involved filling the munitions with the biological agent simulant, Bacillus globigii.[1]

See also

* Operation Dew
* Operation LAC

References

1. ^ a b c U.S. National Research Council, Subcommittee on Zinc Cadmium Sulfide. Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion, (Google Books), National Academies Press, 1997, pp. 44-52, (ISBN 0309057833).
2. ^ a b Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on National Security Policy and Scientific Developments.  U.S. Chemical Warfare Policy , (Google Books), 93rd U.S. Congress – 2nd Session, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1974, p. 340.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Polka_Dot
Categories: Biological warfare | Non-combat military operations involving the United States | Military in Utah

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Polka_Dot
***

Project Bacchus
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Project Bacchus was a covert investigation by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency US Defense Department to determine whether it is possible to construct a bioweapons production facility with off-the-shelf equipment.

Contents

* 1 Revelation to the public
* 2 Project
* 3 References
* 4 Further reading

Revelation to the public

The secret Project Bacchus was revealed to the public in a September 2001 article in The New York Times.[1] Reporters Judith Miller, Stephen Engelberg and William J. Broad collaborated to write the article.[1] It is presumed that the reporters had knowledge of the program for at least several months; shortly after the article appeared they published a book that detailed the story further.[1] The book, Germs: Biological Weapons and America’s Secret War, and the article are the only publicly available sources concerning Project Bacchus and its sister projects, Clear Vision and Jefferson.[1]

Project

Bacchus ran from 1999-2000 and investigated whether  would-be  terrorists could build an anthrax production facility and remain undetected.[1] In the two-year simulation, the facility was constructed, and production of anthrax-like bacterium was successfully completed.[2] The participating scientists were able to produce about one kilogram of highly-refined bacterial particles.[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Enemark, Christian. Disease and Security: Natural Plagues and Biological Weapons in East Asia, (Google Books), Routledge, 2007, pp. 173-75, (ISBN 0415422345).
2. ^ a b MacKenzie, Debora. Anthrax in Florida and New York  the same strain  , New Scientist, October 18, 2001, accessed January 6, 2009.

Further reading

* Tucker, Jonathan B.  Biological Threat Assessment: Is the Cure Worse Than the Disease? , Arms Control Today, October 2004, accessed January 6, 2009.
* Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. Germs: Biological Weapons and America’s Secret War, (Google Books), Simon and Schuster, 2002, (ISBN 0684871599).
* —  U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits , The New York Times, September 4, 2001, accessed January 6, 2009.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Bacchus
Categories: Arms control | Biological warfare | Military projects

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Bacchus

***

Building 470
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Building 470, called the “Pilot Plant” or sometimes “Anthrax Tower”, was a notorious seven-story steel and brick building at Fort Detrick in Frederick, Maryland, USA, used in the small-scale production of biological warfare (BW) agents. The building, a Cold War era structure, was transferred from the Department of Defense to the National Cancer Institute-Frederick (a unit of the National Institutes of Health) in 1988, to which it belonged until 2003 when it was demolished.

Contents

* 1 Structure and design
* 2 History
o 2.1 Construction and use
o 2.2 Decommissioning
o 2.3 Demolition
* 3 Urban legends
* 4 See also
* 5 References
* 6 External links

Structure and design

Building 470 was the tallest structure on the Fort Detrick grounds and for many years was the tallest in Frederick County. The structure of the building was unique: a seven-story tower, the configuration of which was dictated by the two 2,500-gallon, three-story high fermentors housed within. Several of the floors of the building were catwalks (steel grating), such that someone, for example, on the fifth floor looked down upon other workers three floors below. (These tanks were used to perfect methods of bacteriological agent production and to provide a source of small amounts of these agents for the development and testing work done elsewhere on the facility. Production of anthrax in bulk for use in actual munitions was done at larger facilities in Arkansas and Indiana.)

The bottom two floors were, in the 1950s and ’60s, where scientists showered and changed into street clothes after working with lethal agents. (After work, they returned home to their families where they were prohibited from talking about their livelihood.) A network of pipes fed into two large  kill tanks  in the basement, where unused biological agents were flushed and subjected to a treatment that rendered them harmless.

The top floor contained a powerful ventilation system that kept the building at  negative pressure  (air pressure outside was always greater than inside), a redundant safety feature. If a door to the outside was opened unintentionally, or if a crack appeared in a wall, air would rush in, not out. If any contaminants escaped into the building’s hallways, they would not escape to the outside world.

History
Construction and use
The U.S. Army Biological Warfare Laboratories constructed Building 470 in 1953, at a cost of $1.3 million, as a pilot plant for the production of biological agents as part of the United States’ offensive BW program. The program was a part of the nation’s Cold War defense against the generally understood threat of biological warfare. From 1954 to 1965, the building was used for production of the bacteria Bacillus anthracis (the cause of anthrax), Francisella tularensis (the cause of tularemia), and Brucella suis (a cause of brucellosis).

Production of biological agents in Building 470 ceased in 1965 and all production and processing equipment were subsequently sterilized. In 1969 President Richard Nixon declared that the U.S. would unilaterally withdraw from the biological arms race, and turned over many Fort Detrick buildings to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for cancer research. Many buildings (although Building 470 was not yet among them) that had been dedicated to BW research were then deeded to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), decontaminated and renovated for use. In all, approximately 70 acres (280,000 m2) on Fort Detrick were designated as a campus for the NCI. Laboratory work continued in Building 470 until 1970, but no infectious agents were again produced there.

Decommissioning

In 1970, Building 470 was vacated and a thorough decontamination began. The final decontamination process was completed in June 1971. Electric frying pans with a solid form of paraformaldehyde were placed throughout the building, then heated, releasing clouds of gas inside the sealed structure. Simulant bacteria, similar to anthrax, were left inside to serve as markers indicating whether or not the gas had worked. Thereafter, the Army carried out extensive testing and found no evidence of any of the biological agents previously produced there. Samples from approximately 1,500 locations throughout the building tested negative for B. anthracis. The Army declared the building safe for occupancy – although not for renovation – including by workers who had not been immunized against anthrax.

In 1988, the NCI acquired Building 470 as well with the expectation that it, too, might be remodeled and converted to cancer research laboratories. It had been vacant for 17 years, serving only as storage space where employees stashed files or excess lab supplies. Because of the unique (and anachronistic) design structure of the building, however, this was deemed to be prohibitively expensive.

In September 2000, safety experts from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Duke University, and Science Applications International Corporation reviewed the post-decontamination quality assurance test data and concluded that there was no evidence of any residual contamination in the building. The success of the decontamination was tested the following month, when examination of an additional 790 samples revealed no trace of living or dead B. anthracis. These samples were analyzed by either conventional culture methods or by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a more sensitive DNA-based test.

Ultimately, Building 470 fell into alarmingly poor structural condition. The exterior mortar and brick of the building buckled and the roof leaked. Corroded beams and columns, cracked and peeling plaster, and blistering paint contributed to the disrepair of the building, which was in close proximity to several other buildings. It was determined that this deterioration could lead to significant structural failure and risk to adjacent buildings and the employees occupying them.

Demolition

Due to the significant structural deterioration, the demolition of Building 470 was recommended in 1999 by NCI engineers. Carol Shearer, the 470 Project Engineer and an expert in dismantling former bioweapons facilities in the former Soviet Union, stated the main concern was not anthrax, but noise and vibration—and most importantly, the disruption of science in the adjoining and adjacent buildings.

After an EIS and period for public comment, the state of Maryland approved removal of the building. The NIH dismantled the building between February and December 2003. Officials did not concern themselves much with possible anthrax contamination, but concentrated rather on asbestos and lead paint.

Urban legends

Residents of Frederick County are familiar with many stories about deaths occurring in Building 470 or as a result of working there. One of the more lurid stories had it that a dead man was sealed within its walls. [1] According to Robert H. Wiltrout, associate director of the NCI-Frederick, the building, although “an anachronism and a throwback,  was  a lightning rod for all of the things that happened at Fort Detrick .

One perennial tale held that because of a massive accident involving deadly biological agents, the government could never be entirely sure that the building was safe to occupy and therefore it was closed and sealed up. [1] It had to be left standing because officials couldn’t be sure the bacteria were truly gone. In fact, a large spill did occur in Building 470 in 1958. A technician, trying to pry open a stuck valve at the bottom of a fermentor, unintentionally released approximately 2,000 gallons of liquid B. anthracis culture. Because of the design of the building and the safety measures in place, it was possible to isolate the spill to one room. There was no contamination of Fort Detrick or the local community, and no one (including the technician) became ill. The outcome of the incident was taken to indicate the effectiveness of the biological safety practices pioneered during the early days of “bioweaponeering” at Fort Detrick.

In the lead up to its demolition, Dr. George Anderson of Southern Research Institute, an internationally recognized expert on B. anthracis, exhaustively reviewed documents on Building 470 and interviewed many of the men, some still residing in Frederick, who had worked in the building. He learned that no one working in Building 470 had died of anthrax, although three workers elsewhere on Fort Detrick had died of infection with agents that were being researched as biological weapons: one, a microbiologist in 1951, and another, an electrician in 1958, died of inhalational anthrax. The third worker died of Bolivian hemorrhagic fever.

See also

* William C. Patrick III
References

1. ^ a b Snyder, David,  Fort Detrick’s Tower of Doom To Come Down , The Washington Post, Sunday, February 9, 2003; Page C01.

External links

* NCI Website on Building 470, with photos

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_470
Categories: Former United States Army facilities | Former United States Army research facilities | Former United States Army medical research facilities | Biological warfare facilities

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_470

***

Pine Bluff Arsenal
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Joint Munitions Command (JMC)
Active     2003 – present
Country     United States
Type     Major Subordinate Command of the United States Army Materiel Command (AMC)
Role     Operate a nationwide network of facilities where conventional ammunition is produced and stored.
Size     Employs 20 military, over 5800 civilians and 8300 contractor personnel
Colors     red, yellow, white, black, blue
Commanders
Current
commander     Brigadier General Larry Wyche

The Pine Bluff Arsenal (PBA) is a US Army installation located in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. PBA is one of the six Army installations in the United States which stores chemical weapons.[1] PBA supplies specialized production, storage, maintenance and distribution of readiness products, and delivers technical services to the Armed Forces and Homeland Security. PBA also designs, manufactures and refurbishes smoke, riot control, and incendiary munitions, as well as chemical/biological defense operations items. It serves as a technology center for illuminating and infrared munitions and is also the only place in the Northern Hemisphere where white phosphorus munitions are filled. Its Homeland Security mission includes first-responder equipment training and surveillance of prepositioned equipment.

Contents

* 1 Capabilities
* 2 History
* 3 Facilities
* 4 References
* 5 External links

Capabilities

Capabilities of the center include: chemical defense and test equipment; individual and collective chemical protection and decontamination systems; chemical materiel surveillance program; machining, fabrication and assembly; specialty ammunition production; less than lethal ammunition production; and quality assurance and joint logistics services.

History

PBA was established in November 1941 for the manufacture of incendiary grenades and bombs. It was originally named the Chemical Warfare Arsenal but was renamed four months later.[2] The mission expanded to include production and storage of pyrotechnic, riot control, and chemical-filled munitions. At the height of World War II, the plant expanded from making magnesium and thermite incendiary munitions to a chemical warfare manufacturing facility as well, producing lethal gases and chemical compounds installed in artillery shells and specifically designed bombs.[3]
In an incident after WWII, several captured German rockets containing mustard agents were accidentally launched into the surrounding countryside.[citation needed]

Biological weapons operations were conducted at PBA from 1953 to 1969;[2] but operations ceased when President Nixon banned biological weapons after public outcry over Agent Orange.[3] Between 1954 and 1967, at least seven different biological agents were produced at the facility. All agents were destroyed between 1971 and 1973.[4]

Pine Bluff Arsenal was also the home for the Binary Chemical Weapons Facility. The facility was to create the two toxic agents – QL and DF – that would combine to form VX as well as build the bombs to deliver the nerve agent. Construction of the facility began in the mid-1980s and was mothballed prior to completion in the early 1990s as part of the chemical weapons treaties.[5][6]

The Associated Press reported a leak in a container of white phosphorus was suspected to have ignited the fire that destroyed a warehouse at the Pine Bluff Arsenal on June 6, 2005. White smoke from the fire was seen as far away as six miles. When the fire was extinguished, approximately 19 hours later, officials reported the fire destroyed more than 7,500 canisters of white phosphorus. In the same article the AP reported.  The Pine Bluff Arsenal is home to 12 percent of the nation’s chemical weapons stockpile, and destruction of nerve and mustard gas weapons began recently. [7][8]

Facilities

PBA is housed on 13,493 acres (54.60 km2; 21.083 sq mi) with 665 buildings, 271 igloos and storage capacity of 2,090,563 square feet (190,000 m2). Additionally, PBA has more than 5,000 acres (20 km2; 7.8 sq mi) of developable land.

References

1. ^ [http://www.cma.army.mil/pinebluff.aspx Summary of PBA from the US Army Chemical Materials Agency website
2. ^ a b Pine Bluff Chemical Activity (PBCA)
3. ^ a b Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture, Pine Bluff Arsenal
4. ^ Larsen, Jeff; Wirtz, James J.; Croddy, Eric. Weapons of Mass Destruction: An Encyclopedia of Worldwide Policy, Technology, and History (2 volume set). ABC-CLIO. ISBN 1851094903, 9781851094905.
5. ^ [http://www.cma.army.mil/fndocumentviewer.aspx?docid=003673283 Pine Bluff Integrated Binary Production Facilities demolition Fact Sheet]
6. ^ Binary Chemical Weapons information at the Army Chemical Material Agency
7. ^ Pine Bluff Arsenal Fact Sheet
8. ^ Leak Suspected Cause in Arkansas Arsenal Fire

External links

PD-icon.svg This article incorporates public domain material from the United States Government document  Joint Munitions Command website .PD-icon.svg This article incorporates public domain material from the United States Government document  Pine Bluff Arsenal website .

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

v • d • e
Army flag.gif United States Army
Portal:United States Army
Leadership
Secretary of the Army A Chief of Staff A Vice Chief of Staff A Sergeant Major of the Army A Active duty Army four-star generals
United States Department of the Army Seal.svg
Components and Commands
Regular Army A Army Reserve A Army National Guard A Active Units
Central A Europe A Pacific A North A South A Forces A Special Ops A Medical A Corps of Engineers A Signal Corps A Ordnance Corps A Chemical Corps A Test & Evaluation A Training & Doctrine A Materiel A Intelligence & Security A Military Police A Criminal Investigation Command A Judge Advocate General A Military District of Washington
Installations
The Pentagon A United States A Germany A Kuwait A Kosovo A South Korea
Training
Basic Training A OCS A BOLC A West Point A MOS
Uniforms and insignia
Uniforms A Awards A Badges A Officer A Warrant A Enlisted A Branch
Equipment
Individual Weapons A Crew-Served Weapons A Vehicles
History and traditions
History A Continental Army A National Army & Army of the United States A United States Army Air Forces A Center of Military History A Institute of Heraldry A Army Band A The Army Goes Rolling Along A Rangers A Flag A Draft A Army service numbers A America’s Army

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Bluff_Arsenal
Categories: United States Army
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Bluff_Arsenal

***

470px-Mississippi-Coast-towns-NOAA.jpg

Location of Horn Island, Mississippi, south of Ocean Springs (center right)

Horn Island (Mississippi)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Location of Horn Island, Mississippi, south of Ocean Springs (center right)

Horn Island is a long, thin barrier island off the Gulf Coast of Mississippi, south of Ocean Springs. It is part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore. Horn Island is several miles long, but less than a mile wide at its widest point. It occupies about 11 square kilometers.

Contents

* 1 Description
* 2 History
* 3 Nearby Islands
* 4 See also
* 5 References

Description

The island, in part, shelters and bounds the Mississippi Sound to its north, and has a long beach on the Gulf of Mexico on its south side. The island is undeveloped, except for a small ranger station mid-island. Part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore, it is a favorite boating destination for those living on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Horn Island has long stretches of sugar-white sand, dunes punctuated with sea oats, tall pines on small groves, and a few inland lagoons. It is home to varied wildlife including alligators, ospreys, pelicans, ducks, tern, herons, and other migratory birds. The Sound and the Gulf host innumerable species of sea life.

History

From 1943 to 1945 Horn Island was closed to all public access and activity for use as a biological weapons testing site by the U.S. Army.[1] After World War II, Ocean Springs, Mississippi artist, Walter Inglis Anderson, spent the years between 1946-1965 drawing and painting the landscapes and life on the island.[1] Many of his works are on display at the Walter Anderson Museum in Ocean Springs.[1]

Nearby Islands
South Side of Horn Island

Horn is not alone in its small island group. Similar nearby islands include Petit Bois Island to the east, and Ship Island and Cat Island to the west. Of the group, Horn Island is the largest.

See also

* Gruinard Island
* Horn Island Testing Station
* Plum Island

References

1. ^ a b c McGinnis, Helen. Hiking Mississippi: A Guide to Trails and Natural Areas, (Google Books), University Press of Mississippi , 1995, pp. 100-03, (ISBN 0878056645).

Coordinates: 30E15?41?N 88E40?52?W? / ?30.26139EN 88.68111EW? / 30.26139; -88.68111
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_Island_(Mississippi)
Categories: Islands of Mississippi | Barrier islands of Mississippi | History of Mississippi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_Island_(Mississippi)

***

300px-Dugway_Proving_Ground.jpg
Dugway Proving Ground testing area encompasses a vast area of the western Utah desert.

Dugway Proving Ground
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dugway Proving Ground (DPG) is a US Army facility located approximately 85 miles (140 km) southwest of Salt Lake City, Utah in southern Tooele County and just north of Juab County. It encompasses 801,505 acres (3,243.576 km², or 1,252.352 sq mi) of the Great Salt Lake Desert and is surrounded on three sides by mountain ranges. It had a resident population of 2,016 persons as of the 2000 census, all of whom lived in the community of Dugway, Utah, at its extreme eastern end.
Dugway Proving Ground testing area encompasses a vast area of the western Utah desert.
The transcontinental Lincoln Highway passed through the present site of the Dugway Proving Ground, the only significant section of the old highway closed to the public. At least one old wooden bridge over a creek still stands.[2]

Contents

* 1 Mission
* 2 History
* 3 U.S. General Accounting Office report
* 4 Alien speculation and Experimental Aircraft Testing
* 5 References
* 6 See Also
* 7 External links

Mission

Dugway’s mission is to test US and Allied biological and chemical weapon defense systems in a secure and isolated environment. DPG also serves as a facility for US Army Reserve and US National Guard maneuver training, and US Air Force flight tests. DPG is controlled by the U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command (ATEC). The area has also been used by US Army Special Forces for training in preparation for deployments to the War in Afghanistan.[1]

History

In 1941, the Chemical Warfare Service (CWS) determined it needed a testing facility more remote than the US Army’s Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland. The CWS surveyed the Western U.S. for a new location to conduct its tests, and, in the spring of 1942, construction of Dugway Proving Ground began.

Testing commenced in the summer of 1942. During World War II, DPG tested toxic agents, flamethrowers, chemical spray systems, biological warfare weapons, antidotes for chemical agents, and protective clothing. In October 1943, DPG established biological warfare facilities at an isolated area within DPG known as the Granite Peak Installation. DPG was slowly phased out after World War II, until becoming inactive in August 1946. The base was reactivated during the Korean War and in 1954 was confirmed as a permanent Department of the Army installation. In October 1958, DPG became home to the U.S. Army Chemical, Biological, and Radiological (CBR) Weapons School, which moved from the U.S. Army Chemical Center, Maryland.

In March 1968, 6,249 sheep died in Skull Valley, an area nearly thirty miles from Dugway’s testing sites. When examined, the sheep were found to have been poisoned by an organophosphate chemical. The sickening of the sheep, known as the Dugway sheep incident, coincided with several open-air tests of the nerve agent VX at Dugway. Local attention focused on the Army, which initially denied that VX had caused the deaths, instead blaming the local use of organophosphate pesticides on crops. Necropsies conducted on the dead sheep later definitively identified the presence of VX. The Army never admitted liability, but did pay the ranchers for their losses. On the official record, the claim was for 4,372  disabled  sheep, of which about 2,150 were either killed outright by the VX exposure or were so critically injured that they needed to be euthanized on-site by veterinarians. Another 1,877 sheep were  temporarily  injured, or showed no signs of injury but were not marketable due to their potential exposure. All of the exposed sheep which survived the initial exposure were eventually euthanized by the ranchers, since even the potential for exposure had rendered the sheep permanently unsalable for either meat or wool.

The incident, coinciding with the birth of the environmental movement and anti-Vietnam War protests, created an uproar in Utah and the international community. The incident also starkly underscored the inherent unpredictability of air-dispersal of chemical warfare agents, as well as the extreme lethality of next-generation persistent nerve agents at even extremely low concentrations.

On September 8, 2004 the Genesis spacecraft crashed into the desert floor of the Dugway Proving Ground[3].

Dugway Proving Ground was also home to the High Resolution Fly’s Eye Cosmic Ray Detector, which discovered the first  Oh-My-God particle .

U.S. General Accounting Office report

The U.S. General Accounting Office issued a report on September 28, 1994, which stated that between 1940 and 1974, DOD and other national security agencies studied  hundreds, perhaps thousands  of weapons tests and experiments involving hazardous substances.

The quote from the study:
“     … Dugway Proving Ground is a military testing facility located approximately 80 miles from Salt Lake City. For several decades, Dugway has been the site of testing for various chemical and biological agents. From 1951 through 1969, hundreds, perhaps thousands of open-air tests using bacteria and viruses that cause disease in human, animals, and plants were conducted at Dugway… It is unknown how many people in the surrounding vicinity were also exposed to potentially harmful agents used in open-air tests at Dugway.[2]     ”

Alien speculation and Experimental Aircraft Testing

Following the public attention drawn to Area 51 in the early 1990s, UFOlogists and conspiracy theorists have suggested that whatever covert operations, if any, may have been underway at that location were subsequently transferred to DPG.[3][4][5][6][7][8]

The Deseret News reported that Dave Rosenfeld, president of Utah UFO Hunters, stated:
“      Numerous UFOs have been seen and reported in the area in and around Dugway…[military aircraft can’t account for] all the unknowns seen in the area. It might be that our star visitors are keeping an eye on Dugway too…[Dugway is] the new area 51. And probably the new military spaceport.[3]     ”

Additionally, the nearby Michael Army Airfield has been called the  new Area 51  by some, with the Dugway Proving Ground serving as a buffer zone, as the Nevada Test Site served for Groom Lake. One frequently rumored test project is the Lockheed Martin X-33.[6]

References

1. ^ Logan, Laura,  Special Forces Prepare For Afghanistan In Utah Desert , CBS Evening News, July 14, 2009.
2. ^  Is Military Research Hazardous to Veterans Health? Lessons Spanning Half A Century  103rd Congress, 2nd Session-S. Prt. 103-97; Staff Report prepared for the committee on veterans’ affairs, December 8, 1994, John D. Rockefeller IV, West Virginia, Chairman.[1]
3. ^ a b Bauman, Joe (November 4 2004).  Is Dugway’s expansion an alien concept? . Deseret Morning News. http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,595102911,00.html.
4. ^ Davidson, Lee (August 1).  Dugway’s size unclear . Deseret Morning News. http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/96302.html.
5. ^ Rothstein, Linda (May 15).  Area 51: The Dreamland Chronicles; book reviews . Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 54 (3): 64. ISSN 0096-3402. http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/96302.html#A.
6. ^ a b Wilson, Jim (June 1997).  The new ‘Area 51.’U.S. Air Force moves its top-secret test site . Popular Mechanics 174 (6): 54. ISSN 0032-4558. http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/96302.html#B.
7. ^ Smith, Christopher (May 23 1997).  Report: Utah Town, Air Force Headed for Close Encounter; Secret Base: Is It Headed For Utah? . Salt Lake Tribune ( ): A1. http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/96302.html#C.
8. ^ Manning, Mary (May 20 1997).  Magazine: Area 51 gear moving to Utah  ([dead link]). Los Vegas Sun. http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/1997/may/20/505914267.html.

* Dugway Proving Ground: Blocks 3000, 3001, 3004, and 3005, Census Tract 1306, Tooele County, Utah United States Census Bureau

See Also

* Tooele Army Depot

External links

* Dugway Proving Ground
* West Desert Test Center
* Article: Is Dugway’s Expansion an Alien Concept?
* Article: Does Utah Have an ‘Area 51′?
* Article: Dugway Expansion a Mystery
* High Resolution Fly’s Eye Experiment
v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugway_Proving_Ground
Categories: United States Army research facilities | Lincoln Highway | Military in Utah | National Register of Historic Places in Utah | Chemical warfare facilities | Biological warfare facilities | Tooele County, Utah

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugway_Proving_Ground

(***(

Project Jefferson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Project Jefferson was a covert U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency program designed to determine if the current anthrax vaccine was effective against genetically-modified bacteria. The program’s legal status under the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention is disputed.

Contents

* 1 Revelation to the public
* 2 Project
* 3 Legality
* 4 References
* 5 Further reading

Revelation to the public

The secret Project Jefferson was revealed to the public in a September 4, 2001 article in The New York Times.[1][2]. Reporters Judith Miller, Stephen Engelberg and William J. Broad collaborated to write the article.[1] It is presumed that the reporters had knowledge of the program for at least several months; shortly after the article appeared they published a book that detailed the story further.[1] The book, Germs: Biological Weapons and America’s Secret War, and the article are the only publicly available sources detailing Project Jefferson and its sister projects, Bacchus and Clear Vision.[1]

Project

Project Jefferson took place in early 2001.[1] Jefferson was designed to reproduce a strain of genetically-modified anthrax isolated by Russian scientists during the 1990s.[3] The goal of the secret project was to determine whether or not the strain was resistant to the commercially available U.S. anthrax vaccine.[3]

Legality

Project Jefferson was operated by the Defense Intelligence Agency and reviewed by lawyers at the Pentagon.[2] Those lawyers determined that Project Jefferson was in line with the international treaty banning the production of bio-weapons, the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).[2] Despite assertions from the Clinton and Bush administrations that the project, and its sisters, were legal, several international legal scholars disagreed.[3]

Troubling was the fact that the clandestine program was omitted from BWC confidence-building measure (CBM) declarations.[3] These measures were introduced to the BWC in 1986 and 1991 to strengthen the treaty, the U.S. had long been a proponent of their value and these tests damaged American credibility.[3] U.S. desire to keep such programs secret was, according to Bush administration officials, a  significant reason  that the the U.S. President rejected a draft agreement signed by 143 nations to strengthen the BWC.[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Enemark, Christian. Disease and Security: Natural Plagues and Biological Weapons in East Asia, (Google Books), Routledge, 2007, pp. 173-75, (ISBN 0415422345).
2. ^ a b c d Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J.  U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits , The New York Times, September 4, 2001, accessed January 6, 2009.
3. ^ a b c d e Tucker, Jonathan B.  Biological Threat Assessment: Is the Cure Worse Than the Disease? , Arms Control Today, October 2004, accessed January 6, 2009.
Further reading

* Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. Germs: Biological Weapons and America’s Secret War, (Google Books), Simon and Schuster, 2002, (ISBN 0684871599).

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Jefferson
Categories: Arms control | Biological warfare | Military projects

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Jefferson

***

Tooele Army Depot
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Coordinates: 40E32?N 112E20?W? / ?40.533EN 112.333EW? / 40.533; -112.333
Joint Munitions Command (JMC)
Active     2003 – present
Country     United States
Type     Major Subordinate Command of the United States Army Materiel Command (AMC)
Role     Operate a nationwide network of facilities where conventional ammunition is produced and stored.
Size     Employs 20 military, over 5800 civilians and 8300 contractor personnel
Colors     red, yellow, white, black, blue
Commanders
Current
commander     Brigadier General Larry Wyche

Tooele Army Depot (TEAD) is a storage site for war reserve and training ammunition. The depot stores, issues, receives, renovates, modifies, maintains and demilitarizes conventional munitions. The depot also serves as the National Inventory Control Point for ammunition peculiar equipment, developing, fabricating, modifying, storing and distributing such equipment to all services and other customers worldwide. TEAD provides base support to Deseret Chemical Depot. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

Tooele Army Depot is a United States Army post located in Tooele County, Utah. It originally opened in 1942 during the early phase of U.S. involvement in World War II. The workforce at the post is now primarily composed of civilians. A full colonel serves as the commander.

Contents

* 1 Capabilities
* 2 History
* 3 Facilities
* 4 BRAC 2005
* 5 Environment
* 6 See also
* 7 External links
* 8 Contact Information

Capabilities

Capabilities of the depot include: engineering; explosives performance testing;; logistical support; machining, fabrication, assembly, repair; robotics; non-destructive testing; demilitarization; laser cutting; and Slurry Emulsion Manufacturing Facility. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

History

Built in 1945, TEAD was originally called the Tooele Ordnance Depot and was a storage depot for war supplies. In 1988, TEAD acquired the general supply storage mission from Pueblo Army Depot. In BRAC 1993, it lost its troop support mission, maintenance and storage missions. TEAD retained its ammunition logistics support function. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

Facilities

TEAD is housed on 23,610 acres with 1,093 buildings, 902 igloos and storage capacity of 2,483,000 square feet. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

BRAC 2005

TEAD will gain the ammunition storage function from Sierra Army Depot, which will be realigning due to Base Realignment and Closure 2005. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

Environment

TEAD was placed on the Environmental Protection Agency’s National Priority List (Superfund) in 1990. Information Provided by the Joint Munitions Command

See also

* Deseret Chemical Depot
* Deseret Test Center
* Dugway Proving Ground
* Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility
* Umatilla Chemical Depot
* Kambarka
* Porton Down
* Edgewood Chemical Activity
* Dzerzhinsk, Russia
* Pine Bluff Arsenal

External links

* Tooele Army Depot website
* Joint Munitions Command website
* Information compiled from [1]
* Pike, John E. Tooele Army Depot (TEAD) Tooele, Utah, accessed November 15, 2008.

Contact Information

Tooele Army Depot, ATTN: SJMTE-CO, Tooele, Utah, 84074-5000, Phone: (435) 833-2693, E-mail: webmaster@conus.army.mil

PD-icon.svg This article incorporates public domain material from the United States Government document  [2] .

v • d • e
Army flag.gif United States Army
Portal:United States Army
Leadership
Secretary of the Army A Chief of Staff A Vice Chief of Staff A Sergeant Major of the Army A Active duty Army four-star generals
United States Department of the Army Seal.svg
Components and Commands
Regular Army A Army Reserve A Army National Guard A Active Units
Central A Europe A Pacific A North A South A Forces A Special Ops A Medical A Corps of Engineers A Signal Corps A Ordnance Corps A Chemical Corps A Test & Evaluation A Training & Doctrine A Materiel A Intelligence & Security A Military Police A Criminal Investigation Command A Judge Advocate General A Military District of Washington
Installations
The Pentagon A United States A Germany A Kuwait A Kosovo A South Korea
Training
Basic Training A OCS A BOLC A West Point A MOS
Uniforms and insignia
Uniforms A Awards A Badges A Officer A Warrant A Enlisted A Branch
Equipment
Individual Weapons A Crew-Served Weapons A Vehicles
History and traditions
History A Continental Army A National Army & Army of the United States A United States Army Air Forces A Center of Military History A Institute of Heraldry A Army Band A The Army Goes Rolling Along A Rangers A Flag A Draft A Army service numbers A America’s Army

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tooele_Army_Depot
Categories: United States Army logistics facilities | 1942 establishments | Tooele County, Utah | Military in Utah | Utah geography stubs | United States Army

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tooele_Army_Depot

***

Ultra-high-energy cosmic ray
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In high-energy physics, an ultra-high-energy cosmic ray (UHECR) or extreme-energy cosmic ray (EECR) is a cosmic ray (subatomic particle) which appears to have extreme kinetic energy, far beyond both its rest mass and energies typical of other cosmic rays. These particles are significant because they have energy comparable to (and sometimes exceeding) the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin limit.

Contents

* 1 Observational history
* 2 Active galactic cores as one possible source of the particles
* 3 Other possible sources of the particles
* 4 Relation with dark matter
o 4.1 Conversion of dark matter into ultra-high-energy particles
o 4.2 Dark matter particles as ultra-high-energy particles
* 5 Pierre Auger Observatory
* 6 Ultra-high-energy cosmic ray observatories
* 7 References
* 8 Further reading
* 9 External links

Observational history

The first observation of a cosmic ray with an energy exceeding 1020 electronvolts was made by John Linsley at the Volcanic Ranch experiment in New Mexico in 1962.[1][2]
Cosmic rays with even higher energies have since been observed. Among them was the Oh-My-God particle (a play on the nickname  God particle  for the Higgs boson) observed on the evening of 15 October 1991 over Dugway Proving Grounds, Utah. Its observation was a shock to astrophysicists, who estimated its energy to be approximately 3 H 1020 electronvolts (50 joules)—in other words, a subatomic particle with macroscopic kinetic energy equal to that of a baseball (142 g or 5 ounces) traveling at 96 km/h (60 mph).

It was most probably a proton with a speed very close to the speed of light. To a static observer, such a proton, traveling at 1 – (5H10-24) times c, would travel only 47 nanometers (5H10-24 light-years) less than a light-year in one year.[3]

Since the first observation, by the University of Utah’s Fly’s Eye Cosmic Ray Detector, at least fifteen similar events have been recorded, confirming the phenomenon. These very high energy cosmic rays are very rare; the energy of most cosmic rays is between 107 eV and 1010 eV.
See also: Cosmic ray observatory

Active galactic cores as one possible source of the particles

The source of such high energy particles has been a mystery for many years. Recent results from the Pierre Auger Observatory show that ultra-high-energy cosmic ray arrival directions appear to be correlated with extragalactic supermassive black holes at the center of nearby galaxies called active galactic nuclei (AGN).[4] Interactions with blue-shifted cosmic microwave background radiation limit the distance that these particles can travel before losing energy; this is known as the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin limit or GZK limit.

AGN have been proposed as likely sources of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, and results from the Pierre Auger Observatory suggest that these objects may be their source. However, since the angular correlation scale is fairly large (3 degrees or more) these results do not unambiguously identify the origins of such cosmic rays. In particular, the AGN may be tracers of the actual sources, which may be found, for example, in galaxies or other astrophysical objects that are clumped with matter on large scales within 100 Mpc.

Additional data collection will be important for further investigating a possible AGN source for these highest energy particles, which might be protons accelerated to those energies by magnetic fields associated with the rapidly growing black holes at the AGN centers. According to a recent study,[5] short-duration AGN flares resulting from the tidal disruption of a star or from a disk instability can be the main source of the observed flux of super GZK cosmic rays.

Some of the supermassive black holes in AGN are known to be rotating, as in the Seyfert galaxy MCG 6-30-15[6] with time-variability in their inner accretion disks.[7] Black hole spin is a potentially effective agent to drive UHECR production,[8] provided ions are suitably launched to circumvent limiting factors deep within the nucleus, notably curvature radiation[9] and inelastic scattering with radiation from the inner disk. Low-luminosity, intermittent Seyfert galaxies may meet the requirements with the formation of a linear accelerator several light years away from the nucleus, yet within their extended ion tori whose UV radiation ensures a supply of ionic contaminants.[10] The corresponding electric fields are commensurably small, on the order of 10 V/cm, whereby the observed UHECRs are indicative for the astronomical size of the source. Improved statistics by the Pierre Auger Observatory will be instrumental in identifying the presently tentative association of UHECRs (from the Local Universe) with Seyferts and LINERs.[11]

Other possible sources of the particles

Other possible sources of the UHECR are:[12]

* radio lobes of powerful radio galaxies
* intergalactic shocks created during the epoch of galaxy formation
* hypernovae
* gamma-ray bursts
* decay products of supermassive particles from topological defects, left over from phase transitions in the early universe
* Particles undergoing the Penrose effect

Relation with dark matter

Main article: Dark matter
Conversion of dark matter into ultra-high-energy particles

It is hypothesized that active galactic nuclei are capable of converting dark matter into high energy protons. Yuri Pavlov and Andrey Grib at the Alexander Friedmann Laboratory for Theoretical Physics at St. Petersburg hypothesize that dark matter particles are about 15 times heavier than protons, and that they can decay into pairs of particles of a type that interacts.

Near an active galactic nucleus, one of these particles can fall into the black hole, while the other escapes, as described by the Penrose process. Some of the particles that escape will collide with incoming particles creating collisions of very high energy. It is in these collisions, according to Pavlov, that ordinary visible protons can form. These protons would have very high energies. Pavlov claims that evidence of this is present in the form of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays.[13]
Dark matter particles as ultra-high-energy particles

High energy cosmic rays traversing intergalactic space suffer the GZK cutoff above 1020 eV due to interactions with cosmic background radiation if the primary cosmic ray particles are protons or nuclei. The Pierre Auger Project, HiRes and Yakutsk Extensive Air Shower Array found the GZK cutoff, while Akeno-AGASA observed the events above the cutoff (11 events in the past 10 years). The result of the Akeno-AGASA experiment is smooth near the GZK cutoff energy. If one assumes that the Akeno-AGASA result is correct and consider its implication, a possible explanation for the AGASA data on GZK cutoff violation would be a shower caused by a dark matter particles. A dark matter particle is not constrained by the GZK cutoff, since it interacts weakly with cosmic background radiation. Recent measurements by the Pierre Auger Project have found a correlation between the direction of high energy cosmic rays and the location of AGN.[14]

Pierre Auger Observatory
Main article: Pierre Auger Observatory

Pierre Auger Observatory is an international cosmic ray observatory designed to detect ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (sub-atomic particles (protons or other nuclei) with energies beyond 1020 electron-volts). These high energy particles have an estimated arrival rate of just 1 per square kilometer per century, therefore, in order to record a large number of these events, the Auger Observatory has created a detection area of 3,000 km² (the size of Rhode Island, USA) in Mendoza Province, western Argentina.

A larger cosmic ray detector array is also planned for the northern hemisphere as part of the Pierre Auger complex.

The Pierre Auger Observatory, in addition to obtaining directional information from the cluster of water tanks used to observe the cosmic ray shower components, also has four telescopes trained on the night sky to observe fluorescence of the Nitrogen molecules as the shower particles traverse the sky, giving further directional information on the original cosmic ray.

Ultra-high-energy cosmic ray observatories
See also: Category:High energy particle telescopes
See also: Cosmic-ray observatory

* AGASA – Akeno Giant Air Shower Array in Japan
* Antarctic Impulse Transient Antenna (ANITA) detects ultra-high-energy cosmic neutrinos believed to be caused by ultra-high-energy cosmic rays
* Extreme Universe Space Observatory
* GRAPES-3 (Gamma Ray Astronomy PeV EnergieS 3rd establishment) is a project for cosmic ray study with air shower detector array and large area muon detectors at Ooty in southern India.
* High Resolution Fly’s Eye Cosmic Ray Detector (HiRes)
* LOPES (telescope) – LOFAR PrototypE Station is located in Karlsruhe, Germany is part of the LOFAR project.
* MARIACHI – Mixed Apparatus for Radar Investigation of Cosmic-rays of High Ionization located on Long Island, USA.
* Pierre Auger Observatory
* Telescope Array Project
* Yakutsk Extensive Air Shower Array

References

1. ^ John Linsley (1963).  Evidence for a Primary Cosmic-Ray Particle with Energy 1020 eV . Physical Review Letters 10: 146. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.10.146. http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v10/i4/p146_1.
2. ^ physics world.com
3. ^ Walker, John (January 4, 1994).  The Oh-My-God Particle . http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/OhMyGodParticle/.
4. ^ The Pierre Auger Collaboration (November 9 2007).  Correlation of the Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays with Nearby Extragalactic Objects . http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/318/5852/938.
5. ^ Glennys R. Farrar and Andrei Gruzinov, Giant AGN Flares and Cosmic Ray Bursts, e-Print archive
6. ^ Tanaka, Y., Nandra, K., Fabian, A.C., et al., 1995, Nature, 375, 659
7. ^ Iwasawa, K., Fabian, A.C., Reynolds, C.S., et al., 1996, MNRAS, 282, 1038
8. ^ Boldt, E., Gosh, P., 1999, MNRAS, 307, 491
9. ^ Levinson, A., 2000, Phys. Rev. Lett., 85, 912
10. ^ van Putten, M.H.P.M., Gupta, A.C., 2009, MNRAS, 394, 2238
11. ^ Moskalenko, I.V., Stawarz, L., Porter, T.A., Cheung, C.-C., 2008, preprint (ArXiv:0805.1260)
12. ^ Lofar – Astronomy
13. ^ e-Print archive – Do Active Galactic Nuclei Convert Dark Matter into Visible Particles?
14. ^ e-Print archive

Further reading

* The Pierre Auger Collaboration (2007).  Correlation of the Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays with Nearby Extragalactic Objects . Science 318 (5852): 938–943. doi:10.1126/science.1151124.
* Clay, Roger; Dawson, Bruce (1997). Cosmic Bullets: High Energy Particles in Astrophysics. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. ISBN 0738201391.  ? A good introduction to ultra-high-energy cosmic rays.
* Elbert, Jerome W.; Sommers, Paul (1995).  In search of a source for the 320 EeV Fly’s Eye cosmic ray . The Astrophysical Journal 441: 151–161. doi:10.1086/175345. ar?iv:astro-ph/9410069.
* Seife, Charles (2000).  Fly’s Eye Spies Highs in Cosmic Rays’ Demise . Science 288 (5469): 1147. doi:10.1126/science.288.5469.1147a.

External links

* The Highest Energy Particle Ever Recorded The details of the event from the official site of the Fly’s Eye detector.
* John Walker’s lively analysis of the 1991 event, published in 1994
* Origin of energetic space particles pinpointed, by Mark Peplow for news@nature.com, published January 13, 2005.

* Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays – (1908) Ritzian relativity in action?

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-energy_cosmic_ray
Categories: Subatomic particles | Particle physics | Astroparticle physics | Cosmic ray

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-energy_cosmic_ray

On September 8, 2004 the Genesis spacecraft crashed into the desert floor of the Dugway Proving Ground[3].

Dugway Proving Ground was also home to the High Resolution Fly’s Eye Cosmic Ray Detector, which discovered the first  Oh-My-God particle .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugway_Proving_Ground

***

Operation Dark Winter
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Operation Dark Winter was the code name for a senior-level bio-terrorist attack simulation conducted on June 22-23, 2001.[1][2][3] It was designed to carry out a mock version of a covert and widespread smallpox attack on the United States. Tara O’Toole and Thomas Inglesby of the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies (CCBS) / Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and Randy Larsen and Mark DeMier of Analytic Services were the principal designers, authors, and controllers of the Dark Winter project.

Dark Winter was focused on evaluating the inadequacies of a national emergency response during the use of a biological weapon against the American populace. The exercise was solely intended to establish preventive measures and response strategies by increasing governmental and public awareness on the magnitude and potential of such a threat posed by biological weapons.

Dark Winter’s simulated scenario involved a localized smallpox attack on Oklahoma City. The simulation was then designed to spiral out of control. This would create a contingency in which the National Security Council struggles to determine both the origin of the attack as well as deal with containing the spreading virus. By not being able to keep pace with the disease’s rate of spread, a new catastrophic contingency emerges in which massive civilian casualties would overwhelm America’s emergency response capabilities.

The disastrous contingencies that would result in the massive loss of civilian life were used to exploit the weaknesses of the U.S. health care infrastructure and its inability to handle such a threat. The contingencies were also meant to address the widespread panic that would emerge and of which would result in mass social breakdown and mob violence. Exploits would also include the many difficulties that the media would face when providing American citizens with the necessary information regarding safety procedures.

Key participants

President     The Hon. Sam Nunn
National Security Advisor     The Hon. David Gergen
Director of Central Intelligence     The Hon. R. James Woolsey
Secretary of Defense     The Hon. John White
Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff     General John Tilelli (USA, Ret.)
Secretary of Health & Human Services     The Hon. Margaret Hamburg
Secretary of State     The Hon. Frank Wisner
Attorney General     The Hon. George Terwilliger
Director, Federal Emergency Management Agency     Mr. Jerome Hauer
Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation     The Hon. William Sessions
Governor of Oklahoma     The Hon. Frank Keating
Press Secretary, Gov. Frank Keating (OK)     Mr. Dan Mahoney
Correspondent, NBC News     Mr. Jim Miklaszewski
Pentagon Producer, CBS News     Ms. Mary Walsh
Reporter, British Broadcasting Corporation     Ms. Sian Edwards
Reporter, The New York Times     Ms. Judith Miller (journalist)
Reporter, Freelance     Mr. Lester Reingold

References

1. ^ O’Leary, N. P. M. (2005).  Bio-terrorism or Avian Influenza: California, The Model State Emergency Health Powers Act, and Protecting Civil Liberties During a Public Health Emergency . California Western Law Review (California Western School of Law) 42 (2): 249-286. ISSN 0008-1639.
2. ^ Chauhan, Sharad S. (2004). Biological Weapons. APH Publishing. pp. 280–282. ISBN 9788176487320.
3. ^ Kunstler, James Howard (2006). The Long Emergency. Grove Press. pp. 175–178. ISBN 9780802142498.

External links

* Dark Winter – Terrorism Information Center
* Operation Dark Winter
* Journal/Issues/Dark Winter PDF
* Dark Winter Research
* Local Response to a National Threat
* Preventing “Dark Winter”
* CNN: Dark Winter and lack of USA Preparedness
* Dark Winter Teaches Bioterror Lessons
* Dark Winter at SourceWatch

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dark_Winter
Categories: Biological warfare

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dark_Winter

***

Vigo Ordnance Plant
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Not to be confused with the nearby Terre Haute Ordnance Depot.

The Vigo Ordnance Plant, also known as the Vigo Chemical Plant or simply Vigo Plant, was a U.S. Army facility built in 1942 to produce conventional weapons. In 1944 it was converted to produced biological agents for the U.S. bio-weapons program. The plant never produced any bio-weapons before the end of World War II but did produce 8000 pounds of an anthrax simulant. The plant was transferred to Pfizer after the war, the company operated it until announcing its closure in 2008.

Contents

* 1 Location
* 2 History
o 2.1 Construction and conversion
o 2.2 Bio-weapons production
o 2.3 Demilitarization
* 3 Pfizer’s ownership
* 4 Russian tour
* 5 See also
* 6 Notes
* 7 External links

Location

The Vigo Ordnance Plant was located on 700 acres (2.8 km2) of a more than 6,000-acre (24 km2) government-owned tract and cost $21 million to build.[1] The facility was constructed in the Honey Creek Township in Vigo County, Indiana.[1] The plant was located near the small community of Vigo, Indiana, about six miles (10 km) south of Terre Haute.[1] The area surrounding the plant was flat, covered with cornfields and dotted by hog farms.[1] The site of the former Vigo Plant is south of Interstate 70 near Highway 41 and Indiana State Highways 150 and 63.[2]

History
Construction and conversion

The U.S. Army Ordnance Corps constructed the Vigo Plant in 1942, prior to the official start of the U.S. biological weapons program.[1] The Vigo Ordnance Plant began producing conventional explosives and munitions on February 18, 1942.[3] The Army decommissioned the factory less than year later,[1] and on June 30, 1943 the plant was transferred to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.[3] Portions of the Vigo Plant were then leased to the Delco Radio Corporation for the manufacture of military electronics equipment.[1] The plant served in this capacity until May 1944.[1]

On May 8, 1944 the Army Special Projects Division (SPD) directed the Vigo Plant to convert its facilities for full-scale biological agent production.[1][3] The plant was converted for biological warfare (BW) use by the H.K. Ferguson Construction Company; they added fermenter tanks, slurry heaters, laboratories and the other necessities of a biological warfare facility.[1] The plant was to be the first U.S. anthrax factory and would be utilized filling a British order for anthrax bombs.[4] In March 1944 the British had placed an order for 500,000 of these bombs which Winston Churchill, remarked, should only be considered a  first installment .[5]

Bio-weapons production

When it was conceived, the initial plan was for the Vigo Plant to be a production facility for anthrax and botulinum toxin.[5] The 1944 order converting the plant to a BW facility directed that it become a factory capable of producing 275,000 boutlin bombs or one million anthrax bombs per month.[3] The core of the Vigo Plant’s BW operation was the anthrax fermenters installed during the renovations in 1944.[1] There were 12 20,000 gallon fermenter tanks at Vigo, the total of 240,000 gallons which made it the largest bacterial mass-production line anywhere in the world at the time.[1]

After U.S. BW scientists worked through the problems presented by trying to mass-produce bombs that were to be filled with a deadly biological agent, the production line was essentially ready to operate.[1] The line would fill the British four pound anthrax bombs[6] with an anthrax slurry and then cluster them into the M26 cluster adapter, to form the M33 cluster bomb.[1] Before production could begin, however, safety testing commenced. The scientific director of the U.S. BW program, Ira Baldwin, selected Walter Nevius, a specialist in pathogen containment, to lead the safety inspections which began when he arrived at Vigo in the summer 1944.[1]

Nevius was considered conscientious, so much so that at one point the Army wanted to replace him; this resulted in Baldwin resigning his position and becoming an  advisor  to the U.S. BW program.[7] The testing regimen that followed extended well into 1945. The first tests ran water through the system, to ensure there were no leaks. A second round of tests were run with an anthrax simulant, Bacillus globigii.[1] The plant was pronounced water-tight by Nevius in April 1945 and trial runs with the simulant began in June.[1]
By the time the plant was ready to produce the simulant the end of World War II was on the horizon. The plant was able to produce about 8,000 pounds of B. globgii before production was halted in October 1945,[3][7] but was never able to produce any BW agents, including anthrax, before the war ended.[4] As October 1945 ended, approximately $800,000 worth of equipment at Vigo was declared surplus.[7] Eighteen boxcars were loaded with caustics, sulfuric acid, bleach, tributyl phosphate and 765,000 explosive detonators and shipped elsewhere for storage.[3][7] Vigo Ordnance plant was placed on  stand-by  in December 1945, in reality, the demilitarization process had already begun.[3]

Demilitarization

The plant remained on standby to produce  highly classified material  and in February 1947 four areas of the plant were declared restricted.[3] On April 30, 1947 demilitarization of the Vigo Plant began; this allowed prospective buyers to inspect the site.[3] Even with the earlier equipment removal, the fermenters remained behind.[7] On December 15, 1947 the Pfizer company executed a 20 year lease agreement with the government to take over the Vigo site.[3][5] The company would begin antibiotic manufacture at Vigo in 1948 but the military continued to liquidate the surrounding land into 1949.[3] That year a 1,500-acre (6.1 km2) tract was acquired by the Bureau of Prisons to be used as agricultural land, other portions of the Vigo property were acquired by various private entities.[3] The BW production facilities at Vigo were eventually replaced by a more modern factory at Pine Bluff Arsenal in 1954.[5]
Pfizer’s ownership

After the lease agreement, and later the sale of the plant,[5] was finalized the company transferred John E. McKeen to the Vigo site in 1948 in preparation for the production of streptomycin.[3] The main objective of Pfizer’s Vigo operation in the years after the war was the production of veterinary antibiotics.[5] The large fermenters were used during the period after the war to produce penicillin but afterwards sat dormant for decades.[4] Of the areas at Vigo not utilized by Pfizer, most were left undisturbed.[4] Adjacent to the old BW buildings the company constructed their own facilities for drug manufacturing.[4]

After operating the Vigo plant since 1948 Pfizer announced in October 2007 that 600 of the plant’s 750 employees would be placed on paid leave.[8] The announcement followed disappointing sales for the plant’s flagship product, an inhaled insulin known as Exubera.[8] Beginning in 1999, Pfizer had invested $300 million in the plant and hired 400 additional employees,[9][10] Pfizer’s Vigo location was declared the sole producer of Exubera.[10] In January 2008 those employees on paid leave were permanently eliminated.[9] The company announced in May 2008 the remaining 140 jobs, occupied making antibiotics Cefobid and Unasyn,[8] at the plant would be eliminated and the plant closed.[9] In November 2008 the company announced the site and its buildings were for sale.[9]

Russian tour

Per a 1994 arms-control agreement between the United States and Russia each nation was permitted to inspect three sites in the other country that it suspected were biological warfare facilities.[11] The Russians chose to tour Pfizer’s main research center in Groton, Connecticut,[4] the Plum Island facilities, including Building 101, and the Vigo Ordnance Plant.[11] The Russians were shown the decrepit military facilities at Vigo, many of which were shuttered, padlocked and in an obvious state of disrepair.[4] When the Russians observed the fermenters, they asserted that it was evidence of a secret, illegal U.S. BW program.[4] Russian reaction to the tours, in general, was not good, and a negative report of their visit followed when they returned to Russia.[4] The report maintained that the facilities could potentially be used for BW.[4]

See also

* Fort Detrick
* Fort Terry
* Granite Peak Installation
* Horn Island Testing Station
* Plum Island Animal Disease Center

Notes

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Regis, Ed. The Biology of Doom: The History of America’s Secret Germ Warfare Project, (Google Books), Macmillan, 2000 pp. 71-74, (ISBN 080505765X).
2. ^  Pfizer Terre Haute Plant on The Market , Inside Indiana Business, November 10, 2008, accessed January 11, 2009.
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m McCormick, Mike. Terre Haute: Queen City of the Wabash, (Google Books), Arcadia Publishing, 2005, pp. 129-130, (ISBN 0738524069).
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Mangold, Tom. Plague Wars: A True Story of Biological Warfare, (Google Books), Macmillan, 1999, pp. 200-208, (ISBN 0312203535).
5. ^ a b c d e f Meselson, Matthew.  Bioterror: What Can Be Done? , The New York Review of Books, Vol. 48, No. 20, December 20, 2001, accessed January 11, 2009.
6. ^ See also: M114 bomb.
7. ^ a b c d e Guillemin, Jeanne. Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism, (Google Books), Columbia University Press, 2005, pp. 71-73, (ISBN 0231129424).
8. ^ a b c Greninger, Howard.  Pfizer resolves contractual issues tied to Exubera, Nektar Therapeutics , Tribune-Star, November 13, 2007, accessed January 11, 2009.
9. ^ a b c d Staff.  Pfizer puts closed Terre Haute plant up for sale , Associated Press via Chicago Tribune, November 10, 2008, accessed January 11, 2009.
10. ^ a b Editorial board.  Pfizer’s track record provides ray of hope on sad day , (Editorial), Tribune-Star, October 18, 2007, accessed January 11, 2009.
11. ^ a b Carroll, Michael. Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Google Books), HarperCollins, 2004, pp. 233-34, (ISBN 0060011416).

External links

* Records of Chemical Plants, National Archives, Records of the Chemical Warfare Service, Guide to Federal Records, accessed January 11, 2009.

v • d • e
United States biological weapons program
Weaponized agents
Anthrax A Botulism A Brucellosis A Q fever A Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B A Rice blast A Tularemia A VEE A Wheat stem rust
Researched agents
AHF A BHF A Bird flu A CHIKV A Dengue fever A EEE A Glanders A Hantavirus A Lassa fever A Melioidosis A Newcastle disease A Plague A Potato blight A Psittacosis A Ricin A RVF A Rinderpest A Smallpox A Typhus A WEE A Yellow fever
Weapons
E120 bomblet A E133 cluster bomb A E14 munition A E23 munition A E48 particulate bomb A E61 bomb A E77 balloon bomb A E86 cluster bomb A E96 cluster bomb A Flettner rotor bomblet A M114 bomb A M115 bomb A M143 bomblet A M33 cluster bomb
Operations and testing
Edgewood Arsenal experiments A Operation Big Buzz A Operation Big Itch A Operation Dark Winter A Operation Dew A Operation Drop Kick A Operation LAC A Operation May Day A Operation Polka Dot A Operation Whitecoat A Project 112 A Project Bacchus A Project Clear Vision A Project Jefferson
Facilities
U.S. Army Biological Warfare Labs A Building 101 A Building 257 A Building 470 A Deseret Test Center A Dugway Proving Ground A Edgewood Arsenal A Fort Detrick A Fort Douglas A Fort Terry A Granite Peak Installation A Horn Island Testing Station A One-Million-Liter Test Sphere A Pine Bluff Arsenal A Rocky Mountain Arsenal A Vigo Ordnance Plant
Related topics
Biological agent A Biological warfare A Entomological warfare A List of topics A U.S. bio-weapons ban A War Bureau of Consultants

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigo_Ordnance_Plant
Categories: Vigo County, Indiana | Biological warfare facilities | Pfizer | Former United States Army facilities | Indiana in WWII

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigo_Ordnance_Plant

***

Building 101

The structure is a 164,000-square-foot (15,200 m2) T-shaped white building.[9] It is situated on Plum Island’s northwest plateau on a 10-acre (40,000 m2) site where it is buttressed by a steep cliff which leads into the ocean.[9] To the east of the building’s site is the old Plum Island Lighthouse.[9]

Construction on Plum Island’s new laboratory Building 101 began around July 1, 1954, around the same time that the Army’s anti-animal bio-warfare (BW) facilities at Fort Terry were transferred to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.[7] Following the transfer the facilities on Plum Island became known as the Plum Island Animal Disease Center.[7] The USDA’s $7.7. million[9] Building 101 laboratory facility was dedicated on September 26, 1956.[7] Prior to the building’s opening the area around it was sprayed with chemicals to deter insect or animal life from approaching the facility.[9] Upon its opening a variety of tests using pathogens and vectors were conducted on animals in the building.[9] Research on biological weapons at PIADC did not cease until the entire program was canceled in 1969 by Richard Nixon.[8]

A modernization program in 1977 aimed to update both Building 101 and another laboratory, Building 257, but the program was canceled in 1979 because of construction contract irregularities.[7] PIADC facilities were essentially unchanged until a new modernization began in 1990.[7] Two-thirds of the laboratory facilities inside Building 101 were renovated and a operations from Building 257 were consolidated into Building 101.[7] Building 257 was closed, and a major expansion, known as Building 100, was completed on Building 101 in 19

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_101#Building_101

Plum Island Animal Disease Center
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Building 101)

Plum Island Animal Disease Center
The Plum Island Animal Disease Center (PIADC) is a United States federal research facility dedicated to the study of animal diseases. It is part of the DHS Directorate for Science and Technology.

Since 1954, the center has had the goal of protecting America’s livestock from animal diseases. During the Cold War a secret biological weapons program targeting livestock was conducted at the site. This program has been the subject of controversies, and the facility has gained a cult status.

Contents

* 1 Location and description
* 2 History
* 3 Diseases studied and outbreaks
* 4 Historical buildings
o 4.1 Building 257
o 4.2 Building 101
* 5 Replacement facility
* 6 Activities
o 6.1 Bio-weapons research
* 7 Controversy and fiction
* 8 References
* 9 External links

Location and description

The center is located on Plum Island, off the northeast coast of Long Island in New York state. During the Spanish-American War, the island was purchased by the government for the construction of Fort Terry, which was later deactivated after World War II and then reactivated in 1952 for the Army Chemical Corps. The center comprises 70 buildings (many of them dilapidated) on 840 acres (3.4 km2).[1][2]

Plum Island has its own fire department, power plant, and water treatment plant.[1][2] Any wild mammal seen on the island is killed on sight.[1] However, as Plum Island was named an important bird area by the New York Audubon Society, it has successfully attracted different birds, Plum Island had placed osprey nests and bluebird boxes throughout the island and will now add kestrel houses.[3]

History

In response to disease outbreaks in Mexico and Canada in 1954, the Army gave the island to the Agriculture Department to establish a research center dedicated to the study of foot and mouth disease in cattle.[1]

The island was opened to news media for the first time in 1992.[2] In 1995, the Department of Agriculture was issued a $111,000 fine for storing hazardous chemicals on the island.[2]
Local Long Island activists prevented the center from expanding to include diseases that affect humans in 2000, which would require a Biosafety Level 4 designation; in 2002, Congress again considered the plan.[1]

The Wall Street Journal reported in January 2002 that many scientists and government officials wanted the lab to close, believing that the threat of foot and mouth disease was so remote that the center did not merit its $16.5 million annual budget.[1] In 2002, the Plum Island Animal Disease Center was transferred from the United States Department of Agriculture to the United States Department of Homeland Security.

In 2003, a whistleblower who voiced concerns about safety at the facility was fired by the contractor he worked for. He had discussed his concerns with aides to Senator Hillary Clinton.[4] A National Labor Relations Board judge found that the contractor, North Fork Services, had discriminated against the whistleblower.[4]

Diseases studied and outbreaks

As a diagnostic facility, PIADC scientists study more than 40 foreign animal diseases and several domestic diseases, including hog cholera and African swine fever.[1] PIADC runs about 30,000 diagnostic tests each year. PIADC operates Biosafety Level 3 Agriculture (BSL-3Ag), BSL-3 and BSL-2 laboratory facilities. The facility’s research program includes developing diagnostic tools and preventatives (such as vaccines) for foot-and-mouth disease and other diseases of livestock.[1]

Plum Island’s freezers also contain samples of polio and diseases that can be transferred from animals to humans.[1] In 1991, the center’s freezers were threatened following a power outage caused by a hurricane.[1]

Because Congressional law stipulates that live foot-and-mouth disease virus cannot be studied on the mainland, PIADC is unique in that it is currently the only laboratory in the U.S. equipped with research facilities that permit the study of foot-and-mouth disease[5].

Foot-and-mouth disease is extremely contagious among cloven-hoofed animals, and people who have come in contact with it can carry it to animals.[4] Accidental outbreaks of the virus have caused catastrophic livestock and economic losses in many countries throughout the world. Plum Island has experienced outbreaks of its own, including one in 1978 in which the disease was released to animals outside the center, and two incidents in 2004 in which foot and mouth disease was released within the center.[4] Foot-and-mouth disease was eradicated from the U.S. in 1929 (with the exception of the stocks within the Plum Island center)[1] but is currently endemic to many parts of the world.

In response to the two 2004 incidents, New York Senator Hillary Clinton and Congressman Tim Bishop wrote a letter to the Department of Homeland Security regarding their concerns about the center’s safety:  We urge you to immediately investigate these alarming breaches at the highest levels, and to keep us apprised of all developments. [4]
Lab 257, a book by Michael C. Carroll, Ph.D., has alleged a connection between Plum Island Animal Disease Center the outbreaks of three infectious diseases: West Nile virus in 1999, Lyme disease in 1975, and Dutch duck plague in 1967.[6]

Historical buildings

Building 257
Main article: Building 257

Building 257 located at Fort Terry was completed around 1911. The original purpose of the building was to store weapons, such as mines, and the structure was designated the Combined Torpedo Storehouse and Cable Tanks building.[7] Fort Terry went through a period of activations and deactivations through World War II until the U.S. Army Chemical Corps took over the facility in 1952 for use in anti-animal biological warfare (BW) research. The conversion of Fort Terry to a BW facility required the remodeling of Building 257 and other structures.[8] As work neared completion on the lab and other facilities in the spring of 1954 the mission of Fort Terry changed.[9] Construction was completed on the facilities on May 26, 1954, but the Fort Terry was officially transferred to the USDA on July 1, 1954. At the time scientists from the Bureau of Animal Industry were already working in Building 257.[7]

Building 101

The structure is a 164,000-square-foot (15,200 m2) T-shaped white building.[9] It is situated on Plum Island’s northwest plateau on a 10-acre (40,000 m2) site where it is buttressed by a steep cliff which leads into the ocean.[9] To the east of the building’s site is the old Plum Island Lighthouse.[9]

Construction on Plum Island’s new laboratory Building 101 began around July 1, 1954, around the same time that the Army’s anti-animal bio-warfare (BW) facilities at Fort Terry were transferred to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.[7] Following the transfer the facilities on Plum Island became known as the Plum Island Animal Disease Center.[7] The USDA’s $7.7. million[9] Building 101 laboratory facility was dedicated on September 26, 1956.[7] Prior to the building’s opening the area around it was sprayed with chemicals to deter insect or animal life from approaching the facility.[9] Upon its opening a variety of tests using pathogens and vectors were conducted on animals in the building.[9] Research on biological weapons at PIADC did not cease until the entire program was canceled in 1969 by Richard Nixon.[8]

A modernization program in 1977 aimed to update both Building 101 and another laboratory, Building 257, but the program was canceled in 1979 because of construction contract irregularities.[7] PIADC facilities were essentially unchanged until a new modernization began in 1990.[7] Two-thirds of the laboratory facilities inside Building 101 were renovated and a operations from Building 257 were consolidated into Building 101.[7] Building 257 was closed, and a major expansion, known as Building 100, was completed on Building 101 in 1995.[7]

Replacement facility

A modernization program in 1977 aimed to update both Building 101 and another laboratory, Building 257, but the program was canceled in 1979 because of construction contract irregularities. Plum Island facilities were essentially unchanged until a new modernization began in 1990. Two-thirds of the laboratory facilities inside Building 101 were renovated and a operations from Building 257 were consolidated into Building 101.[7] Building 257 was closed, and a major expansion, known as Building 100, was completed on Building 101 in 1995.[7] According to the Department of Homeland Security, Building 257 currently poses no health hazard.[10]

On September 11, 2005, the United States Department of Homeland Security announced that the Plum Island Animal Disease Research Center will be replaced by a new federal facility. The location of the new high-security animal disease lab, to be called the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF), has been recommended to be built in Manhattan, Kansas[11]. However, this plan has been called into question by a recent GAO study which states that claims by the DHS that the work performed on Plum Island can be performed safely on the mainland is not supported by evidence [12].

Activities

PIADC’s mission can be grouped into three main categories: diagnosis, research, and education.[citation needed]

Since 1971, PIADC has been educating veterinarians in foreign animal diseases. The center hosts several Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic schools each year to train federal and state veterinarians and laboratory diagnostic staff, military veterinarians and veterinary school faculty.

At PIADC, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) work together; DHS’ Targeted Advanced Development unit partners with USDA, academia and industry scientists to deliver vaccines and antivirals to the USDA for licensure and inclusion in the USDA National Veterinary Vaccine Stockpile.[citation needed]

USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) performs basic and applied research to better formulate countermeasures against foreign animal diseases, including strategies for prevention, control and recovery. ARS focuses on developing faster-acting vaccines and antivirals to be used during outbreaks to limit or stop transmission. Antivirals prevent infection while vaccine immunity develops. The principal diseases studied are foot-and-mouth disease, classical swine fever, and vesicular stomatitis virus.

USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services (APHIS) operates the Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory, an internationally recognized[citation needed] facility performing diagnostic testing of samples collected from U.S. livestock. APHIS also tests animals and animal products being imported into the U.S. APHIS maintains the North American Foot and Mouth Disease Vaccine Bank at PIADC and hosts the Foreign Animal Disease Diagnosticians training program, offering several classes per year to train veterinarians to recognize foreign animal diseases.

Research on biological weapons at PIADC did not cease until the entire program was canceled in 1969 by Richard Nixon.[8]

Bio-weapons research
The original anti-animal BW mission was  to establish and pursue a program of research and development of certain anti-animal (BW) agents .[13] By August 1954 animals occupied holding areas at Plum Island and research was ongoing within Building 257.[9] The USDA facility, known as the Plum Island Animal Disease Center, continued work on biological warfare research until the U.S. program was ended by Richard Nixon in 1969.[8] The bio-weapons research at Building 257 and Fort Terry was shrouded in aura of mystery and secrecy.[10][14] The existence of biological warfare experiments on Plum Island was denied for several decades by the U.S. government. In 1993 Newsday unearthed documents proving otherwise.[14]

Controversy and fiction

The number of building  257  is a moniker for the entire site in 2004 when Michael Carroll, an attorney, published Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory.[15] Many of the assertions and accusations made in the book are counter to the government’s position and have been criticized and challenged.[10][16] The review in Army Chemical Review concluded  Lab 257 would be cautiously valuable to someone writing a history of Plum Island, but is otherwise an example of fringe literature with a portrayal of almost every form of novelist style. The author has unfortunately wasted an opportunity to write a credible history. [16] The book advances the idea that Lyme disease originated at Plum Island and conjectures several means by which animal diseases could have left the island. David Weld, the executive director of the American Lyme Disease Foundation, commented that  I personally just don’t think that has any merit. [10]

The testing facility at Plum Island also is the subject of a novel, The Poison Plum, by author Les Roberts,[17] and one entitled Plum Island, by Nelson DeMille. DeMille has said,  How could anthrax not be studied there? Every animal has it.  His novel portrays the island as the scene of an incubator for germ warfare.[1]

The center was also mentioned in the movie Silence of the Lambs as a place used by the FBI agents in the film who claimed Dr Hannibal Lecter would be transferred to if he helped in locating a serial killer who had abducted the daughter of a US Senator. Lecter referred to it as  Anthrax Island.

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l  Bioterrorism Fears Revifunky chicken   ve Waning Interest In Agricultural Disease Lab on Plum Island . The Wall Street Journal. 2002-01-08. http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/bioterrorismplumisland.html. Retrieved 2008-05-17.
2. ^ a b c d  Long Island Lab May Do Studies Of Bioterrorism . The New York Times. 1999-09-22. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D02EED7163FF931A1575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2. Retrieved 2008-05-18.
3. ^  About Plum Island Animal Disease Center . Department of Homeland Security. 2008-12-28. http://www.dhs.gov/xres/labs/editorial_0902.shtm. Retrieved 2008-08-04.
4. ^ a b c d e  Plum Island Reports Disease Outbreak . The New York Times. 2004-08-22. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E1D6113FF931A1575BC0A9629C8B63. Retrieved 2008-05-17.
5. ^ U.S. General Accounting Office. HIGH-CONTAINMENT BIOSAFETY LABORATORIES: DHS Lacks Evidence to Conclude That Foot-and-Mouth Disease Research Can Be Done Safely on the U.S. Mainland. GAO-08-821T. 22 May, 2008. Page 1.
6. ^ http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E03E6DF133DF931A15751C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k  1669-2003: A Partial History of Plum Island , United States Animal Health Association Newsletter, Vol. 30, No. 4, October 2003, pp. 5, 26, accessed January 10, 2009.
8. ^ a b c d Cella, Alexandra.  An Overview of Plum Island: History, Research and Effects on Long Island , Long Island Historical Journal, Fall 2003/Spring 2004, Vol. 16, Nos. 1 and 2, pp. 176-181 (194-199 in PDF), accessed January 10, 2009.
9. ^ a b c d e f g h Carroll, Michael C. Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Google Books), HarperCollins, 2004, pp. 45-48 and p. 60, (ISBN 0060011416).
10. ^ a b c d Dunn, Adam.  The mysterious lab off New York’s shore , CNN.com, April 2, 2004, accessed January 10, 2009.
11. ^ http://www.dhs.gov/xnews/releases/pr_1232132671186.shtm
12. ^ http://www.newsday.com/long-island/study-spurs-request-to-not-phase-out-plum-island-1.1341825
13. ^ Wheelis, Mark, et al. Deadly Cultures: Biological Weapons Since 1945, (Google Books), Harvard University Press, 2006 p. 225-228, (ISBN 0674016998).
14. ^ a b Lambert, Bruce.  Closely Guarded Secrets: Some Islands You Can’t Get to Visit , The New York Times, May 17, 1998, accessed January 10, 2009.
15. ^ Bleyer, Bill.  Plum Island Animal Disease Center , from Newsday, via The Baltimore Sun, April 26, 2004, accessed January 10, 2009.
16. ^ a b Kirby, Reid.  Book Reviews , Army Chemical Review, January-June 2005, accessed January 10, 2009.
17. ^  The Poison Plum . Les Roberts. http://www.poisonplum.com/. Retrieved 2008-05-17.

External links

* Official website
* PIADC site
* The Plum Island Animal Disease Laboratory hosted by the UNT Government Documents Department
* CNN.com  The mysterious lab off New York’s shore  Friday, April 2, 2004 by Adam Dunn
* NBDF Information

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plum_Island_Animal_Disease_Center#Building_101
Categories: United States Department of Homeland Security | Plum Island (New York) | United States Department of Agriculture

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_101#Building_101

180px-Plum_Island_Animal_Disease_Center.jpg

***

Pfizer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fizer  redirects here. For the American professional basketball player, see Marcus Fizer.
Pfizer, Inc. Pfizer logo.svg
Type     Public (NYSE: PFE)
Founded     Brooklyn, NY, USA (1849)
Headquarters     Flag of the United States New York City, NY, USA
Key people     Jeff Kindler, CEO
David Shedlarz, VC
Ian Read, Pres. of Pharma.
Martin Mackay, Pres. of R&D
Amy Schulman, GC
Industry     Health Care
Products     Accupril
Lipitor
Viagra
See complete products listing.
Revenue     $48.296 billion USD (2008), ? 1% from 2007
Net income     $8.104 billion USD (2008), ? 1% from 2007[1]
Employees     86,600 (2008)[2]
Website     http://www.pfizer.com

Pfizer Incorporated (NYSE: PFE) is a pharmaceutical company, ranking number one in sales in the world. The company is based in New York City, with its research headquarters in Groton, Connecticut. It produces Lipitor (atorvastatin, used to lower blood cholesterol); the neuropathic pain/fibromyalgia drug Lyrica (pregabalin); the oral antifungal medication Diflucan (fluconazole), antibiotic Zithromax (azithromycin), Viagra (sildenafil citrate), and the anti inflammatory Celebrex (celecoxib) (also known as Celebra in some countries outside USA and Canada, mainly in South America).

Pfizer’s shares were made a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average on April 8, 2004.

Pfizer pleaded guilty in 2009 to the largest health care fraud in U.S. history and received the largest criminal penalty ever levied for illegal marketing of four of its drugs. Called a repeat offender, this was Pfizer’s fourth such settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in the last ten years.[3][4]
On January 26, 2009, Pfizer agreed to buy pharmaceutical giant Wyeth for US$68 billion, a deal financed with cash, shares and loans.[5]

Contents

* 1 History
* 2 Corporate structure
o 2.1 Warner-Lambert / Parke-Davis / Agouron
o 2.2 Pharmacia / Upjohn / Searle
o 2.3 SUGEN
o 2.4 Wyeth
+ 2.4.1 Critics of the merger
o 2.5 Development of torcetrapib
o 2.6 Pharmaceuticals
o 2.7 Animal health brands
* 3 Legislation and litigation
o 3.1 Kelo case
o 3.2 Quigley Co.
o 3.3 Bjork-Shiley heart valve
o 3.4 Tort reform legislation contributions
o 3.5 Off-label promotional practices
+ 3.5.1 Record fine in 2009 fraudulent promotion and bribery case
o 3.6 Nigeria
* 4 Research and development
* 5 Environmental record
* 6 Employment and diversity
* 7 AIDS involvement
o 7.1 AIDS drugs manufactured by Pfizer
* 8 See also
* 9 Notes and references
* 10 External links

History

Pfizer is named after German-American cousins Charles Pfizer and Charles Erhardt (they were originally from Ludwigsburg, Germany) who launched a fine chemicals business, Charles Pfizer and Company, from a building at the intersection of Harrison Avenue and Bartlett Street[6] in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in 1849. There, they produced an antiparasitic called santonin. This was an immediate success, although it was the production of citric acid that really kick-started Pfizer’s growth in the 1880s. Pfizer continued to buy property to expand its lab and factory on the block bounded by Bartlett Street; Harrison Avenue; Gerry Street; and Flushing Avenue. That facility was used by Pfizer until 2005, when Pfizer closed its original plant along with several others. Pfizer established its original administrative headquarters at 81 Maiden Lane in Manhattan[6]. By 1906, sales totaled nearly $3 million.

World War I caused a shortage of calcium citrate that Pfizer imported from Italy for the manufacture of citric acid, and the company began a search for an alternative supply. Pfizer chemists learned of a fungus that ferments sugar to citric acid and were able to commercialize production of citric acid from this source in 1919. As a result Pfizer developed expertise in fermentation technology. These skills were applied to the mass production of penicillin during World War II, in response to a need from the U.S. government. The antibiotic was needed to treat injured Allied soldiers. In fact, most of the penicillin that went ashore with the troops on D-Day was made by Pfizer.

Following the success of penicillin production in the 1940s, penicillin became very inexpensive and Pfizer made very little profit for its efforts. As a result, in the late 1940s Pfizer decided to search for new antibiotics with greater profit potential. The discovery and commercialization of Terramycin (oxytetracycline) by Pfizer in 1950 moved the company on the path of change from a manufacturer of fine chemicals to a research-based pharmaceutical company. To augment its research in fermentation technology, Pfizer began a program to discover drugs through chemical synthesis. Pfizer also established an animal health division in 1959 with an 700-acre farm and research facility in Terre Haute, Indiana.

By the 1950s, Pfizer was established in Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Cuba, Iran, Mexico, Panama, Puerto Rico, Turkey and the United Kingdom. In 1960, the Company moved its medical research laboratory operations to a new facility in Groton, Connecticut. In 1980 Pfizer launched Feldene (piroxicam), a prescription anti-inflammatory medication that became Pfizer’s first product to reach a total of a billion United States dollars in sales.

During the 1980s and 1990s Pfizer underwent a period of growth sustained by the discovery and marketing of Zoloft, Lipitor, Norvasc, Zithromax, Aricept, Diflucan, and Viagra. Pfizer has recently grown by mergers, including those with Warner-Lambert (2000), with Pharmacia (2003), and an agreement to merge with Wyeth (2009).

Corporate structure
Pfizer world headquarters

Current members of the board of directors of Pfizer are: Michael S. Brown, M. Anthony Burns, Robert Burt, Don Cornwell, William H. Gray, Constance Horner, William R. Howell, Stanley Ikenberry, Jeff Kindler (chairman), George Lorch, Dana Mead, Ruth J. Simmons, and William Steere.

* Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairman of the Board: Jeff Kindler
* Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President: Frank A. D’Amelio
* Vice Chairman: David L. Shedlarz
* Strategy and Business Development and Senior Vice President: William R. Ringo Jr.
* General Counsel, Corporate Secretary and Senior Vice President: Amy W. Schulman
* Chief Communications Officer and Senior Vice President: Sally Susman
* President of Worldwide Pharmaceutical Operations and Senior Vice President: Ian Read
* President of Global R&D and Senior Vice President: Martin Mackay
* Senior Vice President and President – Pfizer Global Manufacturing: Natale S. Ricciardi
* Senior Vice President – Worldwide Human Resources: Mary S. McLeod
* Regional President of U.S., Oncology Business Unit: Elizabeth Barrett
* 2007 Pharmacist of the Year: Mike Militello, Pharm.D., BCPS

Pfizer has four divisions: Human Health ($44.28B in 2005 sales), Consumer Healthcare ($3.87B in 2005 sales), Animal Health ($2.2B in 2005 sales), and Corporate Groups (which includes legal, finance, and HR). On June 26, 2006, Pfizer announced that it would sell its Consumer Healthcare unit (manufacturer of Listerine, Nicorette, Visine, Sudafed and Neosporin) to Johnson & Johnson for $16.6B.[7]

Warner-Lambert / Parke-Davis / Agouron

In 2000, Pfizer merged with Warner-Lambert and acquired full rights to Lipitor (atorvastatin), which was previously jointly marketed by Warner-Lambert and Pfizer. Warner-Lambert was based in Morris Plains, New Jersey, where former headquarters became a major base of operations for Pfizer. The majority of the facility, and Pfizer’s consumer healthcare department, was sold to Johnson and Johnson in 2006 for $16.6 billion.

Parke-Davis was acquired by Warner-Lambert in 1970, which in turn was merged into Pfizer in 2000. The headquarters of Parke-Davis was sold several years ago. Pfizer sold the near-174-acre Parke-Davis research complex in Ann Arbor, Michigan to the University of Michigan in 2008 for $108 million. It would ‘accelerate the expansion’ of the university’s research activities.[8] Some renovations would be needed’ and create 2,000 new research jobs, the university said.

Agouron Pharmaceuticals was acquired by Warner Lambert in 1999 and is now a subsidiary of Pfizer. Nelfinavir (Viracept), an antiretroviral drug used in the treatment of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), was developed by Agouron Pharmaceuticals as part of a joint venture with Japan Tobacco, Inc.

Pharmacia / Upjohn / Searle

Searle was founded in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1888. The founder was Gideon Daniel Searle. In 1908, the company was incorporated in Chicago. In 1941, the company established headquarters in Skokie, Illinois. It was acquired by the Monsanto Company, headquartered in St. Louis, in 1985.

The Upjohn Company was a pharmaceutical manufacturing firm founded in 1886 in Kalamazoo, Michigan by Dr. William E. Upjohn, an 1875 graduate of the University of Michigan medical school. The company was originally formed to make friable pills, which were specifically designed to be easily digested.
In 1995, Upjohn merged with Pharmacia, to form Pharmacia & Upjohn. Pharmacia was created in April 2000 through the merger of Pharmacia & Upjohn with the Monsanto Company and its G.D. Searle unit. The merged company was based in Peapack, New Jersey. The agricultural division was spun off from Pharmacia, as Monsanto, in preparation for the close of the acquisition by Pfizer.

In 2002, Pfizer merged with Pharmacia. The merger was again driven in part by the desire to acquire full rights to a product, this time Celebrex (celecoxib), the COX-2 selective inhibitor previously jointly marketed by Searle (acquired by Pharmacia) and Pfizer. In the ensuing years, Pfizer commenced with a massive restructuring resulting in numerous site closures and loss of jobs including: Terre Haute, IN; Holland, MI; Groton, CT; Brooklyn, NY; Sandwich, UK and Puerto Rico.

In 2008, Pfizer announced 275 job cuts at the Kalamazoo manufacturing facility. Kalamazoo was previously the world headquarters for the Upjohn Company.

SUGEN

SUGEN, customarily written with capital letters, was founded in 1991 in Redwood City, California, as a partnership between the laboratories of Joseph Schlessinger at New York University Medical School and Axel Ullrich at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry, with Steven Evans-Freke as a third co-founder. The name, SUGEN, is derived from combining the first  S  in Schlessinger followed by the  U  in Ullrich with  GEN  – a commonly used suffix by biotech companies (short for  GENetics  or  GENesis ). The focus of the enterprise was to develop drugs targeting intracellular signaling pathways to treat cancer. Specifically, the company sought to discover competitive ATP small-molecule kinase inhibitors which block common cancer pathways. Pharmacia acquired SUGEN in 1999, which merged with the pharmaceutical division of Monsanto Company in 2000 and was purchased by Pfizer in 2003. In 1999, Pharmacia advanced two of SUGEN’s lead compounds into clinical trials for colon cancer: SU5416 (Semaxanib) and SU6668; the trials were discontinued but a third and closely related compound named SU11248 was pursued. SUGEN’s laboratories were closed in 2003 as part of the reorganization following Pfizer’s purchase of Pharmacia. From the acquisition, SUGEN compounds SU11248 and SU14813 entered Pfizer’s pipeline.[9][10] In January 2006, SU11248 was approved by the FDA for treatment of GIST and RCC, and it is now marketed as Sutent (sunitinib). Sutent is packed by Plant in Ascoli Piceno, Italy.

Wyeth

On 26 January 2009, after more than a year of talks between the two companies, Pfizer agreed to buy pharmaceuticals rival Wyeth for a combined US$68 billion in cash, shares and loans, including some US$22.5 billion lent by five major Wall Street banks. This deal would cement Pfizer’s place as the largest pharmaceutical company in the world, with the merged company generating over US$20 billion in cash each year, and represents the largest corporate merger since AT&T and BellSouth’s US$70 billion deal in March 2006.[11] Wyeth’s management team is expected to depart following the merger. The combined company could save US$4 billion annually through the streamlining of operations; however, as part of the deal, both companies must repatriate billions of dollars in revenue from foreign sources to the United States, which will result in higher tax costs.

Critics of the merger

The merger received a vast array of criticism. Harvard Business School’s Gary Pisano told the WSJ:
The record of big mergers and acquisitions in Big Pharma has just not been good. There’s just been an enormous amount of shareholder wealth destroyed. [12]

The Warner-Lambert and Pharmacia mergers do not appear to have achieved gains for shareholders so it is unclear who will benefit from the Wyeth-Pfizer merger to many critics.

Development of torcetrapib

Development of torcetrapib, a drug that increases production of HDL, or  good cholesterol , which reduces LDL thought to be correlated to heart disease, was cancelled in December 2006. During a Phase III clinical trial involving 15,000 patients there were more deaths than expected in the group that took the medicine, and a 60% increase in deaths was seen among patients taking torcetrapib plus Lipitor versus Lipitor alone. There was no suggestion these results called into question the safety of Lipitor. Pfizer lost nearly $1 billion invested developing the failed drug, and the market value of the company plummeted in the aftermath.[13][14][15]

Pharmaceuticals

The following is a list of key prescription pharmaceutical products. The names shown are all registered trademarks of Pfizer Inc.[16]

* Accupril (quinapril) for hypertension treatment.
* Aricept (donepezil) for Alzheimer’s disease.
* Aromasin (exemestane) for the prevension of breast cancer and the prevension of osteoporosis and menopause for women.
* Bextra (Valdecoxib) for arthritis.
* Ben-Gay a sports cream co marketed by Johnson and Johnson, and McNeil Laboratories.
* Caduet (amlodipine) and (atorvastatin) for cholesterol and hypertension.
* Camptosar (irinotecan) for cancer and Chemotherapeutic agents.
* Celebrex (celecoxib) for arthritis.
* Chantix (Varenicline) for Nicotinic agonists, and anti nicotine drugs.
* Cefobid a cephalosporin antibiotic.
* Depo-Medrol (methylprednisolone) for asthma.
* Solu-Medrol (methylprednisolone) for asthma.
* Depo Provera for birth control.
* Detrol, and Detrol LA (tolterodine), for bladder control problems.
* Diflucan (fluconazole) for antifungal drug.
* Ellence (epirubicin) for cancer and chemotherapy drug.
* Eraxis (anidulafungin) for antifungal drug.
* Exubera (inhalable insulin) for diabetes, and insulin therapies.
* Flagyl (metronidazole) for bacterial and protozoal infections.
* Genotropin (Growth hormone) for N/A.
* Geodon (ziprasidone) for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
* Inspra (eplerenone) for diuretics.
* Lipitor (atorvastatin) for cholesterol.
* Lyrica (pregabalin) for neuropathic pain.
* Macugen (pegaptanib) for N/A
* Norvasc (amlodipine) for hypertension
* Neurontin (gabapentin) for neuropathic pain.
* Rebif (interferon beta-1a) for Multiple Sclerosis
* Relpax (eletriptan) for including the sulfonamide group of migrane .
* Rescriptor (delavirdine) for HIV.
* Selzentry (maraviroc) for HIV.
* Somavert (pegvisomant) for Acromegaly.
* Sutent (sunitinib) for cancer and chemotherapy drug.
* Spiriva (tiotropium) for asthma.
* Tikosyn (dofetilide) for atrial fibrillation and flutter.
* Vfend (voriconazole) for antifungal drug.
* Viagra sildenafil for erectile dysfunction.
* Viracept (nelfinavir) for AIDS.
* Xalatan (latanoprost) for glaucoma
* Xalacom latanoprost and timolol Medication for glaucoma.
* Xanax and Xanax XR (alprazolam) for anxiety and panic disorders.
* Zoloft (sertraline) for an antidepressant.
* Zyrtec (cetirizine) for allergies.
* Zyvox (linezolid) for antibiotics.

Animal health brands

The following is a partial list of Animal Health brands manufactured by Pfizer:

* Bovi-Shield Gold
* Cerenia
* Convenia
* Dectomax
* Draxxin
* Excede
* Excenel
* Inovocox
* Mycitracin
* Pirsue
* A180
* Revolution Pet Medicine
* Rimadyl
* Simplicef
* Slentrol
* Solitude IGR
* Spectramast
* Stellamune
* Stronghold

Legislation and litigation
Pfizer is party to a number of suits stemming from companies it has acquired or merged with, including asbestos litigation as well as litigation stemming from its medicinal products.

Kelo case

Pfizer’s interest in obtaining property in New London, Connecticut for expanded facilities led to the Kelo v. New London case before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Quigley Co.

Pfizer acquired Quigley in 1968, and the division sold asbestos-containing insulation products until the early 1970s.[17] Asbestos victims and Pfizer have been negotiating a settlement deal which calls for Pfizer to pay $430 million to 80 percent of existing plaintiffs. It will also place an additional $535 million into an asbestos settlement trust that will compensate future plaintiffs as well as the remaining 20 percent of current plaintiffs with claims against Pfizer and Quigley. The compensation deal is worth $965 million all up.Of that $535 million, $405 million is in a 40-year note from Pfizer, while $100 million will come from insurance policies.

Bjork-Shiley heart valve

Pfizer purchased Shiley in 1979 at the onset of its Convexo-Concave valve ordeal, involving the Bjork-Shiley heart valve. Approximately 500 people died when defective valves failed and, in 1994, the United States ruled against Pfizer for ~$200 million.[1]

Tort reform legislation contributions

Pfizer proposed a ban on all lawsuits against manufacturers of body implant parts which was proposed in the United States Congress as part of tort reform legislation.[citation needed]

Off-label promotional practices

Access to pharmaceutical industry documents has revealed marketing strategies used to promote Neurontin for off-label use.[18] In 1993, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved gabapentin (Neurontin, Pfizer) only for treatment of seizures. Warner-Lambert, which merged with Pfizer in 2000, used activities not usually associated with sales promotion, including continuing medical education and research, sponsored articles about the drug for the medical literature, and alleged suppression of unfavorable study results, to promote gabapentin. Within 5 years the drug was being widely used for the off-label treatment of pain and psychiatric conditions. In 2004, Warner-Lambert admitted to charges that it violated FDA regulations by promoting the drug for pain, psychiatric conditions, migraine, and other unapproved uses, and paid $430 million to resolve criminal and civil health care liability charges.[19][20] Today it is a mainstay drug for migraines, even though it was not approved for such use in 2004.[21]

Record fine in 2009 fraudulent promotion and bribery case

Pfizer in 2009 agreed to pay $2.3 billion to settle civil and criminal allegations that it had illegally marketed four drugs: Bextra, Geodon, Zyvox, and Lyrica  with the intent to defraud or mislead  by promoting the drugs for non-approved uses; this marks Pfizer’s fourth such settlement in the previous decade. Pharmacia and Upjohn, a Pfizer subsidiary, agreed to plead guilty to violating the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for illegal promotion of Bextra, a federal felony. The settlement is also the largest health care fraud settlement ever, and included the largest ever criminal penalty fine, $1.3 billion. Pfizer admitted it had illegally promoted the drugs and caused false claims to be submitted to Medicare and Medicaid for uses that were not approved by the Food and Drug Administration. In addition to the False Claims Act the Anti-Kickback Act [22] was invoked. Pfizer has entered a corporate integrity agreement and will be required to make substantial disclosures, on its website, about its activities, including payments to doctors. The settlement also addressed allegations that Pfizer paid bribes to health care providers as inducements to prescribe the four drugs. Six whistle-blowers will receive $102 million; one, John Kopchinski, a former sales representative, will receive $50 million..[3][4][23]

Nigeria

In 1996, an outbreak of measles, cholera, and bacterial meningitis occurred in Nigeria. Pfizer representatives traveled to Kano, Nigeria to assist in treating the affected population. An experimental antibiotic, trovafloxacin, was administered to approximately 200 children. Local Kano officials report that more than 50 children died from infection, while many others developed mental and physical deformities.[24] In 2001, families of the children, as well as the governments of Kano and Nigeria, filed lawsuits regarding the treatment[25]. According to the lawsuits, Pfizer administered the trovafloxacin (now marketed as Trovan) without parental consent. The lawsuits also accuse Pfizer of using the outbreak to perform unapproved human testing, as well as allegedly under-dosing a control group being treated with traditional antibiotics in order to skew the results of the trial in favor of Trovan. Pfizer denied these claims, and subsequently produced an approval letter for testing from the Nigerian Ethics Committee; the Nigerian government claims it is a fake.[26]

In 2007, Pfizer published a Statement of Defense letter.[27] The letter makes several claims which deserve mention:

18 million in Nigerian Naira (NGN) in donations.

The figure in NGN is approximately $216,000 in 1996 US dollars (USD).[28]

The drug’s oral form was presented as safer and easier to administer.

The more likely reason for Pfizer’s insistence on the oral form is the result of testing trovafloxacin intravenously in 1995, which found that the drug precipitated in saline, making it ineffective in patients receiving IV fluids. This is inferred from an FDA communication[29] to ex-CEO William C. Steere, regarding Trovan’s compatibility with saline etc., which was omitted from Trovan’s labeling until January 1999. The administration of Trovan saved lives according to the company.

According to the figures given by their own defense, 94.4% of patients receiving Trovan survived, while only 89.3% of untreated Nigerians survived. This is not a statistically significant difference, i.e. the success of the drug was negligible and possibly circumstantial.

No unusual side effects, unrelated to meningitis, were observed after 4 weeks.

In June 1999, the FDA released a public health statement warning against the use of Trovan except in life-or-death situations, due to high risk of liver failure. In some cases, liver damage occurred after only two days of treatment.[30]

Research and development

Pfizer’s human research and development organization is headquartered in New London, CT while their animal health research and development organization is headquartered in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The company has R&D labs in the following locations: Groton, Connecticut; Sandwich, England; La Jolla, California; Cambridge, Massachusetts; Kalamazoo, Michigan; St. Louis, Missouri. In La Jolla, Pfizer has 1,000 people with plans to create cancer drugs because they are so expensive, a departure from the company’s cardiovascular specialties.[31]

Spending $8.1 billion in research & development (R&D) in 2007, Pfizer has the industry’s largest pharmaceutical R&D organization: Pfizer Global Research and Development.[32]

In 2007, Pfizer announced plans to close or sell on the Loughbeg API facility, located at Loughbeg, Ringaskiddy Co.Cork Ireland by mid to end of 2008

In 2007, Pfizer announced plans to completely close the Ann Arbor, Nagoya and Amboise Research facilities by the end of 2008, eliminating 2,160 jobs and idling the $300-million dollar Michigan facility, which had seen millions of dollars of expansion in recent years.[33]

On June 18, 2007 Pfizer announced it will move the Sandwich, England Animal Health Research (VMRD) division to Kalamazoo, Michigan.[2]

Pipeline:

* dimebon
* tanezumab

Environmental record

According to the EPA, Pfizer is among the top ten companies in America with the most numerous emissions sources. [34] A landfill and two wastewater lagoons in Ledyard, CT near the Pfizer plant in Groton, Connecticut, are a source of groundwater pollution in the area. According to the Connecticut Department of Environmnetal Protection (CT DEP), the Pfizer site is active under the CT DEP Site Remediation program.[35] In June 2002, a chemical explosion at the Groton plant injured seven people and caused the evacuation of over 100 homes in the surrounding area.[36]
Pfizer has provided funding to the Competitive Enterprise Institute[36]
Employment and diversity

Pfizer received a 100% rating on the Corporate Equality Index released by the Human Rights Campaign starting in 2004, the third year of the report. In 2007, Pfizer’s Canadian division was named one of Canada’s Top 100 Employers, as published in Maclean’s magazine, the only research-based pharmaceutical company to receive this honor.[37] In 2008, there was controversy, including inquiries from members of Congress, around Pfizer’s practice of replacing US workers with H-1b guest workers[38]

AIDS involvement

Pfizer has been involved in controversies over the medicine Diflucan (generic name fluconazole). In 1998, a campaign by Thai public health groups led to the elimination of the Pfizer monopoly on selling fluconazole in Thailand, and the price of the antifungal drug decreased from 200 baht to 6.5 baht in nine months, vastly expanding access to the medicine for AIDS patients. Faced with pressure for compulsory licenses to the Pfizer patent on this drug, Pfizer later established a program for limited access to the medicine in Africa.[39]

In the United States, 46 percent of all new HIV/AIDS cases occur in the South. From 2003–2006 the Pfizer Foundation has funded 23 innovative HIV/AIDS prevention programs and strengthened the capacity of community-based organizations to reach and serve their communities. [40] Since 2003, Pfizer has committed a $3 Million grant toward supporting the Southern HIV/AIDS Prevention Initiative.

However, there are criticisms of the way Pfizer is testing its AIDS drug.  The European AIDS Treatment Group (EATG), collection of activists from 31 European Countries,[41] said the design of the trial for Pfizer’s CCR5 inhibitor Maraviroc (previously known as UK-427,857) is putting people with HIV infection at unnecessary risk of developing AIDS. [42]

On June 20, 2007, Maraviroc received an approvable letter from the FDA advisory board. The letter was a product of expedited review of the novel HIV compound.

In 2001, Pfizer asked the U.S. government to pressure the Brazilian government against issuing compulsory licenses for the patents on the AIDS drug nelfinavir.

AIDS drugs manufactured by Pfizer

* Viracept (nelfinavir mesylate)
* Selzentry/Celsentri (maraviroc)
* Rescriptor (delavirdine mesylate)

See also

* Peter Rost
* Viking Bjork

Notes and references

1. ^  Pfizer, Inc. Financial Review . Pfizer, Inc.. August 12, 2009. http://media.pfizer.com/files/annualreport/2008/financial/financial2008.pdf. Retrieved 2009-04-23.
2. ^  Company Profile for Pfizer Inc (PFE) . http://zenobank.com/index.php?symbol=PFE&page=quotesearch. Retrieved 2008-10-01.
3. ^ a b Harris, Gardiner (September 2, 2009).  Pfizer Pays $2.3 Billion to Settle Marketing Case . The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/business/03health.html.
4. ^ a b Johnson, Carrie (3 September 2009).  In Settlement, A Warning To Drugmakers: Pfizer to Pay Record Penalty In Improper-Marketing Case . Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/02/AR2009090201449_pf.html.
5. ^ Andrew Ross Sorkin and Duff Wilson (January 26, 2009).  Pfizer Agrees to Pay $68 Billion for Rival Drug Maker Wyeth . New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/business/26drug.html.
6. ^ a b Kenneth T. Jackson: The Encyclopedia of New York City: The New York Historical Society; Yale University Press; 1995. P. 895.
7. ^  Johnson & Johnson to Buy Pfizer Unit . MoneyNews.com. June 26, 2006. http://www.newsmax.com/money/archives/articles/2006/6/26/082230.cfm. Retrieved 2007-07-19.
8. ^ U-M to buy Pfizer’s former Ann Arbor property, University of Michigan press release, 18 December 2008. Accessed 25 February 2009.
9. ^ Pfizer (2003). Annual Review 2003. Annual Report.
10. ^ Schlessinger, Joseph (2005).  SU11248: Genesis of a New Cancer Drug . The Scientist 19(7):17-24. (subscription required)
11. ^ Pfizer Agrees to Pay $68 Billion for Rival Drug Maker Wyeth By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and DUFF WILSON Published: January 25, 2009 – The New York Times
12. ^ The Pfizer-Wyeth Deal Worst-Case Scenario By Jim Edwards | January 23rd, 2009 – BNET
13. ^ Pfizer Shares Plummet on Loss of a Promising Heart Drug By ALEX BERENSON and ANDREW POLLACK Published: December 5, 2006 – New York Times report
14. ^ Berenson, Alex (December 3, 2006).  Pfizer Ends Studies on Drug for Heart Diseas . The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/03/health/03pfizer.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin. Retrieved 2006-12-03.
15. ^ Theresa Agovino (Associated Press) (December 3, 2006).  Pfizer ends cholesterol drug development . Yahoo  News. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061203/ap_on_he_me/pfizer_cholesterol_drug_5&printer=1. Retrieved 2006-12-03.  Each study arm (torcetrapib + Lipitor vs. Lipitor alone) had 7500 patients enrolled; 51 deaths were observed in the Lipitor alone arm, while 82 deaths occurred in the torcetrapib + Lipitor arm.
16. ^  Prescription Pharmaceuticals and Consumer Health Care (Over-the-Counter) Products by Pfizer . Pfizer Inc. http://www.pfizer.com/do/index.html. Retrieved 2005-03-27.
17. ^ [www.quigleyreorg.com Quigleyreorg.com]
18. ^ Michael A. Steinman, MD; Lisa A. Bero, PhD; Mary-Margaret Chren, MD; and C. Seth Landefeld, MD (15 Aug 2006).  Narrative Review: The Promotion of Gabapentin: An Analysis of Internal Industry Documents . Annals of Internal Medicine 145 (4): 284–293. PMID 16908919. http://www.annals.org/cgi/content/abstract/145/4/284. Retrieved 2006-08-14.
19. ^ Jane E. Henney, MD (15 Aug 2006).  Editorial: Safeguarding Patient Welfare: Who’s In Charge? . Annals of Internal Medicine 145 (4): 305–307. PMID 16908923. http://www.annals.org/cgi/content/full/145/4/305?etoc. Retrieved 2006-08-14.
20. ^ US Department of Justice Press Release: Warner-Lambert to pay $430 million to resolve criminal and civil health care liability charges Retrieved 14 August 2006
21. ^ Mathew, NT; Rapoport A, Saper J, Magnus L, Klapper J,hello Ramadan N, Stacey B, Tepper S (2001).  Efficacy of gabapentin in migraine prophylaxis . Headache 41 (2): 119–28. doi:10.1046/j.1526-4610.2001.111006119.x. PMID 11251695. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=11251695&itool=pubmed_citation. Retrieved 2009-01-12.
22. ^  Compliance Readiness – Law Firms The False Claims Act & The Anti-Kickback Act – A Potent Combination Against The Health Care Industry And Growing Even Stronger?  article by Shannon S. Quill, Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, LLP, October 01, 2006 on metrocorpcounsel.com, accessed February 3, 2009
23. ^  Pfizer agrees record fraud fine . BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8234533.stm.
24. ^ BBC NEWS | Africa | Anger at deadly Nigerian drug trials
25. ^ BBC News | BUSINESS | Nigerians sue Pfizer over test deaths
26. ^ Panel Faults Pfizer in ’96 Clinical Trial In Nigeria – washingtonpost.com
27. ^ http://www.pfizer.com/files/news/trovan_statement_defense_summary.pdf
28. ^ FXHistory – Historical Currency Exchange Rates
29. ^ http://www.fda.gov/CDER/warn/dec98/020760_war_ltr.pdf
30. ^ Trovan Information
31. ^ Pollack, Andrew (September 1, 2009).  For Profit, Industry Seeks Cancer Drugs . The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/02/health/research/02cancerdrug.html. Retrieved 2009-09-03.
32. ^ http://www.pfizer.com/investors/financial_reports/financial_reports_annualreview_2007.jsp
33. ^ Pfizer’s cuts blindside Ann Arbor workers, Kalamazoo Gazette, Sunday, January 23, 2007.
34. ^ What’s Happening at KLD
35. ^ Find New England Sites – PFIZER, INC
36. ^ a b The tempest – Washingtonpost.com
37. ^  Reasons for Selection, 2007 Canada’s Top 100 Employers . http://www.eluta.ca/einfo?en=Pfizer+Canada+Inc.&ri=6a24852a7f1d493ca1615bbec1e4e6aa&rk=2530d7bedc69eed8a38cea9bbe668b30.
38. ^  Pfizer’s American Workers Training Their Replacements . http://blog.vdare.com/archives/2008/11/10/pfizers-american-workers-training-their-replacements.
39. ^ Sithole, Emelia (2001-02-21).  S.Africa okays Pfizer AIDS drug distribution . Reuters NewMedia. http://ww4.aegis.org/news/re/2001/RE010226.html. Retrieved 2006-05-15.
40. ^  Global HIV/AIDS Partnerships: Southern HIV/AIDS Prevention Initiative . Pfizer. http://www.pfizer.com/pfizer/subsites/philanthropy/caring/global.health.hiv.southern.jsp. Retrieved 2006-05-15.
41. ^  European AIDS Treatment Group . http://www.eatg.org/. Retrieved 2006-05-15.
42. ^ Hirschler, Ben (2005-04-12).  Activists attack ethics of Pfizer AIDS drug trial . AIDS Meds.com. http://www.aidsmeds.com/news/20050412ethc002.html. Retrieved 2006-05-15.

Notes

* “Nigeria: Court Adjourns Killer Drug Case Against Pfizer”. All Africa Global Media. 3 October 2007.
* “Value of Black Bodies”. BlackWomb: History, Culture, and Power. 6 June, 2007.
* “Double Standards in Nigerian Health”. The American. 26 June 2007.
* “Nigeria Sues Pfizer Over Child Drug Trial”. West Africa Review. 10 June 2007.
* “Pfizer Faces $8.5 Billion Suit Over Nigeria Drug Trial”. Yahoo News. 24 October 207.
* “Pfizer Statement Concerning 1996 Nigerian Clinical Study” Pfizer.

External links
Companies portal

* Pfizer Company Website – UK corporate site
* Pfizer Company Website – U.S. corporate site
o Company history
o Full product list
o Investor relations
o Corporate governance
o Philanthropy info.
* Yahoo  – Pfizer Inc Company Profile
* Bugs and Drugs – article by Gunjan Sinha
* Boston Globe  Pfizer Offers Discounts for the Uninsured
* Pfizer Settlement Clears Asbestos Litigation Law.com
* Pfizer’s savings program for people without prescription drug coverage Pfizer Helpful Answers
* Pfizer 4Q06 Earnings Press Release
* Barry Yeoman, Putting Science in the Dock, The Nation
* GlaxoSmithKline will overtake Pfizer to become world’s largest pharmaceutical company by 2012 URCH Publishing (Press Release)

v • d • e
Dow Jones Industrial Average components
Current
3M A Alcoa A American Express A AT&T A Bank of America A Boeing A Caterpillar A Chevron A Cisco Systems A The Coca-Cola Company A DuPont A ExxonMobil A General Electric A Hewlett-Packard A The Home Depot A Intel A IBM A Johnson & Johnson A JPMorgan Chase A Kraft Foods A McDonald’s A Merck & Co. A Microsoft A Pfizer A Procter & Gamble A The Travelers Companies A United Technologies Corporation A Verizon Communications A Wal-Mart A The Walt Disney Company
Selected former
Altria Group A American International Group A American Telephone & Telegraph A American Tobacco Company A Bethlehem Steel A Citigroup A Colorado Fuel and Iron A Eastman Kodak A General Foods A General Motors A Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company A Honeywell A International Paper A Johns-Manville A Nash Motors A Navistar International A North American Company A Owens-Illinois A Sears, Roebuck and Company A Union Carbide A United States Rubber Company A F. W. Woolworth Company

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizer
Categories: Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange | Dow Jones Industrial Average | Pfizer | Companies based in New York City | Pharmaceutical companies | Multinational companies | Pharmaceutical companies of the United States | Companies established in 1849 | Corporate crime

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizer

***

Peter Rost
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Peter Rost may refer to:

* Peter Rost (doctor), former vice president of the drug company Pfizer
* Peter Rost (UK politician) (born 1930), British Conservative Party MP 1970–1992
* Peter Rost (handballer) (born 1951), German team handball player

Disambig gray.svg     This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same personal name. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rost
Categories: Human name disambiguation pages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rost

***

Viking Björk
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Viking Bjork)
Viking Olov Björk (3 December 1918 – 18 February 2009) was a Swedish cardiac surgeon.

In 1968, he collaborated with American engineer Donald Shiley to develop the first  monostrut tilting disc valve  used to replace the aortic or mitral valve. [1]

The Bjork-Shiley heart valve was manufactured by Pfizer after they bought the Shiley company in 1979. In 1980 Björk wrote to Pfizer threatening to publish cases of valve failures — often fatal to the patients — unless corrective action was taken. This eventually led to long lawsuit that involved the recall of all existing valves and Pfizer allocating up to US$20 million to pay compensation.
Björk died on 18 February 2009.[2]

References

1. ^ H, Ahn; Kim KH, Kim DJ, Jeong DS (2007-12-22).  Long-term experience with the Bjork-Shiley Monostrut tilting disc valve . PubMed. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18162723. Retrieved 2009-02-14.
2. ^ Obituary in Svenska Dagbladet, 22 February 2009

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_Bj%C3%B6rk
Categories: 1918 births | 2009 deaths | People from Ludvika Municipality | People from Dalarna | Swedish surgeons | Karolinska Institutet faculty | Uppsala University faculty | Swedish people stubs | Medical biography stubs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_Bjork

***

Willowbrook State School
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Willowbrook State School was a state-supported institution for children with mental retardation located in central Staten Island in New York City from the 1930s until 1987.

The school which was designed for 4,000 and had a population of 6,000 in 1965. At the time it was the biggest state run institution for mentally retarded in the United States.[1] Conditions and questionable medical practices and experiments prompted Robert Kennedy to call it a  snake pit.  [2]
Public outcry eventually led to its closure in 1987 and civil rights legislation protecting the handicapped.

Its grounds are now the College of Staten Island.

Contents

* 1 History
o 1.1 Construction
o 1.2 Hepatitis Studies
o 1.3 More Scandals and Abuses
o 1.4 Closing the School
* 2 See also
* 3 References
History
Construction

In 1938, plans were formulated to build a facility for children with mental retardation on a 375 acres (1.52 km2) site in the Willowbrook section of Staten Island. Construction was completed in 1942, but instead of opening for its original purpose, it was converted into a United States Army hospital and named Halloran General Hospital, after the late Colonel Paul Stacey Halloran. After the war, proposals were introduced to turn the site over to the Veterans Administration, but in October, 1947 the New York State Department of Mental Hygiene opened its facility there as originally planned, and the institution was named Willowbrook State School.

Hepatitis Studies

Throughout the first decade of its operation, outbreaks of hepatitis were common at the school[citation needed], and this led to a highly controversial medical study being conducted there between 1963 and 1966 by medical researcher Saul Krugman, in which healthy children were intentionally inoculated, orally and by injection, with the virus that causes the disease, then monitored to gauge the effects of gamma globulin in combating it. A public outcry forced the study to be discontinued.

More Scandals and Abuses

Further problems plagued the institution: In early 1972, Geraldo Rivera, then an investigative reporter for television station WABC-TV in New York City, conducted a series of investigations at Willowbrook (on the heels of a previous series of articles in the Staten Island Advance and Staten Island Register newspapers), uncovering a host of deplorable conditions, including overcrowding, inadequate sanitary facilities, and physical and sexual abuse of residents by members of the school’s staff. Rivera later appeared on the nationally televised Dick Cavett Show with film of patients at the school.

The school was originally intended to house 2000 students, but around the time the scandals at the institution gained attention there were almost 5000 residents. This resulted in a class-action lawsuit being filed against the State of New York in federal court on March 17, 1972. A settlement in the case was reached on May 5, 1975, mandating reforms at the site, but several years would elapse before all of the violations were corrected. The publicity generated by the case was a major contributing factor to the passage of a federal law, called the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act of 1980.

Closing the School

In 1975, a Willowbrook Consent Decree was signed. This committed New York State to improve community placement for the now designated  Willowbrook class .[3]

In 1983, the State of New York announced plans to close Willowbrook, which had been renamed the Staten Island Developmental Center in 1974. By the end of March 1986, the number of residents housed there had dwindled to 250 (down from 5,000 at the height of the scandal exposed by Rivera), and the last children left the grounds on September 17, 1987.

After the developmental center closed, the site became the focus of intense local debate about what should be done with the property. In 1989 a portion of the land was acquired by the City of New York, with the intent of using it to establish a new campus for the College of Staten Island, and the new campus opened at Willowbrook in 1993 (at the same time, one of CSI’s two other existing campuses, located in the island’s Sunnyside neighborhood, was closed and that site became the home of a new high school, Michael Petrides). At 0.8 square kilometres (200 acres), this campus is the largest maintained by the City University of New York.

The remaining 0.7 square kilometres (170 acres) of the state school’s original property, at the south end, is still under the administration of the New York State Department of Mental Hygiene, which maintains a research laboratory facility there called the Institute For Basic Research in Developmental Disorders.

On February 25, 1987, the Federal Court approved the Willowbrook  1987 Stipulation , which set forth guidelines for OMRDD that required OMRDD community placement for the  Willowbrook Class .[3]

See also

* New Jersey State Hospital at Trenton
* Walter E. Fernald State School
* Developmental disability
* Tuskegee Syphilis Study
* Geraldo Rivera

References

1. ^ The Praeger Handbook of Special Education – by Alberto M. Bursztyn – Praeger Publishers; 1 edition (December 30, 2006) ISBN 0313332622
2. ^ [http://www.library.csi.cuny.edu/archives/WillowbrookRG.htm A GUIDE TO WILLOWBROOK STATE SCHOOL RESOURCES AT OTHER INSTITUTIONS – csi.cuny.edu – Retrieved August 25, 2009
3. ^ a b Milestones in OMRDD’s History, OMRDD, (2001-09-19). Retrieved on 2007-09-05.

Coordinates: 40E35?58?N 74E09?02?W? / ?40.59944EN 74.15056EW? / 40.59944; -74.15056
Flag of New York     State of New York Psychiatric hospitals
Adult\Children Facilities

Capital District Psychiatric Center (Albany) | Elmira Psychiatric Center | Greater Binghamton Health Center | Hutchings Psychiatric Center (Syracuse) | Mohawk Valley Psychiatric Center (Utica) | Rochester Psychiatric Center | South Beach Psychiatric Center (Staten Island) | St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center (Ogdensburg) |
Adult Facilities

Bronx Psychiatric Center | Buffalo Psychiatric Center | Creedmoor Psychiatric Center (Queens Village) | Hudson River Psychiatric Center (Poughkeepsie) | Kingsboro Psychiatric Center (Brooklyn) | Manhattan Psychiatric Center | Pilgrim Psychiatric Center (Brentwood) | Rockland Psychiatric Center (Orangeburg) | Washington Heights Community Mental Health Center (Washington Heights)
Children’s Facilities

Bronx Children’s Psychiatric Center | Brooklyn Children’s Psychiatric Center | Queens Children’s Psychiatric Center (Glen Oaks) | Rockland Children’s Psychiatric Center | Sagamore Children’s Psychiatric Center (Dix Hills) | Western NY Children’s Psychiatric Center (West Seneca) |
Forensic Facilities

Central New York Psychiatric Center (Marcy) | Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center (Ward’s Island) | Mid-Hudson Forensic Psychiatric Center (New Hampton) | Rochester Regional Forensic Unit
Research Facilities

Nathan S. Kline Institute (Orangeburg) | New York State Psychiatric Institute (New York City)
Closed Facilities

Asylum on Blackwell’s Island (New York City) | Bloomington Lunatic Asylum (Morningside Heights) | Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane (Buffalo) Central Islip Psychiatric Center (Central Islip) | Dannemora State Hospital (Dannemora) Now know as Clinton Correctional Facility | Gowanda State Hospital (Collins) | Harlem Valley Psychiatric Center (Dover Plains) | Hudson River State Hospital (Poughkeepsie) | Kings Park Psychiatric Center (Kings Park) | Letchworth Village Home for the Feeble Minded and Epileptics (Thiells) | Long Island Developmental Center (Melville) | Manhattan Children’s Psychiatric Center | Matteawan State Hospital (Matteawan) Now known as Fishkill Correctional Facility | Middletown Psychiatric Center (Middletown) | Mohansic State Hospital (Yorktown Heights) | Newville State Hospital (Newville) | New York Asylum for Idiots (Syracuse) | New York State Inebriate Asylum (Binghamton) | Utica State Hospital | (Utica) | Western New York Institution for Deaf-Mutes (Rochester) | Willard State Hospital (Willard) | Willowbrook State School (Staten Island) Institution for children with mental retardation
Sanatorium

Loomis Sanatorium (Liberty) | Interpines Sanatorium (Goshen)
Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willowbrook_State_School
Categories: 1942 establishments | Buildings and structures in Staten Island | Medical ethics | Human experimentation in the United States | Defunct hospitals in the United States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willowbrook_State_School

***

Remembering the man behind homeland security center

October 5, 2009 By JAMES BERNSTEIN james.bernstein@newsday.com

They had a memorial service Monday for Ken Morrelly, the president of the Long Island Forum for Technology and a leading figure in the Island’s business community, who died last week.

The white hard hat with an American flag decal that Morrelly wore every day to oversee construction at the soon-to-be-opened homeland security center in Bethpage was placed atop a slim pole outside the facility, reminiscent of the way soldiers who have died in battle are memorialized.

About 50 construction workers lined up behind the pole, hats off. Shortly before noon, a hearse carrying the body of Morrelly, 64, drove slowly past what is formally known as the Applied Science Center of Innovation and Excellence in Homeland Security, being constructed at the old Plant 5 once owned by Grumman.

Morrelly, who died of a heart attack Thursday, was the guiding force behind the homeland security center.

He was everything to this project,  said Ray Donnelly, LIFT’s deputy executive director.  He was the original conceiver.

The center is to open in about three months. Eight companies, including Northrop Grumman Corp., have already signed on as tenants. The companies are to work on technology to counter terrorist attacks.

There was a sense of irony as Morrelly’s hearse drove past the site. He had moved the project ahead from the beginning and watched over it every step, but he would not be there to see it open.

To many college students, the idea of a career in the real estate industry would probably seem as appealing as study hall in the summer.

But Dannielle Schoepfer and Michelle Suconick, both 21-year-old Hofstra students, don’t feel that way. They are among 12 Hofstra students selected for a brand new program organized by the Long Island Real Estate Group. The program, which began Friday, will expose the students to different aspects of the industry. They will visit six different management or development firms over the next few weeks, and get one college credit while doing so.

I never really thought about real estate,  said Suconick, an international business major. But once she heard about the program, Suconick said, it sounded appealing.

Schoepfer, a marketing major, said her family owns property.  To me, this is really interesting, the zoning [regulations] and what they make the properties into.

LIREG president David Einbinder said the program has never been done before.  I don’t think college students understand how much is involved in real estate,  Einbinder said.
Rob Merker, co-founder of the program called LIREG@Work, agreed many students may not think the industry is fascinating. But, he added, they may change their minds when they see an  an idea can be taken from nothing and a building can be created that never existed before.

http://www.newsday.com/columnists/other-columnists/remembering-the-man-behind-homeland-security-center-1.1502556

***

GSA to reveal plans, update on new DHS headquarters project

October 5, 2009 – 2:31pm

By Jason Miller
Executive Editor
FederalNewsRadio

Vendors wanting to get in on the $3.4 billion Homeland Security Department headquarters project should mark Oct. 26 on their calendars.

The General Services Administration will hold an industry day for all types of vendors in Washington to find out about the project at St. Elizabeth’s. GSA says there will be a separate industry day for technology vendors as well.

This one day event will provide an in depth discussion of the project’s development schedule, overview of the prospectus, GSA and DHS strategies for small business inclusion as prime and subcontractors, as well as a premiere networking opportunities for large and small business owners,  GSA states in the recent notice on FedBizOpps.gov.

DHS last month broke ground on the Coast Guard’s new headquarters on St. Elizabeth’s campus.
And in August, GSA awarded a $435 million contract to design the site’s first phase-the new, 1.18 million-square-foot Coast Guard headquarters facility-to Clark Design Build, LLC.

—
On the Web:

FedBizOpps.gov — Industry Day notice for DHS headquarters

DHS — Coast Guard headquarters ground breaking press release

FederalNewsRadio — DHS marks new milestone with St. E’s campus groundbreaking

(Copyright 2009 by FederalNewsRadio.com. All Rights Reserved.)
Tags: Contracting, GSA, DHS, Coast Guard, Clark Design Build, St. Elizabeth’s, DHS headquarters

http://www.federalnewsradio.com/index.php?nid=35&sid=1778825

***

As the Feds Take Over, St. E’s Moves Further Into Shadow
A view of Washington from an elevated section of the old St. Elizabeths Hospital campus, which will house U.S. security operations.
A view of Washington from an elevated section of the old St. Elizabeths Hospital campus, which will house U.S. security operations. (By Gerald Martineau — The Washington Post)

By Philip Kennicott
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 10, 2009

Councilman Marion Barry was late, and Mayor Adrian Fenty even later, but both arrived in time to grab a golden shovel and turn a little earth on the lush green lawn of St. Elizabeths Hospital. And with that, ground was officially broken for the $3.4 billion headquarters of the Department of Homeland Security, a vast new federal complex that will be built on the quiet hilltop with spectacular views where once stood the city’s main hospital for the mentally ill.

Barry joked that most of the crowd — filled with Coast Guard uniforms and suits from the DHS and the General Services Administration — probably needed a GPS to find it. Which was a sly reference to what many of his Ward 8 constituents, also in the crowd, were thinking: that the federal government was finally investing, in a big way, east of the Anacostia River, in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods.

Barry thanked Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent who helped create the grab-bag department of security-related agencies after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. And apropos of nothing, he reminisced about the days of the civil rights struggle, when he and the district’s congressional delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, had  to fight those mean, mean white people.

They didn’t amen that one, as they did some other remarks of the morning. In general, the mood was celebratory. Norton was ecstatic and noted the critical role of $162 million in stimulus funding in moving the project forward. Lieberman hailed the largest federal project built in the region since the Pentagon. And Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the new campus, which will be home to 14,000 employees when finished in 2016, will help her fledgling agency grow into a more cohesive entity with a unified culture.

But for others around the city, and around the country, the shovels of earth might as well have fallen on a coffin lid. After years of wrangling and public hearings, after complaints and impassioned pleas from historic-preservation groups and skeptical analysis from think tanks (the Brookings Institution has cast doubt on the economic benefits to Ward 8), the fight was over. What had begun in the 1850s as one of the country’s most innovative facilities for treating mental illness, and remains one of the city’s largest and most sylvan sites for development, is beginning the long, slow process of rebirth as a modern, Level 5 security complex, to be surrounded by double perimeter walls and all but closed forever to the public.

Richard Moe, head of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, didn’t attend the event, but found it all rather sad.  We have been involved with this for at least six years, and we have constantly tried to make the case that they are trying to shoehorn too much square footage of new construction into a national landmark site,  said Moe. The trust, he noted, did help reduce the amount of new building on the 176-acre site, and pressured the GSA to preserve and rehabilitate 52 of 62 historic buildings that are part of St. Elizabeths landmark designation.

But he’s still worried about the amount of parking that will be built and plans for an access road that have yet to be approved. Even though a backhoe with a grappler bucket was already tearing an old concrete building to shreds near the ceremonial tent, Moe thinks the groundbreaking may be premature.

Over the past years, as plans were made public and worked their way through the approval process, there was a recurring refrain from beyond the preservation community: St. Elizabeths could be something else. There was a proposal to make the west campus (the east campus is still in use for various city purposes) into the home of a university. Or to renovate it as a mixed-use urban village with housing and retail, an anchor to a revitalized Southeast neighborhood.

Although the site had been closed to most of the public during its many decades as a mental institution, there was a powerful cultural memory of its landscape and the magnificent views from  the Point,  an overlook with a sweeping vista of the city below. There was hope that a newly enlivened St. E’s, as it is known, would be a local amenity, a hub that could transform the distressed Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, and extend the booming development of the pre-crash years into a neighborhood where Barry says there is  35 percent unemployment.

Against that, there was pragmatism. No entity but the federal government had deep enough pockets to renovate and rebuild St. E’s, it was said. The longer the campus remained empty (the last outpatient treatment there ended in 2003), the more the buildings would deteriorate, perhaps past hope of revival.

On a tour of the campus last winter, GSA representatives pointed to the challenge of renovating the central building, where poet Ezra Pound was confined after cavorting with Italian Fascists during the Second World War. Much of the historic structure, a somber brick building with an imposing square tower where the hospital’s superintendent and his family once lived, is subdivided into small, dark rooms, each with load-bearing walls. To open up these cells into a free-flowing, contemporary office space will require expensive structural retrofitting.

The government was also looking for a large site, in or near the District, to consolidate some 35 DHS offices around the region. St. E’s made perfect sense. And now, with stimulus money burning a hole in the bureaucratic pocket, things are moving very quickly.

Last winter, on the slopes below the Point, a herd of deer, too many to be counted, was grazing, a remnant of the porous boundary between the city and the natural world that made the site so attractive to the founders of St. E’s in the 1850s. The campus was empty, its curving streets — which once invited patients to wander among the trees and grass — quiet. On Wednesday they were full of the usual talismans of the new security society: black Chevy Tahoes with tinted windows, large vans with no markings, men with earpieces and short cropped hair.

Even the promises of public access were beginning to morph slowly into the bland language of the bureaucratic wormhole. During the approval process, there had been talk of public access not just to the Point, but to a theater on the campus and an old Civil War cemetery. There was the sense that Hitchcock Hall, which still has the solid bones of a lovely public theater in it, might someday host community gatherings, public lectures, concerts and films. All with DHS approval, of course.

Norton spoke Wednesday as if that were all still true. She hailed a new day,  the first time in memory that residents and visitors will be able to visit the Point, the most panoramic view of the city.

But GSA officials were already muddying up that clear vision.  GSA has been working very closely with DHS and the community to ensure that the operational and security needs of DHS are maintained while allowing public access to the St. Elizabeths campus,  read a GSA statement, released after officials were pressed on comments that seemed to contradict Norton’s sanguine view of wider public access.
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The most reasonable view of the plan for St. E’s is a mix of resignation, sadness, skepticism and anger. Resignation, because the pragmatists are probably right, especially in the current economy. Sadness, because the advocates for a better use are certainly right: This will be a fortress with forbidding walls, occupied by commuters who drive in and out and very likely never leave the compound during the work day. Skepticism because it’s impossible to know how seriously anyone pursued other options for the site.

And anger because early design drawings for the first big new building on the campus, a Coast Guard facility — 1.18 million square feet of bland boxiness that looks as if it was found on a World War II-era drafting board — are so desultory. It is supposed to be energy efficient, and it will stretch down the side of a hill on the edge of the campus, thus preserving some of the historic feel of the old landscape. But the design, by Will + Perkins, is ugly.

The best response to the project is vigilance. To be blunt, the promises of public access are probably hollow, perhaps even disingenuous. Even if they were made sincerely, all it will take is for someone in the bureaucracy to utter the magic words  national security  to deny access to the campus, at first on an occasional basis, and eventually forever. Within a few years, no one will even remember the Point, and St. E’s will sit high and impregnable on its hill, bristling with security and black cars and open to nobody but its employees.

Even the promise to rehabilitate the 52 historic structures must be watched very closely. Can we believe it? What will happen if it turns out to be even more expensive than anticipated to return them to life? Security has become the trump card that transcends all other values. We need to spend our money on more important things . . . .

St. E’s reached the point of Wednesday’s groundbreaking relatively quickly for a project of this size, and the process revealed the usual fault lines between idealists and the get-‘er-done crowd, between preservationists and local community leaders hungry for economic revitalization. Marion Barry probably didn’t mean to raise the specter of race, but perhaps that was involved too, in the usual subterranean fashion that it operates in Washington politics.

This is where an architectural obituary ends with a bland statement of  it remains to be seen . . .   But St. E’s deserves better than that. So here’s a test, to be taken 10 or 15 years from now.
Does anyone walk outside its gates to eat lunch? Have property values risen near the site? Do the same people live there? Did GSA in fact save and repair all 52 buildings as planned? Has there ever been an open performance in the old theater? Is the Civil War cemetery on anyone’s tourist map? Do people gather at sunset on the Point and watch the light fade over the city? If you say  Ezra Pound  to anyone leaving the central building, is there a glimmer of recognition?

Or have all the intangibles of cultural landscape been lost?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/09/AR2009090902436.html?hpid=moreheadlines

***

Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Radiation accidents and other events causing radiation casualties–tabulated data
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last updated 29 January 2009

This is a listing (incomplete) of radiation accidents and other events (e.g. intentional acts) that resulted in acute radiation exposures to humans sufficient to cause casualties. For sources and for details on specific events see individual pages at Database of Radiological Incidents and Related Events or follow links in table.

Notes and codes:

* code: coding for type of accident. Codes:
o A — radiation accident (unspecified or other)
o A-R — accident involving nuclear reactor
o A-NR — accident involving naval reactor
o A-PR — accident involving power reactor
o AC — criticality accident
o AC-RR — criticality accident involving research reactor
o A-a — accelerator accident
o A-d — accidental dispersal of radioactive material
o A-i — accidental internal exposure to radioisotope
o A-ir — irradiator accident
o A-mr — medical radiotherapy accident
o A-mx — medical x-ray accident
o A-os — orphaned source accident
o A-osd — accidental dispersal of orphaned source
o A-rg — radiography accident
o A-s — accidental exposure to source
o A-x — x-ray accident
o I-a — intentional exposure of individual (assault)
o I-c — criminal act (unspecified)
o I-s — intentional self-exposure
o I-t — exposures resulting from theft of source
o NT — nuclear weapon test
o NW — combat use of nuclear weapon
* highest dose: highest dose to any individual; in cases of more than one casualty, most doses were significantly lower. Codes:
o L — casualties involving localized exposures
o N — the individual(s) receiving the highest dose died from effects other than ionizing radiation
* deaths: figures are for ionizing radiation-induced deaths only; parenthetical figures include those from other effects (e.g. thermal and mechanical results of explosions). Code:
o F — indicates fetal deaths.
* public: codes indicating case involved known exposure to the public (i.e. non-employees). Codes:
o c — criminal acts in which only perpetrators were injured
o m — medical, exposure of patients
o x — exposures among public
* source: radioisotope involved, if known. Codes:
o * NW — nuclear detonations
o * — criticality accidents
* release: radioactive release into the environment, if any; for point events (e.g. criticality accidents or nuclear detonations), activity is for 1 hour after event.

date    location/link to entry    type of accident/event    code    highest dose (rem)    deaths    injuries    public    source    release
~ 1896    Chicago, Illinois, USA    radiography overexposure    A-mx    L    0    1    m
~ 1905    Washington, District of Columbia, USA    radiography overexposure    A-mx    L    0    1    m
1920 – 1926    United States    ingestion of radioisotope, chronic injury    A-i         9    70         Ra-226
06 Aug 1945    Hiroshima, Japan    combat use of nuclear weapon    NW    (~80,000–N)    45,000 (130,000)    60,000? (86,000)    x    * NW
09 Aug 1945    Nagasaki, Japan    combat use of nuclear weapon    NW    (~200,000–N)    20,000 (65,000)    50,000? (75,000)    x    * NW
21 Aug 1945    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    criticality accident with plutonium assembly    AC    510    1    1         * Pu
21 May 1946    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    criticality accident with plutonium assembly    AC    2,100    1    1         * Pu
05 Jul 1950    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    5
19 Aug 1950    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
13 Sep 1950    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
20 Sep 1950    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
28 Sep 1950    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    1
Jan 1951    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    1
Jul 1951    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
01 Oct 1951    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    1    3
02 Dec 1951    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    3
15 Dec 1951    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    2
04 Mar 1952    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    1
02 Jun 1952    Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois, USA    criticality accident with uranium    AC    136    0    2         * U
04 Jul 1952    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    2
20 Sep 1952    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
1952    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    3
04 Jan 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accidental internal exposure to radioisotope    A-i    ?    2    0         H-3
15 Mar 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with plutonium solution    AC    1,000    0    3         * Pu
09 Sep 1953    Moscow, Russia, USSR    criticality accident    AC    ?    0    4
18 Sep 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    2
13 Oct 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    5
28 Dec 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    11
1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accidental internal exposure to radioisotope    A-i    ?    0    2
01 Mar 1954    Bikini Atoll, Pacific Ocean    fallout from atmospheric nuclear test    NT    300    1    93+         * NW
11 Mar 1954    Obninsk, Russia, USSR    criticality accident    AC    ?    0    1
28 Jun 1954    Arzamas-16, Sarov, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    1    1         Po-210
14 Sep 1954    Totsk range, Russia, USSR    nuclear test    NT    ?    0    ?         * NW
06 Nov 1954    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
24 Jan 1955    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Sb-124
03 Jun 1955    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    4
27 Jul 1955    Idaho RTA, Idaho Falls, Idaho, USA    accidental exposure to source    A-s    L    0    1
22 Dec 1955    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    accident at radiochemical plant    A    ?    0    1
21 Apr 1957    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium solution    AC    3,000    1    10         * U
Jun 1957    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
29 Sep 1957    Chelyabinsk, Russia, USSR    chemical explosion in stored nuclear wastes    A-d    150    0    0
02 Jan 1958    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium solution    AC    6,000    3    1         * U
16 Jun 1958    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    criticality accident with uranium solution    AC    460    0    5         * U
15 Oct 1958    Vinca, Yugoslavia    criticality accident at research reactor    AC-RR    430    1    5         * U
30 Dec 1958    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    criticality accident with plutonium solution    AC    12,000    1    0         * Pu
08 Mar 1960    Lockport, New York, USA    x-ray accident    A-x    1000    0    2
08 Jun 1960    Moscow, Russia, USSR    intentional overexposure    I-s    1,750    1    0    c    Cs-137
13 Oct 1960    K-8 submarine, Barents Sea    reactor leak    A-NR    200    0    3
1960    USSR    ingestion of radioactive material    A-i    L    1    0         Ra
1960    Kazakhstan, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
03 Jan 1961    SL-1 reactor, Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    criticality excursion with uranium research reactor    AC-RR    (~350–N)    3    0         * U
20 Mar 1961    Moscow, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1         Co-60
26 Jun 1961    Moscow, Russia, USSR    criticality accident    AC    ?    0    4
04 Jul 1961    K-19 submarine, North Atlantic    reactor accident    A-NR    6,000    8    31
14 Jul 1961    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium    AC    200    0    1         * U
30 Sep 1961    Moscow, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
1961    Switzerland    accidental exposure to radioisotope    A    300    1    2         H-3
1961    Plymouth, United Kingdom    x-ray accident    A-mx    L    0    11?    m
06 Feb 1962    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
21 Mar 1962 – Aug 1962    Mexico City, Mexico    lost radiography source    A-os    5,200    4    1    x    Co-60
07 Apr 1962    Hanford, Washington, USA    criticality accident with plutonium solution    AC    110    0    2         * Pu
10 Apr 1962    Moscow, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
02 Nov 1962    Obninsk, Russia, USSR    criticality accident    AC    ?    0    2
11 Jan 1963    Sanlian, PRC    lost source    A-os    8,000    2    4         Co-60
11 Mar 1963    Arzamas-16, Sarov, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with plutonium assembly    AC    550    0    2         * Pu
28 Jun 1963    Sverdlovsk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    3
26 Jul 1963    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
1963    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    1
1963    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
24 Jul 1964    Wood River, Rhode Island, USA    criticality accident with uranium solution    AC    10,000    1    1         * U
1964    FR Germany    accidental exposure to radioisotope    A    1,000    1    3         H-3
12 Feb 1965    K-11 submarine, Severodvinsk, USSR    accident during refueling of naval reactor    A-NR    ?    0    7              ?
29 May 1965    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
30 Dec 1965    Mol, Belgium    criticality accident with uranium in water    AC    500    0    1         * U
1965    Illinois, USA    irradiator accident    A-ir    L    0    1
20 May 1966    Moscow, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
11 Jun 1966    Kaluga, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
1966    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
15 Apr 1967    Frunze, Kirgyzstan, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
24 May 1967    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
May 1967    New Delhi, India    accidental exposure to source    A-s    L    0    1         Co-60
04 Oct 1967    Harmarville, Pennsylvania, USA    irradiator accident    A-ir    600    0    3
09 Dec 1967    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
22 Dec 1967    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Sc-46
~ 1965 – 1968    Pennsylvania, USA    attempt to self-induce abortion using x-ray machine    I-s    ?    0    1    c
05 Apr 1968    Chelyabinsk-70, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium in assembly    AC    3,000    2    0         * U
May 1968    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
03 May 1968 – Jun 1968    La Plata, Argentina    lost source    A-os    L    0    1         Cs-137
24 May 1968    K-27 submarine, Barents Sea    naval reactor accident    A-NR    ?    9    83
27 Jun 1968    Arzamas-16, Sarov, Russia, USSR    accidental internal exposure to radioisotope    A-i    ?    0    2         Po-210
01 Aug 1968    Wisconsin, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    ~450    1    0    m    Au-198
18 Sep 1968    FR Germany    accidental exposure to source    A-s    100    0    1
07 Dec 1968    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
10 Dec 1968    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with plutonium solution    AC    2,450    1    1         * Pu
02 Jan 1969    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
20 Jan 1969    Obninsk, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    2
11 Feb 1969    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
11 Mar 1969    Melekes, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1         Co-60
22 Apr 1969    Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    2
07 May 1969    Voronezh, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    2
20 Sep 1969    Scotland, United Kingdom    accidental exposure to radiography source    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
24 Sep 1969    Tomsk-7, Seversk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
13 Oct 1969    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
13 Oct 1969    Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
14 Oct 1969    Novaya Zemlya, Russia, USSR    venting from underground nuclear test    NT    80    0    ?         * NW
24 Nov 1969    Novomoskovsk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    3         Cs-137
20 Dec 1969    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
1969    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
1969    USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
1969    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
18 Jan 1970    Sormovo, Russia, USSR    construction accident on submarine nuclear reactor    A-NR    ?    3    2
04 Feb 1970    Kiev, Ukraine, USSR    possible criticality accident    AC    ?    0    1
13 Feb 1970    Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1         Co-60
15 Apr 1970    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
23 Jun 1970 – 25 Jun 1970    Australia    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    2
Sep 1970    Chelyabinsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Cs-137
04 Feb 1971    United States    irradiator accident    A-ir    ~260    0    1         Co-60
15 Feb 1971    Kurtchatov, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium    AC    330    0    3         * U
Mar 1971    Tula, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Cs-137
26 May 1971    Kurtchatov, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with uranium in water    AC    6,000    2    2         * U
Sep 1971    Voronezh, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
05 Dec 1971    Arkhangelsk region, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    3         Cs-137
1971    Chiba, Japan    lost source    A-os    130    0    3         Ir-192
1971    Ufa, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Cs-137
29 Feb 1972    Sichuan, PRC    irradiator accident    A-ir    147    0    1         Co-60
31 Mar 1972    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
8 Apr 1972 – Oct 1972    Harris county, Texas, USA    intentional exposure to individual    I-a    L    0    1    x    Cs-137
Jun 1972    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
Jul 1972    India    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
04 Oct 1972    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
09 Oct 1972    Primorsky region, Russia, USSR    criminal act using radioactive source    I-c    ?    0    1    x    Ir-192
22 Dec 1972    Irkutsk, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
Dec 1972    Wuhan, PRC    medical radiation accident    A-s    245    0    1+    m    Co-60
1972    Bulgaria    self-inflicted radiation exposure    I-s    L    1    0    c    Cs-137
11 Jan 1973    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Co-60
17 Mar 1973    Odessa, Ukraine, USSR    criminal act using radioactive source    I-c    ?    0    1    x    Co-60
Mar 1973    Kaliningrad, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
Apr 1973    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
26 Jul 1973    Elektrogorsk, Moscow region, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1         Co-60
05 Sep 1973    Khokhol, Vladimir region, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    4         Cs-137
Dec 1973    Donetsk, Ukraine, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Cs-137
09 Jan 1974    Novosibirsk, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
24 May 1974    Tomsk-7, Seversk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Rh-106
31 May 1974    Semipalatinsk test site, Kazakhstan, USSR    venting from underground nuclear test    NT    150    0    100    x?    * NW
Jun 1974    Parsippany, New Jersey, USA    irradiator accident    A-ir    400    0    1         Co-60
09 Aug 1974    India    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
24 Oct 1974    Perm’, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Co-60
15 Dec 1974    Lipetsk, Russia, USSR    criminal act using radioactive source    I-c    ?    0    2    x    Cs-137
1974    Sverdlovsk, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
1974 – 1976    Columbus, Ohio, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    10    88    m    Co-60
20 Jun 1975    Kazan’, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    2         Co-60
11 Jul 1975    Sverdlovsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    1    2         Co-60
1975    Tucuman, Argentina    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    2    m    Co-60
1975    Rossendorf, GDR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    L    0    1
1975    Halle, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1975    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    ~100    0    1
1975    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1975    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1975    Iraq    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
13 May 1975    Brescia, Lombardia, Italy    food irradiator accident    A-ir    1,200    1    0         Co-60
Mar 1976    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
12 Jul 1976    Moscow, Russia, USSR    irradiator accident    A-ir    400    0    1         Co-60
22 Jul 1976    Melekes, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
12 Nov 1976    Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1976    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    100    0    1
1976    Hanford, Washington, USA    accidental intake of radioisotope    A-i    L    0    1
? 1976    United States    fluoroscopy accidents    A-mx    L    0    2    m
08 Jan 1977    Sasolburg, Transvaal, South Africa    radiography accident    A-rg    116    0    1         Ir-192
01 Mar 1977    Obninsk, Russia, USSR    possible criticality accident    AC    ?    0    1
05 Mar 1977    Kiev, Ukraine, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    L    0    1
02 Apr 1977    Atucha, Argentina    accidental intake of radioisotope through wound    A-i    L    0    1
Sep 1977    Rockaway, New Jersey, USA    irradiator accident    A-ir    200    0    1         Co-60
1977    La Plata, Argentina    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1977    Pardubice, Czechoslovakia    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1977    FR Germany    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1977    Gyor, Hungary    accidental exposure to industrial source    A-rg    120    0    1
1977    Zona del Oleoducto, Peru    accidental exposure to source    A-s    200    0    3         Ir-192
1977    United Kingdom    accidental exposure to radioisotope    A    64    0    2         H-3
1977    United Kingdom    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
07 Mar 1978    Primorsky region, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
04 Apr 1978    Primorsky region, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
05 May 1978    Setif, Algeria    lost radiography source    A-os    140    1 (+1 F)    6    x    Ir-192
03 Jun 1978    Protvino, Kaluga region, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
17 Jul 1978    West Monroe, Louisiana, USA    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
21 Sep 1978    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    L    0    1
17 Oct 1978    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accident at nuclear reactor site    A    ?    0    1
25 Nov 1978    Udmurtia, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
13 Dec 1978    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    criticality accident with plutonium assembly    AC    250    0    1         * Pu
28 Dec 1978    K-171 submarine, Pacific Ocean    submarine reactor accident    A-NR    ?    3
1978    Buenos Aries, Argentina    accidental exposure to industrial source    A-s    L    0    1         Ir-192
1978    Nancy, France    accidental x-ray exposure    A-x    L    0    1
1978    Nykoping, Sweden    accidental exposure at research reactor    A    L    0    1
1978    United Kingdom    intentional self-exposure to radiography source    I-s    152    0    1    c    Ir-192
1978    United States    accelerator accident    A-a    L    0    1
08 May 1979    Sverdlovsk, Russia, USSR    accident involving nuclear reactor    A-R    ?    0    1
11 May 1979    La Hague, France    radiological assault    I-a    L    0    1    x
05 Jun 1979    Los Angeles, California, USA    lost source    A-os    L    0    5         Ir-192
20 Jul 1979    Leningrad, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    2
20 Sep 1979    Frunze, Kirgyzstan, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
01 Dec 1979    Semipalatinsk, Kazahkstan, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1         Co-60
1979    Parana, Argentina    x-ray accident    A-x    94    0    1
1979    Sokolov, Czechoslovakia    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1979    Montpelier, France    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1979    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1979    Freiberg, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1979    USSR nuclear submarine, unknown location    submarine reactor accident    A-NR    ?    0    4
23 May 1980    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
01 Sep 1980    Leningrad, Russia, USSR    irradiator accident    A-ir    ?    1    0         Co-60
19 Sep 1980    Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    1    0         Ir-192
Sep 1980    Shanghai, PRC    irradiator accident    A-ir    500    0    1         Co-60
03 Dec 1980    Vladivostok, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1980    FR Germany    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    2
1980    Bohlen, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1980    Rossendorf, GDR    accidental exposure to radioisotope    A    L    0    1         P-32
1980    Houston, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L?    7    ?    m    Y-90
02 Apr 1981    Saintes, France    accidental exposure to medical source    A-s    L    0    3         Co-60
29 Jul 1981    Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA    intentional self-exposure to industrial radiography source    I-s    ?    1    0    c    Ir-192
1981    Buenos Aires, Argentina    accidental exposure to industrial source    A-s    L    0    2         Ir-192
1981    FR Germany    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1981    Berlin, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
09 Jan 1982    Kramatorsk, Ukraine, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    2    0         Cs-137
15 Mar 1982    Krasnodar, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
19 May 1982    Smolensk, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
14 Jun 1982    Ashkhabad, Turkmenistan, USSR    criminal act using radioactive source    I-c    ?    0    7    x    Co-60
02 Sep 1982    Kjeller, Norway    accident at industrial irradiator    A-ir    2,200    1    0         Co-60
05 Oct 1982    Baku, Azerbaidjan, USSR    lost source    A-os    ?    5    13         Cs-137
18 Dec 1982    Uregoy, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    2         Ir-192
1982    La Plata, Argentina    accident with radiotherapy unit    A-x    L    0    1
1982    Prague, Czechoslovakia    accidental exposure to radiography source    A-os    L    0    1    x    Ir-192
1982    Berlin, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1982    Vikhroli, Bombay, India    lost source    A-os    L    0    1    x    Ir-192
1982    Badak, East Borneo, Indonesia    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
27 Jan 1983    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
28 Apr 1983    Kharkov, Ukraine, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    2         Cs-137
17 May 1983    Volgograd, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
11 Jun 1983    Ufa, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Cs-137
23 Sep 1983    Constituyentes, Argentina    criticality accident with uranium in water    AC    3,700    1    0         * U
07 Dec 1983    Ufa, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1983    Buenos Aires, Argentina    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    2    m    Co-60
1983    FR Germany    accidental x-ray exposure    A-x    L    0    1
1983    Schwarze Pumpe, GDR    accidental exposure to industrial source    A-s    L    0    1         Ir-192
1983    Mulund, Bombay, India    accidental exposure to source    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
6 Dec 1983 – Feb 1984    Ciudad Juarez, Mexico    dispersal of lost radiography source    A-osd    450    1    4    x    Co-60    400 Ci
07 Feb 1984    Perm’, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    5         Ir-192
19 Mar 1984    Casablanca, Morocco    lost radiography source    A-os    ?    8    3    x    Ir-192
21 Apr 1984    Chelyabinsk-40, Ozersk, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
12 Jun 1984    Ufa, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
15 Jun 1984    Gorky, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    8         Ir-192
24 Oct 1984    Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Sb-124
1984    Mendoza, Argentina    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1984    Tiszafured, Hungary    accidental exposure to radiography source    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1984    Lima, Peru    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    6
03 Mar 1985    Norilsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    3         Cs-137
03 Jun 1985    Marietta, Georgia, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m
26 Jul 1985    Hamilton, Ontario, Canada    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m
10 Aug 1985    K-431 submarine, Chazhma Bay, Vladivostok, Russia, USSR    reactor accident during refueling    A-NR    220    0 (10)    49              ~1 kCi
26 Sep 1985    Ignalinskaya, Lithuania, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
Sep 1985    Shanghai, PR China    accelerator accident    A-a    L    0    2
16 Oct 1985    Podolsk, Moscow region, Russia, USSR    radiation accident    A    ?    0    1
1985    PR China    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    1    m    Au-197
1985    PR China    radiation accident    A    L?    0    3         Cs-137
1985    Petrvald, Czechoslovakia    accidental intake of radioisotope    A-i    L    0    1         Am-241
1985    Visakhapatnam, India    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Co-60
1985    Yamuananager, India    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    2         Ir-192
1985    Odessa, Texas, USA    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1
1985    United Kingdom    accidental ingestion of radioisotope    A-i    L    0    1         I-125
Sep 1985 – 06 Jan 1986    Yakima, Washington, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m
Mar 1986    Beijing, PRC    accidental exposure to irradiator source    A-ir    80    0    2         Co-60
21 Mar 1986 – 11 Apr 1986    Tyler, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    2    0    m
26 Apr 1986 – 06 May 1986    Chernobyl, Ukraine, USSR    steam explosion and fire in graphite-moderated power reactor    A-PR    1,600    28 (31)    238+    x         52 MCi
May 1986    Kaifeng City, PRC    accidental exposure to irradiator source    A-ir    350    0    2         Co-60
11 Jun 1986    Obninsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Co-60
05 Aug 1986    Kalinin, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1986    United Kingdom    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    Co-60
17 Jan 1987    Yakima, Washington, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    0    m
19 Feb 1987    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
Jul 1987 – Sep 1987    Koko, Nigeria    radiological exposure to low-level waste    A    ?    0    26
12 Sep 1987 – 29 Sep 1987    Goiania, Goias, Brazil    accidental dispersal of lost radiography source    A-osd    700    5    20    x    Cs-137    1375 Ci
1987    Cirebon, West Java, Indonesia    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1
1987    Zhengzhou City, PRC    irradiator accident    A-ir    135    0    1         Co-60
22 Mar 1988    Sverdlovsk, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    3         Sr-90, Y-90
05 Apr 1988    Tashkent, Uzbekistan, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    2         Ir-192
02 Jul 1988    Sao Paulo, Brazil    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    3         Ir-192
18 Aug 1988    Riga, Latvia, USSR    criminal act using radioactive source    I-c    ?    0    1    x    Cf-252
1988    Zhao Xian, PRC    irradiator accident    A-ir    520    0    1         Co-60
1988    Jena, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
1988    Trustetal, GDR    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    2
1988    Rotterdam, Netherlands    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m
1988    Exeter, United Kingdom    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    ?    0    1+?    m
05 Feb 1989    San Salvador, El Salvador    irradiator accident    A-ir    800    1    2         Co-60
20 Mar 1989    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
04 Aug 1989    Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
14 Aug 1989    Zagorsk, Sergiev Posad, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
30 Oct 1989    Moscow, Russia, USSR    x-ray accident    A-x    ?    0    1
1989    Bangladesh    accident with industrial source    A-s    230    0    1         Ir-192
1989    Beijing, PRC    accidental exposure to source    A-s    89    0    2         Co-60
1989    PR China    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1989    Paks, Hungary    accidental exposure to source    A-s    L    0    1
1989    Hazira, Gujarat, India    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1989    Witbank, Transvaal, South Africa    radiography accident    A-rg    225    0    1         Ir-192
27 Feb 1990    Kalinin, Russia, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
13 Mar 1990    Moscow, Russia, USSR    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
29 Mar 1990    United States    fluoroscopy accident    A-mx    L    0    1    m
19 Jun 1990    Honolulu, Hawaii, USA    ingestion of radioisotope    A-i    L    0    1    x    I-131
21 Jun 1990    Soreq, Israel    accident at commerical irradiation facility    A-ir    1,500    1    0         Co-60
25 Jun 1990    Shanghai, PRC    irradiator accident    A-ir    1,200    2    5         Co-60
13 Sep 1990    Kharkov, Ukraine, USSR    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
01 Nov 1990    Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Russia, USSR    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
10 Dec 1990 – 20 Dec 1990    Zarragosa, Spain    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    18    9    m
1990    Sasolburg, Transvaal South Africa    orphaned source    A-os    L    0    4    x    Co-60
24 Aug 1991    Bratsk, Irkutsk, Russia, USSR    attempted homicide using radioactive source    I-a    ?    0    1    x    Cs-137
13 Aug 1991    Forbach, France    irradiator accident    A-ir    L    0    3
26 Oct 1991    Nesvizh, Belarus    irradiator accident    A-ir    1,250    1    0         Co-60
11 Dec 1991    Maryland, USA    irradiator accident    A-ir    L    0    1
? 1977 – 1991    United Kingdom    radiography accident    A-rg    L    1    0         Ir-192
09 Jan 1992    Riazan’, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    2         Ir-192
25 May 1992    Axay, Kazakhstan    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
16 Nov 1992 – 21 Nov 1992    Indiana (city), Pennsylvania, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    0    m    Ir-192
19 Nov 1992    Jilin, Xinzhou, PRC    lost industrial source    A-os    800    3    5    x    Co-60
17 Nov 1992    Hanoi, Vietnam    irradiation accident    A-ir    L    0    1
Nov 1992    Wuhan, PR China    irradiator accident    A-ir    ?    0    4
1992    Switzerland    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1992    San Antonio, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131
14 Apr 1993    Moscow, Russia    homicide using radioactive source    I-a    ?    1    0    x    Cs-137?
12 Jul 1993    Vologda, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
07 Aug 1993    Dimitrovograd, Russia    accident at nuclear reactor site    A         0    1
09 Nov 1993    Tula region, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1993    United Kingdom    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1
28 Apr 1994    Tokyo, Japan    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    1
21 Oct 1994 – 18 Nov 1994    Tammiku, Estonia    exposure to stolen source    I-t    400    1    4    x    Cs-137
28 Nov 1994    Voronezh, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1994    Texas City, Texas, USA    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1
~ Feb 1995 – 07 Jul 1995    Zheleznodorozhny, Moscow region, Russia    criminal act using radioactive source    I-a    800    1    0    x    Cs-137
18 Mar 1995    Pervouralsk, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
23 May 1995    Smolensk, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
11 Sep 1995    Moscow, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Cs-137
03 Oct 1995    Nizhny Novgorod, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1995    France    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
1995    France    orphaned source    A-os    L    0    1    x    Cs-137
1995    Tyler, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131
01 Oct 1994 – 15 Feb 1996    Republic of China (Taiwan)    intentional poisoning using radioactive material    I-a    ?    0    1    x    P-32
05 Jan 1996    Jilin, Xinzhou, PRC    exposure to lost source    A-os    290    0    1         Ir-192
23 Feb 1996    Moscow, Russia    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
27 Feb 1996 – 05 Mar 1996    Houston, Texas, USA    exposure to stolen source    I-t    L    0    1    x    Co-60
08 Jun 1996    Nizhny Novgorod, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
Jun 1996 – 09 Oct 1997    Lilo Training Center, Tbilisi, Georgia    lost sources    A-os    590    0    11         Ra-226, ?
24 Jul 1996    Gilan, Iran    lost industrial radiography source    A-os    450    0    1         Ir-192
22 Aug 1996 – 27 Sep 1996    San Jose, Costa Rica    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    7    81    m    Co-60
17 Jun 1997    Arzamas-16, Sarov, Russia    criticality accident with uranium assembly    AC    4,850    1    0         * U
29 Nov 1997    Grozny, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    3         Co-60
02 Dec 1997    Volgograd, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Ir-192
1997    Georgia    lost source    A-os    ?    1    ?    x    Co-60
18 Mar 1998    Moscow, Russia    accidental exposure to source    A-s    ?    0    1         Co-60
06 Oct 1998    Kansas City, Missouri, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0 (+2 F)    0    m    I-131
31 Dec 1998    Aransas Pass, Texas, USA    radiography accident    A-rg    L    0    1         Ir-192
10 Dec 1998 – 08 Jan 1999    Istanbul, Turkey    lost radiograpy sources    A-os    310    0    10    x    Co-60    636 Ci
20 Feb 1999    Yanango, Peru    lost source    A-os    150    0    1         Ir-192
26 Apr 1999 – 28 Apr 1999    Henan, PRC    lost source    A-os    610    0    3    x    Co-60
04 Aug 1999    Houston, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131
13 Sep 1999    Grozny, Russia    attempted theft of sources    I-t    high    3    3    c    Co-60
30 Sep 1999 – 01 Oct 1999    Toki-mura, Ibarakin, Japan    criticality accident with uranium solution    AC    1,800    2    1         * U
1999    Kingisepp, Russia    exposure to stolen source    I-t    ?    3    0    c
24 Jan 2000 – 20 Feb 2000    Samut Prakarn, Thailand    lost radiography source    A-os    200    3    7    x    Co-60
05 Jun 2000 – 03 Jul 2000    Meet Halfa, Qaluobiya, Egypt    lost radiography source    A-os    750    2    5    x    Ir-192
16 Aug 2000    Samara, Russia    lost radiography source    A-os    275    0    3         Ir-192
13 Oct 2000    Dubna, Russia    accelerator accident    A-a    ?    0    1
Aug 2000 – 24 Mar 2001    Panama City, Panama    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    17    11    m
06 Feb 2001    Nizhny Novgorod, Russia    x-ray accident    A-x    L    0    4
27 Feb 2001    Bialystok, Poland    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    5    m
24 Jun 2001    Stavropolskij Kraj, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
01 Aug 2001    Salavat, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    2         Ir-192
summer 2001    Kandalaksha, Russia    exposure to stolen source    I-t    ?    0    4    c
early Dec 2001 – Feb 2002    Liya, Georgia    exposure to stolen source    I-t    ?    0    3    c    Sr-90
May 2002    Guangzhou, PRC    intentional exposure using radioactive sources    I-a    ?    0    75    x    Ir-192
01 Sep 2002    Nizhny Novgorod, Russia    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    1         Ir-192
09 Jun 2003 – 11 Jun 2003    Houston, Texas, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m
08 Aug 2003    Anderson, Indiana, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131
2003 – 13 Nov 2003    Kola Harbor, Russia    exposure to stolen sources    I-t    ?    ?    1+?    c    Sr-90
26 Jan 2004 – 22 Mar 2004    South Bend, Indiana, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    3    m    Cs-137
~03 Sep 2004 – 24 Sep 2004    St. Petersburg, Russia    intentional poisoning using radioactive substance    I-a    ?    1    0    x
02 Nov 2004 – 16 Nov 2004    Columbus, Ohio, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131, I-123
Nov 2004    Lyon, France    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    0    m
May 2004 – May 2005    Epinal, France    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    13    m
14 Dec 2005 – 15 Dec 2005    Ranquil, Chile    lost radiography source    A-os    ?    0    4         Ir-192
05 Jan 2006 – 01 Feb 2006    Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    1    0    m
11 Mar 2006    Fleurus, Belgium    irradiator accident    A-ir    460    0    1         Co-60
26 May 2006    Florence, South Carolina, USA    radiotherapy accident    A-mr    L    0    1    m    I-131, Tc-99m
~ Aug 2006    Dakar, Senegal, and Abidjan, Ivory Coast    radiography accident    A-rg    ?    0    4         Ir-192
01 Nov 2006    London, United Kingdom    intentional poisoning using radioactive substance    I-a    ?    1    2    x    Po-210
Aug 2007    Clinton, Michigan, USA    theft of sources    I-t    L?    0    1?    c

© 2004-2008, 2009 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 29 January 2009.
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Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Clinton radioactive source theft, 2007
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 17 October 2007

Date: 1 August 2007

Location: Clinton, Michigan, United States

Type of event: exposure related to theft of radioactive sources

Description:

David Hahn was arrested 1 August 2007 for stealing smoke detectors, apparently to collect radioactive sources from them. He was specifically charged with stealing at least 13 smoke detectors (containing americium-241) from several buildings in his apartment complex. At the time his face was covered with open sores reported related to exposure to radioactive materials. On 27 August he plead guilty. On 2 October he was sentenced to a 90-day jail term to be served in six months after he is assessed and treated by doctors at a Veterans Administration Hospital.

Hahn had, around 1993 at age 17, accumulated large amounts of commercial radioactive sources including americium, thorium, radium, and tritium, in an effort to build a homemade breeder reactor. The effort was accidentally discovered by local authorities; the radioactive materials were eventually disposed of by federal authorities.
Consequences: 1 injury?

References:

* AP, 27 Aug. 2007,  Man dubbed ‘radioactive boy scout’ pleads guilty,  Detroit Free Press, on line [http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070827/BUSINESS05/70827091].
* AP, 4 Aug. 2007,  ‘Radioactive boy scout’ charged in smoke detector theft,  Fox News, on line [http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,292111,00.html].
* Cardenas, Edward L., and Charles E. Ramirez, 14 Aug. 2007,  Former Scout is held in thefts,  Detroit News, on line [http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070814/METRO03/708140362/1014].
* ClickOnDetroit, 4 Oct. 2007,  ‘Radioactive Boy Scout’ sentenced,  ClickOnDetroit, on line [http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/14269131/detail.html].
* Silverstein, Ken, 2004, The Radioactive Boy Scout: The Frightening True Story of a Whiz Kid and His Homemade Nuclear Reactor, Villard.
* WNN, 2 Aug. 2007,  ‘Radioactive boy scout’ arrested,  World Nuclear News, on line [http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/regulationSafety/Former_Radioactive_Boy_Scout_arrested_for_stealing_smoke_detectors-030807.shtml].

2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 17 October 2007.
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Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

London radiological homicide, 2006
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 7 July 2008

Date: ~1 November 2006

Location: London, United Kingdom

Type of event: assasination by poisoning using ingested radioactive substance

Description:

Alexander Litvinenko, a former KGB agent and recent critic of Russia’s Putin administration, fell ill in London and eventually died of poisoning. Litvinenko had been granted asylum in the United Kingdom in 2000 following persecution in Russia. Recently he had been investigating the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, a journalist critical of the Putin administration. On 1 November he met with two Russians, Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitry Kovtun, at Pine Bar in London’s Millennium Hotel, then met with Italian Mario Scaramella at a London sushi bar. A few hours later he fell ill and was admitted to a London hospital. Doctors came to suspect poisoning, with poisoning by a radioactive substance suggested on 21 November. Litvinenko died on 23 November, and on 24 November his death was linked to a  major dose  of radioactive polonium-210. Polonium-210 is an alpha emitter with a half-life of 138 days and is a fairly volatile metal; the ingested maximum permissible body burden is 0.03 microcuries, or about 7 nanograms. Reportedly Litvinenko’s symptoms and time from exposure to death are consistent with the ingestion of about 5 microcuries of polonium-210 (about 1 microgram, equivalent to a sphere 0.6 millimeters in diameter).

Litvinenko’s wife was found to be contaminated with polonium-210 but did not suffer injury. On 24 November unusually high levels of polonium-210 were found at the sushi restaurant visited by Litvinenko as well as Litvinenko’s home and a portion of the hospital where Litvinenko was treated; these sites were closed off for decontamination. Trace levels of polonium-210 contamination were reported on 27 November at two other central London locations, on 29 November on two British Airways 767s that served the London-Moscow route, and on 30 November at a total of 12 London locations, including a soccer stadium visited by Lugovi and Kovtun on 1 November. Checks at additional locations proved negative, including some of 30 locations identified as  actually or potentially contaminated  as of 20 December. As of 5 December 3,233 people had called the British health service regarding possible exposures. Of these, 244 were identified for followup and 28 had been referred for assessment of possible radiation exposure. (These figures were up from 1,325 callers, 68 identified for checking, and 21 referred, through 29 November). In addition, 238 workers at the two hospitals where Litvinenko was treated were investigated for possible exposure and 71 were referred for testing. No additional positive exposures were identified through 6 December; this includes negative results on workers at the hospitals where Litvinenko was treated, all staff at the sushi bar, and 3 individuals referred after reporting possible radiation exposure. However, on 7 December it was announced that 7 bar staff of the Millenium Hotel’s Pine Bar were found contaminated with polonium-210. Following an interview of Lugovoi by British investigators at the British embassy in Moscow on 4 December, trace amounts of radioactive contamination were found there. Radioactive material has been ruled out in the poisoning of former Russian prime minister Yegor Gaidar in Dublin, Ireland, on 24 November.

On 6 December UK authorities officially announced Litvinenko’s death was being investigated as a homicide. On 7 December Russian authorities announced they were opening a criminal case, additionally stating that Kovtun had fallen ill. Disputed reports state that Kovtun is in critical condition and in a coma. On 8 December Lugovoi was reported ill as well. The use of polonium-210 in a poisoning would require access to the product from a nuclear research-type reactor and/or sophistication laboratory separation techniques. The Russian government has denied any involvement in the poisoning. On 28 May 2007 UK authorities formally requested extradition of Lugovoi from Russia under charges for Litvinenko’s murder. Russia formally refused the request on 5 July, asserting that the Russian constitution did not permit extradition of citizens. The United Kingdom and Russia expelled four of each other’s diplomats in the rift that followed. In July 2008 it was reported that British officials had concluded there were  strong indications  that the murder was backed by the Russian government.

In 2007 UK authorities reported results of tests on a total of 735 people for Po-210 contamination: 596 were not contaminated; 120 showed probable contact with Po-210 but with levels indicating no health risk; and 17 people (one relative of Litvinenko, probably his wife, and 16 motel staff) with Po-210 levels  not significant enough to cause any illness in the short term and any increased risk in the long term is likely to be very small.

Consequences: 1 death, 2 injuries.

References:

* AP, 7 Dec. 2006,  Criminal case opened in ex-spy’s death,  Yahoo News, on line [http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061207/ap_on_re_eu/poisoned_spy].
* BBC, 7 Dec. 2006,  Funeral service for murdered spy,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6216202.stm].
* BBC, 24 Nov. 2006,  ‘No radiation risk’ public told,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6181190.stm].
* BBC, 6 Dec. 2006,  Radiation find in British embassy,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6215168.stm].
* BBC, 24 Nov. 2006,  Radiation tests after spy death,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6180682.stm].
* BBC, 19 July 2007,  Russia expels four embassy staff, BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6906481.stm].
* BBC, 7 Dec. 2006,  Russian ex-PM blames ‘poisoners’,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6216842.stm].
* BBC, 24 Nov. 2006,  Spy’s death-bed Putin accusation,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6180068.stm].
* BBC, 8 Dec. 2006,  Tests for spy murder bar visitors,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6220026.stm].
* BBC, 8 Dec. 2006,  Timeline: Former Russian spy case,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6179074.stm].
* BBC, 27 July 2007,  Timeline: Litvinenko death case,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6179074.stm].
* BBC, 7 July 2008, Russia ‘backed Litvinenko murder’,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7494142.stm].
* Harrison, John, Rich Leggett, David Lloyd, Alan Phipps, and Bobby Scott, 2007,  Polonium-210 as a poison,  Journal of Radiological Protectin, 27:17-40.
* Health Protection Agency, 19 Sept. 2007,  Public health response to the polonium-210 incident,  Health Protection Agency, on line [http://www.hpa.org.uk/hpa/news/articles/press_releases/2007/070919_polonium.htm].
* Health Protection Agency, 29 Nov. 2006,  Updated on public health issues related to Polonium-210 investigation,  Health Protection Agency, on line [http://www.hpa.org.uk/hpa/news/articles/press_releases/2006/291106_pol210.htm].
* Health Protection Agency, 3 Dec. 2006,  Updated on public health issues related to Polonium-210 investigation,  Health Protection Agency, on line [http://www.hpa.org.uk/hpa/news/articles/press_releases/2006/031206_pol210.htm].
* Health Protection Agency, 6 Dec. 2006,  Updated on public health issues related to Polonium-210 investigation,  Health Protection Agency, on line [http://www.hpa.org.uk/hpa/news/articles/press_releases/2006/061206_pol210.htm].
* Health Protection Agency, 15 March 2007,  Updated on public health issues related to Polonium-210 investigation,  Health Protection Agency, on line [http://www.hpa.org.uk/hpa/news/articles/press_releases/2007/070315_polonium-210.htm].
* Ionactive, 2007,  Polonium-210 poisoning,  Ionactive Consulting, on line [http://www.ionactive.co.uk/news_article.html?n=42].
* London Resilience Partnership, 20 Dec. 2006,  Agencies announce progress on the Litvinenko remediation process,  London Resilience, on line [http://www.londonprepared.gov.uk//statements/statement-20061220.jsp].
* Los Alamos National Laboratories Chemistry Division, 12 Dec. 2003,  Polonium,  LANL, on line [http://periodic.lanl.gov/elements/84.html].
* Reuters, 7 Dec. 2006,  Litvinenko contact Kovtun critically ill: Ifax,  Yahoo News, on line [http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061207/ts_nm/britain_poisoning_kovtun_dc].
* Ricon, Paul, 28 Nov. 2006,  Sophistication behind spy’s poisoning,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6190144.stm].

2006-2007, 2008 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 7 July 2008.
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Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Florence radiotherapy accident, 2006
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 1 November 2007

Date: 26 May 2006

Location: McLeod Regional Medical Center, Florence, South Carolina, United States

Type of event: accidental radiotherapy exposure to fetus

Description:

A pregnant woman was administered a thyroid ablation treatment involving 15 mCi of metastable technetium-99 (Tc-99m) and 14 uCi of iodine-131. The woman signed a statement that she was not pregnant and persuaded the administering technician that she was not pregnant; the technician failed to perform a pregnancy test as required by procedure. The woman was 17 weeks’ pregnant at the time, however. Her obstetrician reported the issue to the nuclear medicine licensee on 3 October 2006, who estimated the dose to the fetus as 5.17 rad whole body and 13,920 rad to the thyroid. The child was born November 2006 with underactive thyroid gland but no other apparent health problems. The child is receiving thyroid supplement.

Consequences: 1 injury

References:

* Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 2007,  Report to Congress on Abnormal Occurrences, Fiscal Year 2006,  NUREG-0090 Vol. 29, NRC, on line [http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/commission/secys/2007/secy2007-0037/2007-0037scy-attachment1.pdf].

2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 1 November 2007.
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Dakar radiography accident, 2006
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 24 September 2007
Date: ~August 2006

Location: Dakar, Senegal, and Abidjan, Ivory Coast

Type of event: accidental exposure to radiography source

Description:

Following use of an iridium-192 source in radiography equipment in Dakar, Senegal, the source failed to retract into the shielded storage container. Users were not aware that the source was not secure, and the equipment was stored under a staircase for several weeks and later moved to Abidjan, Ivory Coast, for use there. Operators discovered the source was not secure when preparing to use it again. Between the two locations, four employees suffered sufficient exposure to warrant transfer to Paris, France, for medical treatment: all with localized radiation injuries and one additionally reportedly in  particularly serious  condition. Other employees at both sites are being tested for exposure.

Consequences: 4 injuries.

References:

* Bureau Veritas, 1 Sept. 2006,  Accidental exposure to ionising radiation in Senegal and the Ivory Coast: four people receive treatment in France,  Bureau Veritas, on line [http://www.bureauveritas.com/webapp/servlet/RequestHandler?mode=displayArchiveDetail&contentID=63992&nextpage=ViewArticle.jsp].
* IRSN, 31 Aug. 2006,  Accident de gammagraphie en Afrique: l’IRSN apporte son assistance et mobilise ses experts dans le domaine de l’irradiation accidentelle,  IRSN, on line [http://www.irsn.fr/].
* IRSN, 15 Feb. 2007,  Les accidents dus aux rayonnements ionisants: le bilan sur un demi-siecle,  IRSN, on line [http://www.irsn.org/document/site_1/fckfiles/File/Internet/documents_doctrines_et_syntheses/les_accidents_dus_aux_rayonnements_ionisants.pdf].

© 2006, 2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 24 September 2007.
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Fleurus irradiator accident, 2006
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 24 September 2007

Date: 11 March 2006

Location: Fleurus, Belgium

Type of event: accident with industrial irradiator

Description:

A worker received an accidental radiation exposure at a facility for irradiation of medical devices. The facility uses a cobalt-60 source in an exposure cell but stowed in a pool when personnel are present, using a safety interlock system. On 11 March the employee noticed a radiation monitor alarm was activated with no irradiation in progress and the cell door open. He reset the alarm and entered the cell for 20 seconds to close the cell door. The worker was not carrying a Geiger counter as required by company procedures. He suffered nausea and vomiting soon afterward but made no connection to the irradiator. Several weeks later he suffered massive hair loss and went to a doctor, when it was determined he suffered an exposure of 420 rem; this estimate was subsequently revised to 440-480 rem. The individual was admitted to a French hospital for treatment of radiation sickness on 31 March. Primary cause of the accident has been suggested to be a failure of the hydraulic control system that raises and lowers the source from safe storage in its pool.

Consequences: 1 injury.

References:
* FANC, 12 April 2006,  Information file: Sterigenics,  FANC, on line [http://fanc.fgov.be/FANC/en/sterigenics_2006_04_11_dossier1.htm].
* Ionactive Consulting, 2006,  Overexposure–irradiation facility,  Ionactive Consulting, on line [http://www.ionactive.co.uk/news_article.html?n=37].
* Ionactive Consulting, Jan. 2007,  Overexposure–irradiation facility,  Ionactive Consulting Newsletter, 1:16, on line at Ionactive Consulting, on line [http://www.radprocalculator.com/Files/Ionactive_Radiation_Protection_newsletter_January_2007.pdf].
* NucNet, 2006,  Belgium overexposure incident provisionally rated INES level 4,  NucNet, on line [http://www.csvts.cz/cns/news06/060407n.htm].
* VRT FlandersNews, 6 April 2006,  Man critical after accident,  VRT FlandersNews, on line [http://www.vrtnieuws.be/nieuwsnet_master/versie2/english/details/060406_nuclear/index.shtml].

2006, 2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 24 September 2007.
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***

St. Petersburg radiological homicide, 2004
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 24 September 2007

Date: ~3-24 September 2004

Location: St. Petersburg, Russia

Type of event: homicide possibly using radioactive material

Description:

Roman Tsepov died 24 September 2004 of poisoning with unknown material. He fell ill shortly after a business trip to Moscow, and in less than three weeks later died. A post mortem analysis reportedly suggested that radioactive material was used in the murder, with contamination of an unspecified radioactive element found at one million times background levels. Other reports suggest the poison was a medicine used to treat leukemia. Tsepov’s symptoms prior to death have been described as severe radiation sickness. Tsepov was general director of the Baltik-Escort private security company, whose clients had included Vladimir Putin when Putin was deputy mayor of St. Petersburg. Both Tsepov and Alexander Litvinenko had connections to a scandal involving the Russian oil company Yukos.

Consequences: 1 fatality.
References:

* Calvert, Jonathan, and Pazit Ravina, 31 Dec. 2006,  Litvinenko murder may be linked to mystery Russian poisonings,  TimesOnLine, on line [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/newspapers/sunday_times/britain/article1265372.ece].
* Krasov, Petr, 22 Nov. 2006,  Famous poisonings,  Kommersant, on line [http://www.kommersant.com/p723709/Alexander_Livinenko_assassination_poisoning/].
* O’Halloran, Julian, 6 Feb. 2007,  Russia’s poisoning ‘without a poison’,  BBC News, on line [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/file_on_4/6324241.stm].
* Yasmann, Victor, 20 Dec. 2006,  Russia: The KGB’s post-Soviet ‘commercialization’,  Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, on line [http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticleprint/2006/12/888236cc-139d-4212-a28d-88451fdaccab.html].
* Zaitseva, Lyudmila, Aug. 2007,  Organized crime, terrorism and nuclear trafficking,  Strategic Insights, 6(5), on line at Center for Contemporary Conflict [http://www.ccc.nps.navy.mil/si/2007/Aug/zaitsevaAug07.asp].

2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 24 September 2007.
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http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/2004RUS1.html

***

Kola Harbor orphaned sources, 2003
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 8 April 2005

Date: 2003-13 November 2003

Location: Kola Harbor, near Polyarny, Russia

Type of event: orphaned sources

Description:

On 12 November 2003, inspectors found the radiothermal generator at navigation lighthouse 414.1 in Olenya Bay, Kola Harbor, had been dismantled. Most of the shielding had been stolen, including the depleted uranium radiation shield. One radioisotope heat source was found nearby in the water 2-3 meters deep. The following day inspectors found a similar situation at lighthouse 437 on Yuzhny Goryachinsky Island, Kola Harbor. Again, the shielding had been stolen, including the depleted uranium shielding, and one source was recovered near the island’s north shore. Both RTGs were BETA-M RTGs, each containing 35,000-curie strontium-90 sources (5 kg each). Without the shielding, the dose rate is 800-1000 roentgens/hour at a distance of 2-5 cm from the sources; the sources generate 230 W of heat. Both cases appear to have involved individuals seeking to steal metal to sell as scrap. It is probable that the perpetrators incurred radiation injury or even a fatal dose; no success was reported in attempts to track down the perpetrators.

Consequences: At least 1 injury presumed.

References:

* Alimov, Rashid, 2 April 2005,  Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators,  on line, Bellona [http://www.bellona.no/en/international/russia/navy/northern_fleet/incidents/37598.html].
* Kudrik, Igor, Rashid Alimov, and Charles Digges, 17 Nov. 2003,  Two strontium powered lighthouses vandalised on the Kola Peninsula,  on line, Bellona [http://www.bellona.no/en/international/russia/navy/northern_fleet/incidents/31767.html].

2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 8 April 2005.
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http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/2003RUS1.html

Liya orphaned sources, 2001-2002
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 23 November 2005

Date: early December 2001-February 2002

Location: Liya, Tsalenjikha district, Republic of Georgia

Type of event: orphaned radiothermal generators

Description:

Three men found two radiothermal generators in the woods 27 km from Liya, western Georgia. They removed the shielding, apparently to recover the material as scrap metal. In early December 2001 they removed both strontium-90 sources, each one 35,000 curies, and took them back to their campsite where they used them as heat sources. All three became sick from radiation exposure within hours. After they sought medical treatment, Georgian authorities contacted the IAEA on 24 December for assistance in securing the sources. A team attempted to reach the sources in January 2002 but was unable to due to heavy snow and rugged terrain. A team successfully reached the sources on 4 February 2002 after which they were secured. Subsequently investigators concluded that the men had been using and selling lead from the RTG shields for a period of months; 20 kg of contaminated lead was recovered in a Liya house. One report claims the men were offered $10,000 to transport the sources to Turkey.

Consequences: 3 injuries.
References:

* IAEA, 2003,  Safety related events and issues worldwide during 2002: A report supporting the nuclear safety review for the year 2002,  on line, IAEA [http://www.iaea.org/ns/CoordiNet/documents/nsr2002_events.pdf].
* Kudrik, Igor, Rashid Alimov, and Charles Digges, 17 Nov. 2003,  Two strontium powered lighthouses vandalised on the Kola Peninsula,  on line, Bellona [http://www.bellona.no/en/international/russia/navy/northern_fleet/incidents/31767.html].
* Parrish, Scott, ed., 1 May 2002,  Radiothermal generators containing strontium-90 discovered in Liya, Georgia,  Center for Nonproliferation Studies, on line at Nuclear Threat Institute [http://www.nti.org/db/nistraff/2002/20020030.htm].
* Standring, W. J. F., O. G. Selanaes, M. Sneve, I. E. Finne, A. Hosseini, I. Amundsen, and P. Strand, 2005,  Assessment of environmental, health and safety consequences of decommissioning radioisotope thermal generators (RTGs) in Northwest Russia,  StralevernRapport 2005:4, on line at Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority [http://www.nrpa.no/dokumentarkiv/StralevernRapport4_05.pdf].

2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 23 November 2005.
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***

Guangzhou radiological assault, 2002
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 18 September 2007

Date: May 2002

Location: Guangzhou, P.R. China

Type of event: use of radioactive material in intentional assault on an individual

Description:

A Chinese nuclear scientist, Gu Jiming, used radioactive iridium-192 pellets in an attack on a business rival. Gu used forged papers to obtain an industrial machine containing the iridium-192, then placed them above the ceiling panels in the hospital office of the rival. The victim soon reported symptoms including memory loss, fatigue, appetite loss, headaches, vomiting, and bleeding gums. Another 74 staff members of the hospital, including one pregnant woman, also had symptoms. Gu was convicted 29 September 2003, given a suspended death sentence (life in prison), and an assistant was sentenced to a 15-year prison term.

Consequences: 75 injuries.

References:

* Mohtadi, Hamid, and Antu Murshid, 7 July 2006,  A global chronology of incidents of chemical, biological, radioactive and nuclear attacks: 1950-2005,  on line, National Center for Food Protection and Defense [http://www.ncfpd.umn.edu/docs/GlobalChron.pdf].
* Nature, 9 Oct. 2003,  Researcher faces life in prison for revenge radiation poisoning,  Nature, 425:552.

2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 18 September 2007.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/2002PRC1.html

***
Kandalaksha orphaned source, 2001
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 28 February 2008

Date: May-June 2001

Location: Kandalaksha Nature Preserve, Murmansk region, Russia

Type of event: orphaned source

Description:

In May four individuals partially dismantled a radiothermal generator shielding at a lighthouse near Kandalaksha, seeking to steal metal to sell as scrap; they removed three radioisotope power sources. All four were hospitalized with radiation injuries. The sources were recovered in June 2001. The recovery operation was supported by the government of Finnmark, a province of Norway.

Consequences: 4 injuries.

References:

* Alimov, Rashid, April 2005,  Radioisotope thermoelectric generators,  Bellona, on line [http://www.bellona.org/english_import_area/international/russia/navy/northern_fleet/incidents/37598].
* Standring, W. J. F., M. Dowdall, M. Sneve, O. G. Selnaes, and I. Amundsen, 2007,  Environmental, health and safety assessment of decommisioning radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) in northwest Russia,  Journal of Radiological Protection, 27:321-331.
* Standring, W. J. F., O. G. Selanaes, M. Sneve, I. E. Finne, A. Hosseini, I. Amundsen, and P. Strand, 2005,  Assessment of environmental, health and safety consequences of decommissioning radioisotope thermal generators (RTGs) in Northwest Russia,  StralevernRapport 2005:4, on line at Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority [http://www.nrpa.no/dokumentarkiv/StralevernRapport4_05.pdf].

2005-2007, 2008 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 28 February 2008.
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http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/2001RUS2.html

***

doe1x.jpg

Johnston’s Archive

Nuclear Weapons

North Korea’s first nuclear test

on weapons effects:

* The Effects of a Nuclear Attack on the Rio Grande Valley

* The Effects of a Global Thermonuclear War, 4th ed.

* Nuclear weapons effects–an overview
* Nuclear weapons effects: Some data

* High-altitude nuclear explosions

* Graphs of weapons effects

* Your annual radiation dose

on weapons design:

* Simplified schematic of a nuclear fission implosion weapon (typical atomic bomb, diagram)
* Simplified schematic of a multistage thermonuclear weapon (typical hydrogen bomb, diagram)

* Nuclear weapon yields vs. weight (graph)

on programs, weapons, and deployments:

* Strategic and theater nuclear forces:
o Part 1: Introduction and sources
o Part 2: United States
o Part 3: Russia
o Part 4: United Kingdom, France, and P.R. China
o Part 5: Israel, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Iran
o Part 6: Summary data

* U.S. and Soviet/Russian strategic warheads, 1984-1994 (graph)

Nuclear stockpiles, cumulative estimates and graphs
o including Cumulative estimates, introduction

* Listings of nuclear warhead types:
o Introduction
o United States
o Soviet Union/Russia
o United Kingdom
o France
o People’s Republic of China
o Other countries

* Multimegaton weapons: the largest nuclear weapons

* Nuclear weapons and fissile material in Israel

* Iran: WMD-related facilities

* Listings of strategic missile submarines:
o United States
o Soviet Union/Russia
o United Kingdom
o France
o People’s Republic of China
o Israel

* Missile designations:
o Missile designations, introduction
o Soviet/Russian missile designations
o PR Chinese missile designations

* Listing of Soviet/Russian naval vessels:
o Introduction
o Listing of Soviet/Russian naval vessels
on strategic defense:

* Ballistic Missile Defense and the Strategic Defense Initiative
*  U.S. should have missile defense system
o see also at The Brownsville Herald.

* President George W. Bush’s Speech on National Missile Defense, 1 May 2001.

on nuclear testing:

Nuclear tests–databases and other material

general material:

* Nuclear weapon milestones
o Part 1
o Part 1-B
o Part 2

other material:

*
Database of Radiological Incidents and Related Events
o including List of radiation accidents and other events causing radiation casualties
o Statistical summary of radiation accidents and other events causing radiation casualties
o List of criticality accidents
o and pages on individual incidents

* Nuclear terrorism:
o Nuclear terrorism incidents
o Osama bin Laden and nuclear weapons
o Dirty bombs and other radiological weapons

* Nuclear Weapons in Film

NUCLEAR WEAPONS–INFORMATION LINKS

* United States government sources:
o U.S. Department of Defense.
o DOE Nevada Operations Office.

* foreign government sources:
o CEA (French atomic energy agency) (English).

* organizations and sources in the United States:
o Arms Control Association.
o Brookings Institution.
o Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
o Center for Defense Information.
o Center for Nonproliferation Studies–at the Monterrey Institute for International Studies.
o Center for Strategic and International Studies.
o Federation of American Scientists.
o GlobalSecurity.org.
o Heritage Foundation.
o High Energy Weapons Archive–in depth information, including some of the most detailed information on the Internet regarding nuclear weapon physics.
o High Frontier.
o Institute for Science and International Security.
o National Institute for Public Policy.
o Nautilus.
o Natural Resources Defense Council.
o Submarine World Network.
o Trinity Atomic Web Site.

* organizations outside the United States:
o Bellona Foundation–foundation in Norway.
o Center for Arms Control, Energy and Environmental Studies–at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.
o Centre for Defense and International Security Studies (CDISS)–in the United Kingdom.
o Jane’s Information Group–publisher in the United Kingdom.
o British American Security Information Council (BASIC).

Some recommended nuclear weapon documents

Banner image: Plumbbob Stokes, a 19 kt airburst test of the XW-30 conducted 7 August 1957 (credit: U.S. Department of Energy photograph).

Comments? Questions? Corrections? Contact me.

Copyright © 2001-2006, 2008 by Wm. Robert Johnston. All rights reserved.
Last modified 13 May 2008.
Return to Home. Go to What’s New. Go to FAQ on use of material from this site.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/index.html

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/wrjp1855.html
Nuclear terrorism incidents

SL-1 reactor excursion, 1961
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 17 October 2007

Date: 3 January 1961

Location: SL-1 reactor, National Reactor Testing Station, Idaho, USA

Type of event: criticality excursion in research reactor

Description:

The SL-1 reactor was a prototype of a reactor intended for easy assembly at remote facilities such as DEW line stations in the Arctic. It used 15 kg of uranium fuel (enriched to 91% U-235), was water moderated, and had a thermal power capacity of 3 MWt. Five aluminum-clad cadmium control rods provided reactor control. The SL-1 had operated 2 years, with an 11-day shutdown for maintenance being completed at the time of the incident.

Three workers were reassembling the control rod drives on 3 January in preparation for startup the following day. At about 9:01 PM the three workers were on top of the reactor when one manually removed the center control rod as rapidly as possible, over a 0.5-second period. The reactor became supercritical, with a total energy release of 1.3 x 108 joules (comparable to 30 kg of TNT), producing a steam explosion. The worker who extracted the rod was killed instantly, impaled on the building’s ceiling by a control rod. The other two men were burned and thrown by the steam explosion, one dying instantly from impact with a shielding block and the other sustaining head injuries of which he died 2 hours later (maximum dose sustained was possibly 350 rad). The release of radioactive material was largely contained to the building.

Emergency responders were alerted by an automated alarm and arrived at the site at 9:10 PM. High radiation readings were measured in the reactor building, delaying entry. At 10:50 PM several responders and contractor personnel removed one man alive, who died shortly afterwards. One body was removed from the reactor building on 4 January and the other on 9 January. Of personnel/responders involved, 22 received doses of 3-27 rads from entering the building and/or handling the casualties.

The reason that the control rod was withdrawn is unknown, since none of the workers survived and the facility did not have appropriate data recording systems. The control rods in SL-1 had some tendency to stick, sometimes causing difficulty during manual extraction. One hypothesis is that the worker accidentally withdrew the control rod too far in an effort to overcome a stuck condition. The amount of withdrawal involved was about 50 cm, possibly difficult to achieve accidentally, and the particular control rod involved had not been sticking for the past six months. Another hypothesis is that the rod was intentionally withdrawn in an act of murder-suicide; this was the conclusion of the investigation of the incident.

Consequences: 3 fatalities, all from mechanical/thermal effects of the explosion.

References:

* Combustion Engineering, 15 May 1961,  SL-1 Reactor Accident on January 3, 1961: Interim Report,  U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, on line at Idaho Operations Office [http://www.id.doe.gov/foia/IDO-19300a.pdf].
* Flight Propulsion Laboratory Department, General Electric Company, 21 Nov. 1962,  Additional Analysis of the SL-1 Excursion: Final Report of Progress July through October 1962,  U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, on line at Idaho Operations Office [http://www.id.doe.gov/foia/IDO-19313.pdf].
* Horan, J. R., 1968,  Major health physics experiences during 15 years of reactor testing,  in Radiation Protection, Part 1, ed. by W. S. Snyder, H. H. Abee, L. K. Burton, R. Maushart, A. Benco, F. Duhamel, and B. M. Wheatley, Pergamon Press (New York, NY), pp. 541-546.
* McKeown, William, 2003, Idaho Falls: The Untold Story of America’s First Nuclear Accident, ECW Press.
* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].
* RNSI, June 2002,  The International Accident Dosimetry Comparison Programme 10-21 June 2002 , on line at IRSN [http://www.irsn.fr/va/04_act/04_act_2/04_act_21dossiers_irsn/pdf/va_dp_intercomp.pdf].
* SL-1 Report Task Force, Jan. 1962,  IDO Report on the Nuclear Incident at the SL-1 Reactor on January 3, 1961 at the National Reactor Testing Station,  U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, on line at Idaho Operations Office [http://www.id.doe.gov/foia/IDO-19302.pdf].
* Stacy, Susan M., 2000, Proving the Principle: A History of the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, 1949-1999, U.S. DOE, on line at Idaho National Laboratory [http://www.inl.gov/proving-the-principle/].

2004-2006, 2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 17 October 2007.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1961USA1.html

***

Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Wood River criticality accident, 1964
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 14 September 2005

Date: 24 July 1964

Location: Wood River, Rhode Island, USA

Type of event: criticality accident with uranium solution
Description:

The accident occurred at a facility which reprocessed for recovery highly enriched uranium in scrap material from fuel element production. A tank containing uranium (93% U-235) in sodium carbonate solution was being agitated by a stirrer. A worker, intending to add a bottle of trichloroethane to remove organics, erroneously added a bottle of uranium solution to the tank, producing a criticality excursion accompanied by a flash of light and the splashing of about 20% of the tank’s contents (about 10 liters out of 40-50 liters, including the bottle contents) out of the tank. The worker fled to the site’s emergency building. Two plant administrators returned to the building; one turned off the agitator, producing a lesser criticality excursion that was not recognized until their dosimeters were examined. The administrators incurred doses of 100 rads and 60 rads. The worker absorbed about 10,000 rads and died 49 hours after the accident.

Consequences: 1 fatality (10,000 rem), 1 injury.

References:

* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].

2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 14 September 2005.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1964USA1.html

***

List of Criticality Accidents
last updated 20 September 2007

date    location    type of accident    deaths    injuries    highest dose (rem)    activity release    fissions (x1015)
11 Feb 1945    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium in styrex    0    0    0        6
6 Jun 1945    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium in water    0    0    66        40
21 Aug 1945    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    plutonium assembly    1    1    510        10
21 May 1946    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    plutonium assembly    1    4    2100        3
? Dec 1949    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    2.5        35
~1950?    Chalk River, Ontario, Canada    uranium in water    0    0    >5?        ?
1 Feb 1951    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium in water    0    0    ~0        100
16 Nov 1951    Hanford Works, Washington, USA    plutonium in solution    0    0    low        80
18 Apr 1952    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        15
2 Jun 1952    Argonne, Illinois, USA    uranium in water    0    2    140        122
12 Dec 1952    Chalk River, Ontario, Canada    uranium in water    0    0    low        120000
9 Apr 1953    Sarov, Russia, USSR    plutonium assembly    0    0    1.6        11
15 Mar 1953    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    plutonium in solution    1    1    1000        200
3 Feb 1954    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        56
26 May 1954    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    0.9        100
22 Jul 1954    Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    uranium in water    0    0    ~0        4680
29 Nov 1955    Argonne, Illinois, USA    uranium    0    0    ~0        470
1 Feb 1956    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    0.6        160
3 Jul 1956    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium    0    0    0        32
12 Feb 1957    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        120
21 Apr 1957    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    uranium in solution    1    5    3000        100
2 Jan 1958    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    uranium in solution    3    1    6000        230
16 Jun 1958    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    uranium in solution    0    5    460        1300
15 Oct 1958    Vinca, Yugoslavia    uranium in water    1    5    430        2600
18 Nov 1958    Reactor Testing Area, Idaho, USA    uranium    0    0    ~0        25000
30 Dec 1958    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    plutonium in solution    1    0    12000        150
16 Oct 1959    Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    50    some    40000
15 Mar 1960    Saclay, France    uranium in water    0    0    ~0        3000
17 Jun 1960    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        60
5 Dec 1960    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    plutonium in solution    0    0    2        250
3 Jan 1961    Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    uranium in water    3    0    fatal*        4400
25 Jan 1961    Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    <0.06        600
14 Jul 1961    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    uranium    0    1    200        12
10 Nov 1961    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        10
7 Apr 1962    Hanford, Washington, USA    plutonium in solution    0    3    110        800
7 Sep 1962    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    plutonium in solution    0    0    low        200
5 Nov 1962    Idaho RTA, Idaho, USA    uranium in water    0    0    ~0        1000
11 Dec 1962    Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA    uranium    0    0    ~0        30
30 Jan 1963    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    uranium in solution    0    0    17        790
11 Mar 1963    Sarov, Russia, USSR    plutonium assembly    0    2    550        5
26 Mar 1963    Livermore, California, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    0.12        376
2 Dec 1963    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    uranium in solution    0    0    <5        60
24 Jul 1964    Wood River, Rhode Island, USA    uranium in solution    1    1    10000        130
28 May 1965    White Sands, New Mexico, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0        150
30 Dec 1965    Mol, Belgium    uranium in water    0    1    500        430
3 Nov 1965    Electrostal Plant, Russia, USSR    uranium oxide slurry    0    0    3        8
16 Dec 1965    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    uranium in solution    0    0    0.27        550
30 Jan 1968    Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    low        11
5 Apr 1968    Chelyabinsk-70, Russia, USSR    uranium assembly    2    0    3000        60
6 Sep 1968    Aberdeen, Maryland, USA    uranium assembly    0    0    ~0    0    609
10 Dec 1968    Mayak Enterprise, Russia, USSR    plutonium in solution    1    1    2450        130
24 Aug 1970    Windscale Works, England, United Kingdom    plutonium in solution    0    0    2        1
15 Feb 1971    Kurtchatov, Russia, USSR    uranium    0    2    ?        20000
26 May 1971    Kurtchatov, Russia, USSR    uranium in water    2    2    6000        2000
17 Oct 1978    Idaho CPP, Idaho, USA    uranium in solution    0    0    low        2700
13 Dec 1978    Siberian Chemical Combine, Russia, USSR    plutonium assembly    0    1    250        3
23 Sep 1983    Constituyentes, Argentina    uranium in water    1    0    3700        400
10 Aug 1985    Chazhma Bay, Vladivostock, Russia, USSR    uranium reactor    10    49    220    ~7 MCi    5000
15-16 May 1997    Novosibirsk Plant, Russia    uranium in solution    0    0    <0.4        5.5
17 Jun 1997    Arzamas-16, Russia    uranium assembly    1    0    4800        10000
30 Sep 1999    Toki-mura, Japan    uranium in solution    2    1    1800        2500

2002, 2007 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 20 September 2007.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radcrit.html

***

Kurtchatov SF-3 criticality accident, 1971
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 14 September 2005

Date: 26 May 1971

Location: Kurtchatov, Russia, USSR

Type of event: criticality accident with uranium in water

Description:

Experiments were being conducted to determine the number of uranium fuel rods (90% U-235) required to produce a critical configuration. Rods were placed in various geometries within a Plexiglas tank which was filled with water, with additional rods added a few at a time. Insufficient calculations had been performed regarding such an apparatus. At the completion of one experiment, the water was being rapidly drained, causing the rods to slump into a supercritical configuration. The excursion ejected water and fuel rod fragments from the tank. One technician received about 6,000 rem and died 5 days later; a supervisor received 2,000 rem and died 15 days later. Two others in the room received doses of 700-800 rem and suffered acute radiation sickness; they survived with long term health effects.

Consequences: 2 fatalities (6,000 and 2,000 rem), 2 injuries (700-800 rem).

References:

* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].

2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 14 September 2005.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1971USSR2.html

***
Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Toki-mura criticality accident, 1999
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 11 June 2006

Date: 30 September-1 October 1999

Location: JCO Fuel Fabrication Plant, Toki-mura, Ibarakin, Japan

Type of event: criticality accident at fuel fabrication plant

Description:

Three operators were engaged in processes combining uranium oxide with nitric acid to produce a uranium-containing solution for shipment. The uranium involved was 18.8% U-235. The procedure used deviated from that licensed to the facility. In particular the uranium solution was being placed in a precipitation tank for dispensing into shipment containers, not the more narrow vessel (geometrically favorable to minimizing criticality risks) prescribed by license. At about 10:35 AM, while two workers were adding a seventh batch of uranium solution to the tank, a criticality excursion occurred. The two workers, along with a third worker nearby, observed a blue flash and fled the location; simultaneously, gamma-radiation detectors went off in the building and two adjacent buildings, prompting all workers to evacuate to a muster area. Workers were relocated following higher than background radiation readings. The two workers who had been pouring both began vomiting during transport to the hospital. The excursion continued for 20 hours (the facility did not have a procedure for dealing with criticality events) until outside experts were brought in to drain the tank, shortly after midnight. At 3:18 PM an evacuation of residents within 350 meters of the site had been ordered due to 5 rad/hr readings at the facility boundary; at 10:30 PM an advisory was issued to residents within a radius of 10 km to stay indoors. Of the three workers involved in the accident, the one pouring the solution received 600-1,000 rem and died 210 days later; the one holding the funnel received 1,600-2,000 rem and died 82 days later; and the one at a nearby desk received 100-450 rem and was hospitalized for three months. Both workers who died had received transplants of blood stem cells. The highest doses to neighboring residents were between 5 and 25 rem in the case of about 20 residents.

Consequences: 2 fatalities (1,700 and 800 rem), 1 injury (300 rem).

References:

* Fujimoto, Kenzo, Dec. 1999,  Nuclear accident in Tokai, Japan,  Journal of Radiological Protection, 19:377-380.
* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].
* UNSCEAR, 2000,  Annex E: Occupational radiation exposures,  in Sources and Effects of Ionizing Radiation: United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation UNSCEAR 2000 Report to the General Assembly, with Scientific Annexes, Volume I: Sources, UNSCEAR, on line at UNSCEAR [http://www.unscear.org/docs/reports/annexe.pdf].

2004, 2005, 2006 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 11 June 2006.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1999JAP1.html

***

Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Arzamas-16 criticality accident, 1997
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 14 September 2005

Date: 17 June 1997

Location: Russian Federal Nuclear Center (Arzamas-16), Sarov, Russia

Type of event: criticality accident with uranium metal assembly

Description:

A criticality accident occurred at the Russian Federal Nuclear Center, formerly Arzamas-16. An experimenter was attempting to replicate a successful 1972 experiment involving a sphere of highly enriched uranium (90%) surrounded by a spherical copper reflector. However, he had incorrectly recorded the outside reflector dimensions and as a result used a much larger reflector; further, he had failed to complete appropriate paperwork on the experiment and was working alone. He had assembled the uranium sphere within a hemisphere of the copper reflector in an experimental cell. While adding the first layer of the second copper hemisphere, it dropped onto the assembly and produced a supercritical assembly at 10:40 AM. A flash of light resulted, after which the experimenter left the cell. The uranium core reached a calculated peak temperature of 865E C before power output declined to a steady 480 W. The assembly remained in this state until 12:45 AM on 24 June 1997 when it was remotely disassembled. The experimenter received a dose of 4850 rem, from which he died the morning of 20 June, 66 hours after the accident.

Consequences: 1 fatality (4850 rem).

References:

* IAEA, 2001, The Criticality Accident at Sarov, IAEA (Vienna, Austria), on line at IAEA [http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1106_scr.pdf].
* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].

2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 14 September 2005.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1997RUS1.html

***

Database of radiological incidents and related events–Johnston’s Archive

Constituyentes research reactor accident, 1983
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 14 September 2005

Date: 23 September 1983

Location: RA-2 Facility, Constituyentes, Argentina

Type of event: criticality accident in research reactor

Description:

An accident occurred during operation of the RA-2 research reactor. Two fuel elements had been placed outside the graphite reflector surrounding the reactor but had not been removed from the tank. A technician was changing the fuel configuration from the control room while moderating water was in the reactor, a procedural violation. A criticality excursion occurred, exposing the operator to a 3,700-rad dose (2000 rad gamma and 1700 rad neutron), with the upper right side of the body exposed the worst. The operator died 2 days later. Two others in the control room received doses of 35 rad each.

Consequences: 1 fatality.

References:

* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].
© 2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 14 September 2005.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1983ARG1.html

****

Vinca reactor accident, 1958
compiled by Wm. Robert Johnston
last modified 14 September 2005

Date: 15 October 1958

Location: Boris Kidrich Institute, Vinca, Yugoslavia

Type of event: criticality accident at research reactor

Description:

The accident involved a research reactor using 3,995 kg of aluminum-clad natural uranium fuel in a tank filled with heavy water for moderator. A subcritical foil counting experiment was being performed when an experimenter noticed the smell of ozone and realized a criticality excursion was occurring. The power buildup had gone undetected as the water level was raised due to saturation of both detecting chambers. The total energy release was about 80 million joules (about 2 kg of TNT equivalent). The six individuals in the room received doses of 433, 422, 415, 410, 320, and 205 rem. All developed severe radiation sickness and one died. The five survivors all received experimental bone marrow transplants, which were rejected in all patients, although before rejection the transplants probably contributed to survival.

Consequences: 1 fatality (433 rem?), 5 injuries (422, 415, 410, 320, 205 rem).
References:

* Cosset, Jean Marc, 2002,  ESTRO Breur Gold Medal Award Lecture 2001: Irradiation accidents–lessons for oncology?,  Radiotherapy and Oncology, 63:1-10.
* McLaughlin, Thomas P., Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, May 2000, A Review of Criticality Accidents, 2000 Revision, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM), on line at CSRIC [http://www.csirc.net/docs/reports/la-13638.pdf].

2004, 2005 by Wm. Robert Johnston.
Last modified 14 September 2005.
Return to Home. Return to Nuclear Weapons Resources. Return to Database of radiological incidents and related events.
http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/radevents/1958YUG1.html

***

« up

732 F.2d 404

15 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 978

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
Edwin P. WILSON, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 83-2125.

United States Court of Appeals,
Fifth Circuit.

May 4, 1984.

Marian S. Rosen, Houston, Tex., for defendant-appellant.

Daniel K. Hedges, U.S. Atty., James R. Gough, Asst. U.S. Atty., Houston, Tex., for defendant-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas.

Before GEE, POLITZ and JOHNSON, Circuit Judges.

POLITZ, Circuit Judge:
1

Convicted by jury of conspiracy, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 371, and of substantive counts arising out of an illegal shipment of plastic explosives, contrary to 18 U.S.C. Secs. 2 and 1001, 22 U.S.C. Sec. 2778(c), and 49 U.S.C. Sec. 1809(b), Edwin P. Wilson appeals, assigning multiple errors. Finding no reversible error, we affirm.

Procedural Background
2

Wilson, Edward Bloom and Donald Thresher were indicted for conspiracy to make an illegal shipment of twenty tons of C-4 plastic explosives from Houston, Texas to Tripoli, Libya in October 1977. Bloom and Thresher were severed. Bloom was separately tried and convicted; Thresher pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge.
3
The indictment contains four counts. Count one charges the conspiracy, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 371. Count two charges the presentation of a falsified Shipper’s Export Declaration, which listed the explosives as drilling mud, 18 U.S.C. Secs. 2 and 1001. Count three charges the export of cyclotrimethylene trinitramine (the active ingredient in the C-4 explosive) without obtaining the required license from the State Department, in violation of 22 U.S.C. Sec. 2778(c), 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2, and Title 22 C.F.R. Secs. 121.01 (category V), 121.11, 123.01. Count four charges the illegal transportation of a hazardous material by cargo aircraft, in violation of 49 U.S.C. Sec. 1809(b), 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2, and 49 C.F.R. Secs. 172.100, 172.101.
4

Prior to trial two hearings were conducted. The first involved Wilson’s motion to dismiss the indictment because of the manner in which he was taken into custody and brought before the court. Wilson maintained that the government had acted improperly in luring him back to the United States. The district court denied this motion. The court then conducted a James hearing and made the requisite findings of a conspiracy and Wilson’s involvement in it. After trial, the jury returned verdicts of guilty on all four counts.

Factual Background
5

In early 1977, Jerome S. Brower, a manufacturer and distributor of explosives from Pomona, California, met with Wilson to discuss the purchase by Wilson of C-4 explosives for shipment to Libya. Brower obtained 40,000 pounds which he sold to Wilson for $13.75 per pound, payable in advance to Brower’s account in a Swiss bank. The payment was made on August 18, 1977. At Wilson’s direction, Brower prepared an invoice reflecting a price of $20 per pound.
6

After acquiring the C-4 from different sources Brower packaged it in five-gallon cans and covered it with drilling mud. Brower completed the disguise by affixing fictitious drilling mud labels.
7

The camouflaged explosives were trucked to Houston and loaded on a chartered DC-8 for ostensible shipment to Lisbon, Portugal. The flight did not terminate in Portugal, but continued to Tripoli, Libya where the aircraft was met by Wilson who directed the ultimate delivery of the explosives.
8

In the shipping process, Wilson’s representative falsified the shipping documents by claiming that the cargo was drilling mud additive and by falsely declaring the destination. No license to export was secured and the cargo carrier was not informed of the hazardous nature of the shipment.

Assignments of Errors
9

1.  CIA Defense
10

Wilson contends that he was denied a fair trial because evidence probative of his intent was excluded, thus denying him an opportunity to present his  CIA defense.  He maintains that he was precluded from introducing evidence that he was either employed by the Central Intelligence Agency or his actions were welcomed and sanctioned by that agency. By showing the government’s approval of his actions and that the apparent criminal acts were a cover for governmental operations, Wilson argues that he could have demonstrated his lack of specific intent to commit the violations charged.
11

The record belies Wilson’s assertions that he was not accorded an opportunity to develop his  CIA defense. 1 He was allowed that opportunity. Wilson claims, however, that the exclusion of the testimony of former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and a portion of the proposed testimony of Victor L. Marchetti, undercut the development of this defense. There is no suggestion that Clark had personal knowledge of Wilson or of his activities. Marchetti denied having such knowledge. There is an indication that in an earlier case Clark testified that the CIA had once claimed non-involvement in an incident. This later proved untrue. The record also reflects that Marchetti formerly worked for the CIA but had left that employment 14 years before the trial and eight years before the C-4 shipment. Thereafter his knowledge about CIA activities and practices was limited to public information and conversations with friends in the agency. We find nothing to support a suggestion that Clark or Marchetti had any expert knowledge about the specific types of activities Wilson purportedly engaged in or about the CIA involvement in such activities.
12

Since neither Clark nor Marchetti had pertinent personal knowledge of Wilson or of his association or involvement with the CIA, their testimony could only relate to irrelevant issues or to facts involving the internal practices and procedures of the agency. Clark had no such knowledge and Marchetti’s knowledge was dated. If they were ostensible expert witnesses on agency practices and procedures it fell within  the trial judge[‘s] broad discretion in the matter of the admission or exclusion of expert testimony, and his action is to be sustained unless manifestly erroneous.  Salem v. United States Lines Co., 370 U.S. 31, 35, 82 S.Ct. 1119, 1122, 8 L.Ed.2d 313 (1962). Considering the attenuated nature of the proffered testimony, we cannot say that the trial court’s exclusion constituted reversible error. See Perkins v. Volkswagen of America, Inc., 596 F.2d 681 (5th Cir.1979).

2. Good Faith Defense
13

Wilson contends that he was denied a fair trial because the trial judge declined to instruct the jury on his good faith defense. The trial judge refused the instruction for lack of sufficient evidence to support the claimed defense. We agree. United States v. Caicedo-Asprilla, 632 F.2d 1161 (5th Cir.1980). The evidence which Wilson marshals in support of this assigned error  was insufficient to instruct the jury on the availability of that defense.  Id. at 1171. Wilson’s evidence indicates that during the period of his activities in Libya, Wilson twice met with United States government officials, received a list of Russian military equipment from a CIA agent, discussed with U.S. officials the possibility of acquiring a Russian aircraft through Libya and delivered what was purportedly a set of plans for an atomic weapon. But there is no evidence of government authorizations, express or implied, for the C-4 shipment to Libya. The trial judge did not err in denying the good faith defense instruction.

3. Extraneous Offenses
14

Defendant contends that his trial was tainted by the government’s introduction of evidence concerning extraneous offenses and incidents involving terrorism. Wilson complains of testimony that in 1976 he supported terrorist activities including the building of booby traps, letter bombs and the shipment of explosives to England. He complains of evidence that in 1979 similar cans as were involved in the instant shipment were seen in a Rotterdam warehouse and two such cans were recovered in 1982. He further complains of the use of a videotape showing the recovery of cans containing C-4 and detonation tests reflecting the explosive power of C-4. Wilson further complains of testimony by Brower about a contract Brower had to furnish personnel for production of certain  clandestine devices  in Libya. These devices included lamps that exploded instead of lighting, fire extinguishers that blew up instead of spraying an apyrous material, and briefcases which detonated on command. In closing argument the prosecutor stressed the terrorist training schools, explosive devices and the contents of the videotape.
15

The evidence was offered by the government under Fed.R.Evid. 404(b).2 Admissibility of such evidence is governed by the rule as expressed in United States v. Beechum, 582 F.2d 898, 911 (5th Cir.1978):
16

First, it must be determined that the extrinsic offense evidence is relevant to an issue other than the defendant’s character. Second, the evidence must possess probative value that is not substantially outweighed by its undue prejudice and must meet the other requirements of Rule 403.
17

The first prong is immediately satisfied; the government offered the evidence to establish Wilson’s motive, intent and plan. The more difficult question is posed by the second requirement.
18

The advisory committee notes to Rule 404(b) caution that
19

No mechanical solution [to the issue of admissibility of extrinsic offense evidence] is offered. The determination must be made whether the danger of undue prejudice outweighs the probative value of the evidence in view of the availability of other means of proof and other factors appropriate for making decisions of this kind under Rule 403.
20

28 U.S.C.A. Rules of Evidence at 109 (1975). The determination of probative value vs. unfair prejudice  calls for a commonsense assessment of all the circumstances surrounding the extrinsic offense.  Beechum, 582 F.2d at 914. Wilson sought to justify his acts by claiming that he had no intent to commit the charged crimes. The prosecution’s evidence was probative of that essential element, and the particular extrinsic acts were sufficiently proximate to the alleged offenses. We perceive no error in the decision that the probative value was not substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice. Nor do any of the other Rule 403 grounds for exclusion apply.

4. Evidence Before Grand Jury
21

Wilson submits that the indictment was defective because the grand jury process was abused by the presentation of certain evidence, including extraneous offense evidence. The grand jury which returned the indictment at bar received testimony previously presented to two other grand juries.
22

Traditionally, the grand jury has been accorded wide latitude in its investigation of possible criminal offenses. The grand jury may draw its information from a wide variety of sources, and  the validity of an indictment is not affected by the character of the evidence considered.  United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 343-45, 94 S.Ct. 613, 617-18, 38 L.Ed.2d 561 (1974). A grand jury is not limited to the witnesses or alleged offenders brought before it and is not confined to the evidence or charges presented to it. United States v. Thompson, 251 U.S. 407, 40 S.Ct. 289, 64 L.Ed. 333 (1970). The grand jury is free of the restraints of technical, procedural and evidentiary rules that govern the conduct of criminal trials. United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 94 S.Ct. 613, 38 L.Ed.2d 561 (1974); United States v. McKenzie, 678 F.2d 629 (5th Cir.1982). It may consider any evidence bearing upon the defendant’s guilt, regardless of whether that evidence would be excluded at trial. Courts have consistently refused to dismiss an indictment when the challenge primarily questioned the quality or quantity of the evidence before the grand jury. See United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S. 338, 94 S.Ct. 613, 38 L.Ed.2d 561 (1974) (refusing to dismiss indictment based upon evidence obtained in unlawful search and seizure); United States v. Costello, 350 U.S. 359, 76 S.Ct. 406, 100 L.Ed. 397 (1956) (refusing to dismiss indictment based upon hearsay); United States v. Ocanas, 628 F.2d 353 (5th Cir.1980) (refusing to dismiss indictment based upon evidence obtained in violation of Fed.R.Crim.P. 11(e)(6)). Wilson’s challenge to the indictment is without merit.

5. Biased Jurors
23

Wilson claims denial of a fair trial because the court refused to excuse for cause two jurors who purportedly were biased against him. The record does not support this contention.
24
One of the challenged jurors testified during voir dire examination that he had seen a television broadcast about Wilson, and although he thought it placed Wilson in a bad light, he could not recall any specifics. This juror said he understood the presumption of innocence, and he expressly assured that any prior media exposure would not affect his ability to serve impartially. Wilson does not indicate the basis for the challenge to the second juror other than to note her prior close affinity to law enforcement, through employment and marriage, and because of answers which would support a conclusion that she had no opinion of Wilson’s guilt or innocence. Of this juror, Wilson suggests  it was very apparent she was trying to give noncomittal type answers so that she could be on the jury and was obviously not being truthful with the Court.  The trial judge was not so impressed, nor are we.
25

It is within the discretion of the trial judge to accept jurors exposed to pretrial publicity when the court is satisfied the juror can return a verdict based solely on the evidence adduced and the law as charged. United States v. Jimenez-Diaz, 659 F.2d 562 (5th Cir.1981). Mere awareness of some of the allegations in a case does not disqualify a potential juror. United States v. Dozier, 672 F.2d 531 (5th Cir.1982). A trial court will be reversed only upon a showing of clear abuse of discretion. United States v. Giacalone, 588 F.2d 1158 (5th Cir.1978). We find no abuse in the trial court’s refusal to allow these two jurors to be challenged for cause.
26

6. Misconduct in Securing Custody of Defendant
27

Wilson charges that the court’s jurisdiction over his person was secured by fraud and force and the court should dismiss the indictment. Alleging governmental misconduct Wilson cites as authority United States v. Toscanino, 500 F.2d 267 (2d Cir.1974).
28

In Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436, 7 S.Ct. 225, 30 L.Ed. 421 (1886), the Supreme Court held that the power of a court to try a person for a crime would not be impaired by the fact that the person was forcibly brought within the court’s jurisdiction. The Court has consistently so ruled through a line of cases3 leading to Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519, 72 S.Ct. 509, 96 L.Ed. 541 (1952), and beyond, Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103, 95 S.Ct. 854, 43 L.Ed.2d 54 (1975); United v. Crews, 445 U.S. 463, 100 S.Ct. 1244, 63 L.Ed.2d 537 (1980).
29

Wilson cites Toscanino for the proposition that the courts have moved away from the Ker-Frisbie rule, and, taking a broader view of due process, would deny jurisdiction when the defendant’s physical presence is obtained through fraud or force. We are not persuaded. In Toscanino, the defendant was kidnapped, beaten and tortured. The Second Circuit, appalled at the violation of the standard of human decency, concluded that due process required dismissal of the indictment. Citing Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165, 72 S.Ct. 205, 96 L.Ed. 183 (1952), our colleagues noted that a court can  be presented with a situation in which the conduct of law enforcement agents is so outrageous that due process principles would absolutely bar the government from invoking judicial processes to obtain a conviction.  Toscanino, 500 F.2d at 274. The Supreme Court had noted such in Ker:  We do not intend to say that there may not be proceedings previous to the trial, in regard to which the presence could invoke in some manner the provisions of [the due process] clause of the Constitution.  Ker, 119 U.S. at 440, 7 S.Ct. at 227.
30

We earlier indicated that we did not accept Toscanino as a departure from the long standing rule, and we made it clear that we would not follow it if it were. United States v. Herrera, 504 F.2d 859 (5th Cir.1974), citing Ker and Frisbie, and our decisions in United States v. Caramian, 468 F.2d 1370 (5th Cir.1972); United States v. Vicars, 467 F.2d 452 (5th Cir.1972), and that of our sister circuits, United States v. Cotten, 471 F.2d 744 (9th Cir.1973), and Hobson v. Crouse, 332 F.2d 561 (10th Cir.1964).
31

The Second Circuit subsequently clarified its Toscanino holding in United States Ex Rel Lujan v. Gengler, 510 F.2d 62 (2d Cir.1975), a case factually similar to that now before us. In Lujan the defendant was induced to fly from Argentina to Bolivia, supposedly for business reasons. Instead, American agents were waiting to apprehend him for a return to the United States to face criminal charges. Apparently conscious of the concerns about the possible sweep of its Toscanino decision, the Second Circuit stated:
32

[I]n recognizing that Ker and Frisbie no longer provided a carte blanche to government agents bringing defendants from abroad to the United States by the use of torture, brutality and similar outrageous conduct, we did not intend to suggest that any irregularity in the circumstances of a defendant’s arrival in the jurisdiction would vitiate the proceedings of the criminal court. In holding that Ker and Frisbie must yield to the extent they were inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s more recent pronouncements we scarcely could have meant to eviscerate the Ker-Frisbie rule, which the Supreme Court has never felt impelled to disavow. Although we cited other cases in Toscanino as evidence of the partial erosion of Ker and Frisbie, the twin pillars of our holding were Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165, 72 S.Ct. 205, 96 L.Ed. 183 (1952) and dictum in United States v. Russell, 411 U.S. at [423,] 431-432, 93 S.Ct. 1637 [1642-43, 36 L.Ed.2d 366], both of which dealt with government conduct of a most shocking and outrageous character.
33

510 F.2d at 65. Our analysis of Ker and its progeny compels the conclusion that unless the government conduct in securing custody of the defendant is shocking and outrageous, the court should not dismiss the indictment on a due process basis.
34

When Wilson was indicted he was not within the jurisdiction of the United States. He was considered a fugitive. He was duped by agents of the government who persuaded him to travel to the Dominican Republic. With the cooperation of the authorities there Wilson was placed on a commercial aircraft bound for the United States. Upon arrival he was taken into custody by federal agents. We perceive no factual basis for a deviation from the Ker-Frisbie rule. Wilson was the victim of a nonviolent trick. The district court correctly declined to dismiss the indictment.

7. Insufficient Evidence of Intent
35

Wilson contends that there was insufficient evidence of his specific intent to commit the crimes charged, specific intent being an element of all three offenses for which he was charged. United States v. Hernandez, 662 F.2d 289 (5th Cir.1981); United States v. Wieschenberg, 604 F.2d 326 (5th Cir.1979). Appellant correctly notes the items of proof required for a conviction but fails to note why the proof offered should be found wanting.
36

The standard for review of the sufficiency of the evidence in a criminal case is whether, viewing the evidence and all reasonable inferences most favorable to the prosecution, a reasonable jury could find the guilt of defendant proven beyond a reasonable doubt. The record before us is replete with evidence of Wilson’s knowledge and involvement in the scheme to ship the explosives in an illegal manner. That he willfully intended to conspire and commit the alleged offenses was a matter for the jury’s determination. Its finding is amply supported by the evidence.

8. Exclusion of Classified Information
37

Wilson sought to offer classified information claimed to be relevant to his CIA defense and the issue of intent. In conformity with the requirements of the Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA), 18 U.S.C. Appendix 3 (Supp.1983), 94 Stat. 2025, Wilson filed a Confidential Statement. The government responded by requesting an in camera hearing, as provided for by section 6 of CIPA, to determine the use, relevance and admissibility of the classified information. The government also sought a protective order on use and release of classified information. After a chambers conference the district judge orally stated his ruling on defendant’s request. Wilson’s filing listed nine general subjects areas, none of which related to the October 1977 shipment of C-4 from Houston to Libya. The trial court found this proposed evidence irrelevant and immaterial. Upon completion of our review of this record, including a studied examination of the classified filings, we conclude that the district court correctly found this evidence inadmissible under the ordinary rules of evidence, separate and apart from any CIPA consideration. CIPA does not  undertake to create new substantive law governing admissibility.  United States v. Collins, 720 F.2d 1195, 1199 (11th Cir.1983).

9. Suppression of Subpoenas Duces Tecum
38

On the day jury selection was completed, Wilson served nine subpoenas duces tecum on various persons and agencies, including the Attorney General of the United States, the General Counsel of four intelligence agencies, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of Texas, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the National Security Agency. The subpoenas were identical except that the U.S. Attorney was asked for two items not requested from the other witnesses. The government viewed the subpoenas as an effort to circumvent the court’s prior order and as a delay and harassment tactic. All were quashed.
39

Some of the information sought by the subpoenas previously had been found immaterial and irrelevant, a ruling we have approved. In addition, the subpoenas were general, overbroad and untimely. The district court did not err in quashing them. Fed.R.Crim.P. 17(c).
40

10. Denial of Compulsory Process and Confrontation
41

Wilson claims that in quashing the various subpoenas the district court violated his sixth amendment rights to compulsory process and confrontation. This claim is intertwined with issues earlier discussed, particularly those related to the CIA defense and to Wilson’s assertion that specific intent and knowing criminal acts were not proven. Wilson was not denied an opportunity to offer his defense. He was not denied an opportunity to challenge the government’s proof of specific intent. He called six witnesses. The limitations imposed by the district court’s rulings on evidentiary matters did no violence to Wilson’s constitutional guarantees. The criminal defendant’s right to compulsory process is not absolute and the Constitution does not grant the right to subpoena any and all witnesses a party might wish to call. Ross v. Estelle, 694 F.2d 1008 (5th Cir.1983). The matter is addressed to the trial court’s discretion. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 94 S.Ct. 3090, 41 L.Ed.2d 1039 (1974).11. Error in Applying CIPA
42

Wilson complains that the district judge’s ruling on the CIPA submissions was oral whereas CIPA requires that the basis for the court’s determination is to be  set forth in writing.  Section 6(a) of CIPA. The government concedes that the trial court failed to enter a written order or ruling but contends that Wilson failed to object timely and was not prejudiced. The trial judge on two occasions orally articulated his reasons for that ruling. Although CIPA requires that this determination be in writing, we are convinced that the dictation of reasons into the record, timely transcribed by the court reporter, obviated any likelihood of prejudice in this case. The noncompliance with CIPA, in this case, does not justify a reversal, for the court’s failure to reduce its ruling to writing did not impact on the defense or upon the verdict of the jury. See United States v. Heller, 625 F.2d 594 (5th Cir.1980).

12. Evidence by Affidavit
43

The government introduced an affidavit of Charles A. Briggs, the Executive Director of the CIA and its third-ranking official, subordinate only to the Director and Deputy Director. In this affidavit Briggs declared that he authorized the Chief of the Information Management Staff to have access to all records of the CIA for the purpose of making a search for material  that in any way pertains to Mr. Edwin P. Wilson.  Access was also authorized to the results of any prior search.
44

The government proposed to present the live testimony of the CIA employee who conducted and supervised the search, presumably the Chief of Information Management Staff. As a security matter the government sought permission to tender the witness under a pseudonym but proposed to disclose to the jury his position in the CIA, his access to and review of CIA records, and a description of his background sufficient to qualify him as an expert in covert operations. The government sought an order prohibiting cross-examination about the proposed witness’s real name, his exact address and specific details of his CIA covert activities. The defendant objected to the restrictions and the court sustained the objection. The government offered the Briggs affidavit in the place of the testimony of that witness.
45

The court permitted introduction of the Briggs affidavit under Fed.R.Evid. 803(7) & (10). Wilson contends that admission of this affidavit was error because: (1) it was inadmissible hearsay, (2) if admissible as an exception to the hearsay rule it violated his right of confrontation, and (3) it was procedurally defective.
46

The affidavit was not inadmissible hearsay. It comes within the purview of the exception contained in Rule 803(10), which provides for proof of the absence of a record by a certification in accordance with Fed.R.Evid. 902. The affidavit, read as a whole, substantially conforms to Rules 803(10) and 902. It was executed by the third highest official of the CIA whose duties include overall management, and it is attested to by the General Counsel of the CIA, the custodian of the seal of the CIA.
47

Wilson argues that introduction of the affidavit violated his right to confrontation of witnesses. The claim is not devoid of merit but it is not sufficient to render the affidavit inadmissible as a matter of law. Most exceptions to the hearsay rule necessarily implicate an interruption of the right of confrontation. That fact alone does not bar use of otherwise relevant, material evidence which satisfies sufficient guarantees of trustworthiness and reliability.
48

In the present case, Wilson sought to justify his criminal activity by claiming a special relationship with the CIA. It need hardly be noted that the CIA operates and seeks to operate with a minimum public profile. Its internal workings and activities are not made public and evidence about such is carefully guarded, as it should be. The apparent dilemma presented by the instant case was real. The government was called upon to prove the negative, that Wilson was not directly or indirectly associated with the CIA, or acting with the CIA’s knowledge and approbation when he arranged and concluded the C-4 shipment from Houston to Libya. The approach taken by the government was to first offer a live witness with personal knowledge of CIA records, subject to what the government perceived as reasonable security limitations, and, when blocked by defendant’s objection, to offer the certification of the lack of record evidence, as provided for by the Rules of Evidence. This procedure was not constitutionally impermissible.
49
Wilson’s complaint that the affidavit was procedurally defective is not persuasive. Although preferable, the affidavit need not contain, as an essential element, the words that  diligent search failed to disclose the record …,  Fed.R.Evid. 803(10); United States v. Harris, 551 F.2d 621 (5th Cir.1977). It suffices that the affidavit, and all relevant circumstances, reflect an adequate search. In this regard, the determination by the district court will be accorded wide discretion. There is no merit to this assigned error.

13. Unconstitutionality of CIPA
50

Wilson contends that CIPA is unconstitutional on its face and as applied because it: (1) is void for vagueness, (2) violates the privilege against self-incrimination, (3) violates the confrontation rule, and (4) permits unilateral appeal by the government. Consistent with the court’s obligation to eschew deciding unnecessary points of constitutional law, we do not address these constitutional complaints. United States v. Raines, 362 U.S. 17, 80 S.Ct. 519, 4 L.Ed.2d 524 (1960). We perceive no significant evidence which was allowed or disallowed solely on the basis of CIPA. Certain classified material was ruled out as irrelevant and immaterial, certain subpoenas duces tecum were quashed because they were overbroad, directed to material previously ruled inadmissible, or tardily served. The questions posed by this assignment of error remain for another day for this court.

14. Brady Violation
51

Appellant claims a Brady violation, suggesting that the government had information about associations of certain people with the CIA which would have materially aided Wilson’s defense. Our review of the record, with particular emphasis on the classified filings, briefs and oral arguments, satisfies us beyond peradventure that no Brady violation occurred.
52

Finding no reversible error in any assignment of error, and none as a consequence of the cumulative total of the assignments, we AFFIRM.
1

The trial court made it clear that Wilson was free to develop this defense:

The Court: … There will be no evidence offered at the trial concerning the details of that. If you want to get up there and say, yes, I was sending back valuable information; I was involved in projects before, during and after, but we are not going to talk about the projects or the information.

[Defense counsel]: Do I understand your ruling, that we will be permitted to discuss the projects, as a defensive matter, but we can’t go into detail?

The Court: What do you mean by discuss the projects?

[Defense counsel]: During this entire timeframe, Your Honor, that Mr. Wilson was working over there with the full knowledge of some high officials with the Government, that they knew he had a cover company, that he had been operating in the same manner that he had to some extent previously, and that he was to a great extent given free license to do whatever would be necessary in order to establish the confidence of the Libyans, and during this timeframe that he was doing things, reporting to certain people here with the Government. It seems to me that all of that is very relevant to the man’s defense.

The Court: Yes, to that extent, I would certainly permit it.
2

Fed.R.Evid. 404(b) provides:

OTHER CRIMES, WRONGS, OR ACTS. Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show that he acted in conformity therewith. It may, however, be admissible for other purposes, such as proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or accident.
3

See, e.g., Mahon v. Justice, 127 U.S. 700, 8 S.Ct. 1204, 32 L.Ed. 283 (1888); Lascelles v. Georgia, 148 U.S. 537, 13 S.Ct. 687, 37 L.Ed. 549 (1893); and In re Johnson, 167 U.S. 120, 17 S.Ct. 735, 42 L.Ed. 103 (1897)

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Edwin W. Pauley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Edwin Pauley)
Edwin Wendell Pauley Sr. (January 7, 1903 – July 28, 1981) was an American oilman and political appointee.

Contents

* 1 Early life
* 2 Oil career
* 3 Politics
* 4 1965-1972: CIA, FBI, and UC Berkeley anti-war protests
* 5 References

Early life

Born in Indiana to Elbert L. Pauley and the former Ellen Van Petten, he attended Occidental College northeast of Los Angeles during 1919-20 before getting a degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1922, where he was a member of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, and an M.S. a year later.

Oil career

Pauley made his fortune running oil companies from the mid-1920s onward. He founded The Petrol Corp. in 1923. Pauley was president of Fortuna Petroleum by 1933. In 1938 he was appointed to fill an unexpired term on the UC Berkeley Board of Regents, and remained a regent until 1972. In 1940 he served as a member of the Interstate Oil and Compact Commission; then in 1941 became Roosevelt’s petroleum coordinator for war in Europe on petroleum lend-lease supplies for Russia and England. He was involved in a wide variety of oil business deals, and was sometimes described as an  oil king-pin.  In 1947 he bought Coconut Island in Hawaii, as a private retreat.[1]Several of his deals involved Zapata Corporation, run by George H. W. Bush, including a joint-venture with Pemargo in 1960. In 1958 he founded Pauley Petroleum which, with Howard Hughes, expanded oil production in the Gulf of Mexico.

Later Pauley also became a part owner of the Los Angeles Rams football team and a director of Western Airlines.

Politics

Pauley became involved with the Democratic Party as a fundraiser in 1930s, eventually becoming treasurer of the Democratic National Committee. He was director of the Democratic convention in 1944. He was a friend and confidante of Harry S. Truman, and through Truman’s influence he was appointed as Petroleum Coordinator of Lend-Lease Supplies for the Soviet Union and Britain. As president, Truman appointed him United States representative to the Allied Reparations Committee from 1945-1947. With the rank of ambassador, as well as industrial and commercial advisor to the Potsdam Conference, his chief task was to renegotiate the reparations agreements formulated at Yalta (many of which affected Dulles’ former clients). When Truman tried to appoint him Undersecretary of the Navy in 1946, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes resigned in protest at the conflict of interest given Pauley’s ties to the oil industry. Ickes’ resignation scuttled the appointment, and Pauley worked behind the scenes thereafter.

Pauley left government in the late 1940s and returned to being an independent oil-man.

By successive appointments from several California governors, Pauley served as a University of California Regent from 1940 to 1972. The Pauley Pavilion at University of California, Los Angeles is named in the honor of his parents for Edwin’s philanthropy and service as a Regent. A much smaller but still significant dedication to Edwin Pauley himself, rather than his parents, is the Pauley Ballroom, which can seat up to 1,000 people in the Martin Luther King, Jr. Student Union on the UC Berkeley campus.

By the 1960s, Pauley came to support Ronald Reagan. He was the Board of Regents’ harshest critic of student protests on UC campuses.[2]

1965-1972: CIA, FBI, and UC Berkeley anti-war protests

In 1965, Pauley was serving as a Regent at the University of California, when anti-Vietnam war campus protests began to grow. At Pauley’s request, CIA Director John McCone met with FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover on January 28 and Hoover agreed to leak to Pauley information about UC Berkeley President Clark Kerr. (See memo regarding McCone’s request to meet with Hoover. McCone graduated from UC Berkeley in 1922, the year before Pauley.) At that meeting, McCone told Hoover that Pauley was very upset about the  situation at Berkeley , and was  anxious to get a line on any persons who are communists or have communist associations, either on the faculty or in the student body.  As soon as McCone left his office, Hoover phoned Los Angeles FBI chief Wesley Grapp, and ordered him to give Pauley anonymous memos on regents, faculty members, and students who were  causing trouble at Berkeley.  Hoover admonished Grapp,  It must be impressed upon Mr. Pauley that this data is being furnished in strict confidence. [3]
1965 memo to J. Edgar Hoover from CIA Director John McCone, re: UC Berkeley protests.

Five days later (February 2) Grapp met with Pauley for two hours at his office in the Pauley Petroleum Building in Los Angeles. Grapp provided him information from FBI files on other Regents, faculty, and students who were considered  ultra-liberal.  The CIA and FBI worked in conjunction with Ronald Reagan, who sought to mount a  psychological warfare campaign  against the budding Free Speech Movement and anti-war sit-ins, including using tax-evasion and  any other available  charges in which the FBI agreed to assist.  This has been done in the past, and has worked quite successfully,  Hoover noted.[4][5] [6]

(This information was not made public until 2002, after a fifteen-year legal battle with the FBI that went all the way to the US Supreme Court, as a result of a FOIA request for an in-depth San Francisco Chronicle investigation. The FBI had claimed it needed to maintain secrecy to  protect law enforcement operations.  The National Security Act of 1947 bars the CIA from engaging in domestic intelligence activities.) [7]

Pauley began the February 2, 1965 meeting with Grapp by saying he was upset about the Free Speech Movement and recalled that  obnoxious question… concerning the FBI being a secret police  (referring to a 1959 entry exam question.) He told Grapp he had  no use for [UC President] Kerr  and had accused Kerr of being a  communist or a communist follower.  Pauley explained that the 24-member Board of Regents was divided and that his faction wanted  strong positive action taken immediately to clean up the mess. [citation needed] The problem, he said, was that so far he’d been unable to muster the votes to fire Kerr. He blamed the impasse on three  ultra-liberal  regents who staunchly backed Kerr. Governor Pat Brown (D)) had named to the board: William Coblentz (Brown’s former special counsel); William M. Roth (member of the ACLU executive committee); and Elinor Raas Heller (member of the Democratic National Committee).

Pauley told Grapp that in the 1950s the FBI secretly gave the university reports on professors it was considering hiring. He said he wanted to restore the procedure—which the FBI had code-named the Responsibilities Program — and offered to pay someone to check FBI files. After obtaining Pauley’s promise not to reveal that the FBI was his source, Grapp handed him Hoover’s memos. Pauley quickly read one.  This is perfect,  he said.  This is just what I need. [citation needed] It was a three-page report on UC Berkeley immunology professor Leon Wofsy that summarized news stories from 1945 to 1956, noting that Wofsy had been a self-avowed Communist Party official who tried to get young people involved with the party. (The report failed to note that since 1957 the FBI had found no evidence that Wofsy had been involved with the party.)

Two days later, Grapp reported to Hoover that Pauley would be  an excellent source of information  about internal university affairs. Pauley could also  use his influence to curtail, harass and at times eliminate communists and ultra-liberal members on the faculty [citation needed] — and on the Board of Regents. About a week later, Grapp secretly gave Pauley verbal reports containing confidential information about regents Coblentz, Roth and Heller—even though they had fully disclosed it to the bureau and held top-level security clearances. Pauley, Grapp reported to Hoover, was  most appreciative  of the information on his opponents. As Pauley saw it, according to Grapp’s report, UC would remain in turmoil  as long as the current officials were in power at the university.

That fall, thousands of students joined the escalating protests. To Pauley and the FBI, it was further proof that Kerr had lost control of the university. Pauley confided to Grapp that two alumni were taking things into their own hands. They had recruited athletes to  beat up the demonstrators  and hired a barber to  forcibly ‘shear’ the students who need it. [citation needed] Grapp continued to slip Pauley anonymous memos about students and faculty—at least two dozen more—that he could use in persuading the regents to fire Kerr. But in October, a frustrated Pauley told Grapp he was still  two votes short to fire Clark Kerr. [citation needed] Kerr would remain in charge of the university, it seemed, as long as Brown remained governor.

When Ronald Reagan was elected California’s governor in 1966, after campaigning against  campus malcontents and filthy speech advocates  at Berkeley, one of his first moves was to fire Kerr. Reagan’s Legal Affairs Secretary, Herbert Ellingwood, met with FBI agent Cartha  Deke  DeLoach at FBI Headquarters, and noted that Reagan was  dedicated to the destruction of disruptive elements on college campuses. [8]

After his retirement from the UC system, Pauley concentrated on his many philanthropic interests and business concerns. He was particularly interested in promoting the use of his Coconut Island in Kane`ohe Bay, O`ahu, Hawai`i by the University of Hawai`i and its Hawai`i Institute of Marine Biology.[1] He kept about half of the island for the use of his family—his wife Bobbi, his sons and daughter, and eventually their families. After Pauley’s death in 1981, his surviving wife Bobbi Pauley established the Edwin W. Pauley Foundation to continue their philanthropic work. In 1995, the Pauley family presented the University of Hawai`i with a gift of the private portion of the ca. 24 acre island to the University, and provided funds for the building of a new library and laboratory buildings for the Institute. Built on a living coral reef, the Institute is now one of the world’s premier locations for the study of marine biology.

References

* Saxon, Wolfgang (July 29, 1981). Edwin Wendell Pauley Sr., 78. New York Times
* Biographical sketches: Edwin W. Pauley via Truman Library
* Minor, Linda (2002). Follow The Yellow Brick Road: From Harvard to Enron.
* San Francisco Chronicle,  Reagan, Hoover, and the UC Red Scare,  9 June, 2002.

1. ^ Klieger, P. Christiaan, 2008. Moku o Lo`e: A History of Coconut Island, Bishop Museum Press, Honolulu

Retrieved from  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_W._Pauley
Categories: American businesspeople | 1903 births | 1981 deaths | University of California regents | Bohemian Club members
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Pauley

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Published: Aug. 21, 2009 at 3:32 PM

TEHRAN, Aug. 21 (UPI) — Iran’s Ahwaz Power Generation Management Co. is teaming up with Russia-based power equipment supplier Power Machines to renovate a 300 MW steam turbine at the Ramin thermal power plant Unit 1 in Iran.

Under the contract, Power Machines will manufacture and supply parts and components to renovate the steam turbine’s intermediate pressure cylinder flow path, according to the Russian company.

The contract price is valued at $5 million.

In a related move, Montenegro’s Elektroprivreda Crne Gore has agreed to renovate the Pljevlja thermal power plant.

In that deal, Power Machines will renovate a 210 MW power unit, extending the economic life of the K-210-130-3 turbine and renovating the low pressure cylinder flow path (including rotor and diaphragm replacement), according to Middle East business intelligence reports.

The unit’s TBB-200 turbo generator will also be inspected by Russia engineers.

Half of the estimated $11 million contract will be by the Russian state as part of a debt owed to the former Yugoslav republic.

The renovation projects are scheduled for completion by the end of 2009.

The renovation will increase Pljevlja TPP’s turbine power by 10 MW at a steam rate of 670 tons per hour, according to Power Machines.
2009 United Press International, Inc.

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