WEBVTT

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<v Speaker 1>Imagine you are sleeping soundly in your bed. You're in

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<v Speaker 1>North Carolina. It's the dead of winter, January twenty fourth,

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<v Speaker 1>nineteen sixty one, right, so it's absolutely freezing outside exactly,

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<v Speaker 1>the temperature is hovering right around freezing and above you,

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<v Speaker 1>completely unseen in this pitch black night sky, a United

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<v Speaker 1>States Air Force B fifty two bomber is flying a

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<v Speaker 1>routine patrol.

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<v Speaker 2>And we should clarify a B fifty two is an

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<v Speaker 2>absolute behemoth of an aircraft.

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<v Speaker 1>Oh, it's massive, and it's being piloted by Major Walter Tullock.

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<v Speaker 1>But at roughly ten thousand feet up, something goes catastrophically wrong.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, a fuel leak in the right.

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<v Speaker 1>Wing, right, and this leak causes a massive structural failure.

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<v Speaker 1>The wing literally tears.

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<v Speaker 2>Off, just just rips right off in midair.

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<v Speaker 1>Yes, the aircraft spins wildly out of control. Centrifugal force

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<v Speaker 1>just starts tearing the fuselage apart and tumbling out of

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<v Speaker 1>the disintegrating Bombay are two Mark thirty nine hydrogen bombs.

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<v Speaker 2>Which is just terrifying. I mean, for a sense of

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<v Speaker 2>scale for you listening, each of these weapons has a

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<v Speaker 2>yield of four mega times megatons. Yeah, that is roughly

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<v Speaker 2>two hundred and fifty times more powerful than the weapon

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<v Speaker 2>dropped on Hiroshima.

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<v Speaker 1>It's almost hard to wrap your head around that kind

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<v Speaker 1>of power.

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<v Speaker 2>It really is. It's a volume of destructive force that

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<v Speaker 2>human biology almost isn't equipped to comprehend. Right, you're talking

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<v Speaker 2>about a thermal flash that would vaporize everything within a

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<v Speaker 2>several mile radius, a shockwave that would flatten cities. And

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<v Speaker 2>these two massive weapons are simply free falling in the

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<v Speaker 2>dark over the American South.

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<v Speaker 1>So both bombs separate from the wreckage, right, they're falling

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<v Speaker 1>to Earth. One of them miraculously deploys its parachute the

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<v Speaker 1>stroke of luck, huge luck. It drifts down, gets tangled

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<v Speaker 1>in some trees and lands completely intact. But the other one, well,

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<v Speaker 1>the other one is the reason we're here today.

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<v Speaker 2>Because it didn't deploy the parachute.

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<v Speaker 1>Nope, it plummeted into a muddy field at nearly seven

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<v Speaker 1>hundred miles per hour. But the truly terrifying part is

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<v Speaker 1>what happened on the way.

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<v Speaker 2>Down the arming sequence.

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<v Speaker 1>Yes, as it fell, it went through almost every single

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<v Speaker 1>step of its complex multi stage arming sequence. The timers

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<v Speaker 1>engaged down timeters two right, exactly the barometrical timeters sensing

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<v Speaker 1>the change in air pressure as it fell triggered perfectly.

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<v Speaker 1>The only thing standing between a quiet winter night and

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<v Speaker 1>a nuclear apocalypse on American soil was a single low

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<v Speaker 1>voltage arm safe switch.

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<v Speaker 2>The sheer mechanical probability of that is I mean, it's hunted.

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<v Speaker 1>It's like skydiving with a parachute made of tissue paper.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah. We often think of nuclear weapons as these monolithic,

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<v Speaker 2>magical devices, but at their core they're.

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<v Speaker 1>Just machines, just circuits and wires.

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<v Speaker 2>Exactly, electrical circuits, physical switches, chemical explosives, and the Mark

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<v Speaker 2>thirty nine had a very specific sequence required to initiate

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<v Speaker 2>the nuclear core.

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<v Speaker 1>And if that final switch had flipped.

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<v Speaker 2>If that simple arming switch had flipped, and it was

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<v Speaker 2>literally just a small switch designed to be engaged by

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<v Speaker 2>the pilot in the cockpit, the conventional explosives would have fired. Wow,

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<v Speaker 2>it would compress the plutonium in North Carolina would just

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<v Speaker 2>be a crater.

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Thrilling Threads. I'm your host, and today we

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<v Speaker 1>are doing a deep dive into the historical record. We're

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<v Speaker 1>pulling the thread on declassified documents to explore ten nuclear

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<v Speaker 1>disasters the government desperately tried to keep.

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<v Speaker 2>Secret because we all know the names Chernobyl and Fukushima.

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<v Speaker 1>Right, those are household names the events that were just

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<v Speaker 1>too massive to hide.

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<v Speaker 2>But today we want to look at the shadows exactly.

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<v Speaker 1>And the most chilling part of the history we're looking

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<v Speaker 1>at today is that, in many cases, governments successfully buried

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<v Speaker 1>these neu apocalypses for decades. I was reading through the

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<v Speaker 1>incident reports for this deep dive, and I kept finding

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<v Speaker 1>myself literally holding my breath.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh, I totally get that. The overarching theme of our

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<v Speaker 2>exploration today really highlights a profound and frankly dangerous disconnect.

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<v Speaker 2>What do you mean, Well, on one hand, you have

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<v Speaker 2>the immense, unforgiving physics of atomic energy, and on the

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<v Speaker 2>other hand, you have the deeply flawed, highly secretive, politically

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<v Speaker 2>motivated human institutions trying to manage it.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Humans are messy, very messy.

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<v Speaker 2>Now, it is crucial to state upfront that we are

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<v Speaker 2>examining the raw historical data here. We're not taking political size.

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<v Speaker 1>Ye oh, not at all.

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<v Speaker 2>Whether we are looking at the actions of the United States,

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<v Speaker 2>the United Kingdom, or the Soviet Union. We are simply

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<v Speaker 2>looking at the declassified facts. We want to understand how

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<v Speaker 2>secrecy operates in the high stakes environment of the.

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<v Speaker 1>Cold War, just the raw history. So to you listening

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<v Speaker 1>right now, buckle up. As we navigate through these events,

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<v Speaker 1>I want you to keep one single question in the

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<v Speaker 1>back of your mind.

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<v Speaker 2>It's a big one.

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<v Speaker 1>Why is the immediate knee jerk reflex of authority almost

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<v Speaker 1>always silence?

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, that's the real thread we're pulling.

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<v Speaker 1>So let's stay with Goldsboro, North Carolina for a minute,

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<v Speaker 1>because I want to understand the mechanics of this cover up.

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<v Speaker 1>A single low voltage switch save the Eastern Seaboard. How

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<v Speaker 1>do you keep something with steaks that astronomical a secret?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, you keep it a secret by controlling the narrative

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<v Speaker 2>immediately and aggressively.

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<v Speaker 1>And the public knew a plane crash, right.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh, absolutely, the public knew a B fifty two crashed.

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<v Speaker 2>You cannot hide the flaming wreckage of an eight engine

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<v Speaker 2>strategic bomber scattered across.

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<v Speaker 1>The countryside, right, that's impossible.

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<v Speaker 2>But the military isolated the crash site, they classified the

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<v Speaker 2>recovery of the weapons, and actively obscured how close that

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<v Speaker 2>second bomb came to full detonation.

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<v Speaker 1>So they just lied by a mission.

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<v Speaker 2>Essentially, Yes, the true narrative that the bomb had completed

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<v Speaker 2>all but one arming step was hidden in classified vaults

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<v Speaker 2>for over fifty years.

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<v Speaker 1>That is just wild to me.

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<v Speaker 2>But if we look at the psychology of the early

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<v Speaker 2>Cold War era, you start to see the rationale.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, so we were talking about nineteen sixty one. John F.

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<v Speaker 1>Kennedy has just been inaugurated. The tension with the Soviets

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<v Speaker 1>is a total powder keg.

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<v Speaker 2>The world is literally sitting on the cusp of the

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<v Speaker 2>Cuban missile crisis. The concept of mutually assured destruction is

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<v Speaker 2>the only thing keeping a fragile piece.

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<v Speaker 1>So they were terrified of looking weak.

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<v Speaker 2>Precisely from the perspective of the Pentagon and the White House.

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<v Speaker 2>Admitting that you almost neut your own country due to

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<v Speaker 2>a structural flaw achieves two disastrous outcomes.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, what's the first time?

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<v Speaker 2>Domestically, it incites uncontrollable panic. If citizens believe the military

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<v Speaker 2>cannot safely transport its own weapons, trust in the defense

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<v Speaker 2>apparatus collapses.

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<v Speaker 1>I mean, I would certainly panic if I found out

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<v Speaker 1>a four megatone weapon armed itself by accident over my house.

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<v Speaker 1>I would question the entire concept of our national defense.

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<v Speaker 2>Anyone would.

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<v Speaker 1>I'd be terrified every time I heard a plane fly over,

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<v Speaker 1>But wouldn't. The military also argue that admitting a critical

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<v Speaker 1>flaw in the B fifty two program would embolden the.

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<v Speaker 2>Soviets, and that is the second, perhaps more pressing outcome

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<v Speaker 2>for them. You're engaged in a global theater where projecting

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<v Speaker 2>absolute technological superiority is your primary deterrent.

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<v Speaker 1>Right the whole we have better weapons than you game exactly.

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<v Speaker 2>The Strategic Air Command's entire doctrine was based on maintaining

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<v Speaker 2>a constant, flawless airborne alert. If Moscow realizes your bombers

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<v Speaker 2>are dropping armed weapons on your own soil due to fuel.

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<v Speaker 1>Leaks, it shatters your illusion.

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<v Speaker 2>Of control completely. So the paternalistic instinct of the state

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<v Speaker 2>takes over. The authorities decide that knowing the truth won't

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<v Speaker 2>make the public safer, They convince themselves, it will only

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<v Speaker 2>create instability.

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<v Speaker 1>It is a staggering lack of trust in the citizen ry,

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<v Speaker 1>deciding we just can't handle the truth. It really is,

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<v Speaker 1>and Goldsborough wasn't a one off. It falls under a

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<v Speaker 1>specific military classification called a broken arrow.

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<v Speaker 2>Right, which refers to an accidental event involving nuclear weapons

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<v Speaker 2>that doesn't create a risk of nuclear war.

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<v Speaker 1>And dropping these things from the sky happened way more

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<v Speaker 1>than anyone wants to admit. Let's move forward just five

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<v Speaker 1>years to January seventeenth, nineteen sixty six. We are looking

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<v Speaker 1>at pal Mares, which is a small farming and fishing

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<v Speaker 1>village on the coast of Spain.

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<v Speaker 2>Now, this incident introduces a completely different layer of geopolitical complexity.

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<v Speaker 1>Because it involves a sovereign NATO ally exactly. So here's

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<v Speaker 1>the setup. A USB fifty two bomber is attempting a

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<v Speaker 1>mid air refueling with a KC one th five Strato

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<v Speaker 1>tanker over the Spanish coast.

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<v Speaker 2>This was part of Operation Chrome Dome.

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<v Speaker 1>Right, where the US kept nuclear armed bombers in the

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<v Speaker 1>air twenty four hours a day. Now, mid air refueling

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<v Speaker 1>sounds insane even with modern technology, but doing it in

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<v Speaker 1>the nineteen sixties with a massive bomber seems incredibly perilous.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh, it's a highly delicate ballet. You have two incredibly

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<v Speaker 2>heavy aircraft flying at hundreds of miles per hour.

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<v Speaker 1>Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

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<v Speaker 2>The bomber has to maneuver its receptacle perfectly to catch

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<v Speaker 2>a flying boom lowered by the tanker. It requires perfect visibility,

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<v Speaker 2>perfect air speed matching, flawless communication, and on this.

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<v Speaker 1>Day, the ballet fails. The B fifty two approaches too

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<v Speaker 1>fast it collides with the boom of the tanker.

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<v Speaker 2>A devastating mistake.

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<v Speaker 1>The boom tears off the bomber's left wing. Both planes

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<v Speaker 1>instantly explode in a massive fireball.

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<v Speaker 2>And the BFC two is carrying four hydrogen bombs.

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<v Speaker 1>Four of them, and all four fall onto the Pelomar Spain. Now, thankfully,

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<v Speaker 1>the nuclear cores do not detonate, but two of the

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<v Speaker 1>bombs hit the ground at terminal velocity, and the sheer

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<v Speaker 1>force of the impact causes their conventional explosives to detonate.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and we need to clarify what that means. The

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<v Speaker 2>conventional explosives. These are the lenses that surround the plutonium core.

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<v Speaker 2>They are highly volatile. Okay, when they detonate without the

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<v Speaker 2>precise timing required for a nuclear yield, they essentially act

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<v Speaker 2>like a dirty bomb.

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<v Speaker 1>Oh wow, so they just scatter the radiation exactly.

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<v Speaker 2>They shatter the core and scatter highly radioactive plutonium two

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<v Speaker 2>thirty nine all across the agricultural fields of this Spanish village.

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<v Speaker 1>The military logistics of what happened next absolutely boggle my mind.

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<v Speaker 2>This is a massive undertaking.

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<v Speaker 1>The United States launched a frantic cleanup operation called Camp Wilson.

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<v Speaker 1>Listen to this. They literally scraped up fourteen hundred tons

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<v Speaker 1>of contaminated Spanish top soil and.

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<v Speaker 2>Vegetation, literally scooping up the countryside.

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<v Speaker 1>Yes, they packed it into thousands of specialized steel barrels

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<v Speaker 1>and shipped it across the Atlantic Ocean and back to

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<v Speaker 1>a facility in South Carolina.

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<v Speaker 2>It's hard to even picture that scale.

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<v Speaker 1>My question is, how on earth do you hide an

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<v Speaker 1>operation of that magnitude. You drop four nuclear bombs on

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<v Speaker 1>a foreign country, you roll in in hazmat suits, and

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<v Speaker 1>you scoop up a village's livelihood. How do you keep

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<v Speaker 1>the international press from turning that into a global scandal.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, you manage it through strict alliance leverage and media suppression, meaning.

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<v Speaker 1>They just bullied the press.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, remember the political landscape of Spain In nineteen sixty six.

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<v Speaker 2>Spain was ruled by the Dictator Francisco Franco. Oh, right,

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<v Speaker 2>the Spanish press was heavily censored and state controlled. The

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<v Speaker 2>US military informed the Franco government immediately. I mean, you

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<v Speaker 2>cannot hide a bomber crash from the host nation, right.

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<v Speaker 1>There's flaming debris everywhere.

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<v Speaker 2>But both governments had a vested interest in suppressing the

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<v Speaker 2>severity of the contamination from the Spanish public and the

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<v Speaker 2>wider world.

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<v Speaker 1>Franco wanted to keep American money and military bases right.

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<v Speaker 2>Yes, and the US needed Spanish airspace to maintain its

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<v Speaker 2>deterrence patrol against the Soviets.

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<v Speaker 1>It's a classic background deal. The strategic imperative of keeping

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<v Speaker 1>those bombers airborne overrode the fundamental rights of the Spanish

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<v Speaker 1>citizens to know their land was laced with plutonium.

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<v Speaker 2>Exactly so the US and Spanish governments engaged in this

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<v Speaker 2>highly orchestrated piece of political theater to downplay the danger.

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<v Speaker 1>The swimming incident.

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<v Speaker 2>Yes, the most famous example. The American ambassador anj Your

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<v Speaker 2>Biddleduke and the Spanish minister went to the beach at

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<v Speaker 2>Palomares and swam in the Mediterranean Sea for the cameras.

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<v Speaker 1>That is just deeply cynical.

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<v Speaker 2>Supposedly to prove the area was perfectly safe.

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<v Speaker 1>Ignore the men in hazmat suits bulldozing your tomato fields.

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<v Speaker 1>Look at the ambassador enjoying a lovely swim. I mean,

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<v Speaker 1>it's insulting, but the reality is that they didn't actually

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<v Speaker 1>get all of the plutonium, did they They did not.

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<v Speaker 2>Plutonium two thirty nine is an alpha emitter.

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<v Speaker 1>What does that mean? Exactly?

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<v Speaker 2>It means if it sits on the ground, your skin

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<v Speaker 2>can actually block the radiation, okay, But if it oxidizes

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<v Speaker 2>into dust and the wind blows it and you inhale

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<v Speaker 2>even a microscopic particle into your lungs, it is lethally carcinogenic. God,

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<v Speaker 2>and the cleanup was rushed. Trenches of contaminated material were

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<v Speaker 2>allegedly buried and just forgotten. The full story of the

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<v Speaker 2>remaining contamination was suppressed for decades.

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<v Speaker 1>That is horrifying.

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<v Speaker 2>It wasn't until twenty fifteen, nearly fifty years later, that

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<v Speaker 2>the US and Spain finally signed a new statement of

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<v Speaker 2>intent to finish the cleanup efforts.

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<v Speaker 1>Which proves the initial effort was largely cosmetic performative.

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<v Speaker 2>Exactly.

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<v Speaker 1>The secrecy wasn't just about domestic pr It was about

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<v Speaker 1>holding together a military coalition, even if it meant lying

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<v Speaker 1>to the people living at ground zero.

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00:12:38.639 --> 00:12:40.720
<v Speaker 2>The alliance mattered more than the local farmers.

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<v Speaker 1>That brings us to an incident that happened much closer

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<v Speaker 1>to home. And honestly, this is the one that gives

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<v Speaker 1>me the most anxiety because of how unresolved it still

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<v Speaker 1>is today.

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<v Speaker 2>Tybee Island.

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<v Speaker 1>Yes, let's step back slightly to February fifth, nineteen fifty eight.

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<v Speaker 1>We are off the coast of Tybee Island, Georgia.

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<v Speaker 2>A very different kind of broken arrow. This one was

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<v Speaker 2>driven by the immediate survival instincts of an aircrew.

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<v Speaker 1>Right, a USB forty seven Stratajet bomber is flying a

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<v Speaker 1>simulated combat mission. It collides midair with an F eighty

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<v Speaker 1>six fighter Jet.

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<v Speaker 2>Another collision.

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<v Speaker 1>The fighter pilot ejects safely, but the B forty seven

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<v Speaker 1>is severely damaged. The pilot, Major Howard Richardson, is trying

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<v Speaker 1>to stabilize his aircraft to make an emergency landing at

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<v Speaker 1>Hunter Air Force Base.

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<v Speaker 2>So he's got a massive problem, a huge problem.

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<v Speaker 1>The plane is too heavy and the landing speed would

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00:13:28.399 --> 00:13:31.799
<v Speaker 1>be far too dangerous with the damage, so he requests

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<v Speaker 1>and receives permission to jettison his payload to save his crew, and.

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<v Speaker 2>That payload is a seventy six hundred pound Mark fifteen

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<v Speaker 2>nuclear bomb.

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<v Speaker 1>He drops it directly into the shallow coastal waters of

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<v Speaker 1>the Wassaw Sound, right near the mouth of the Savannah.

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<v Speaker 2>River, and it has never been seen again.

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<v Speaker 1>Never. The Air Force searched for nearly ten weeks. They

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00:13:53.440 --> 00:13:56.200
<v Speaker 1>had navy divers scouring the bottom. They dragged the ocean

288
00:13:56.200 --> 00:13:59.360
<v Speaker 1>floor with cables. They used sonar, but the environment there

289
00:13:59.399 --> 00:14:01.759
<v Speaker 1>is tough, the silt and the currents in that area

290
00:14:01.799 --> 00:14:03.720
<v Speaker 1>are notoriously difficult to navigate.

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<v Speaker 2>They found nothing, zero trace.

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<v Speaker 1>Now this is where the betrayal of public trust really

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00:14:09.000 --> 00:14:12.000
<v Speaker 1>becomes a central theme for me. For forty three years,

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<v Speaker 1>the official government line, the story told to the residents

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<v Speaker 1>of Georgia and the American public, was that the weapon

296
00:14:19.000 --> 00:14:21.200
<v Speaker 1>dropped was simply a training dummy.

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00:14:21.320 --> 00:14:24.720
<v Speaker 2>They claimed it contained no nuclear capsule, nothing to worry about.

298
00:14:24.879 --> 00:14:28.799
<v Speaker 1>But in two thousand and one, declassified military documents finally

299
00:14:28.840 --> 00:14:31.039
<v Speaker 1>came to light confirming the terrifying truth.

300
00:14:31.320 --> 00:14:35.000
<v Speaker 2>It was a fully functional, complete nuclear weapon with a

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00:14:35.039 --> 00:14:36.240
<v Speaker 2>live plutonium core.

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00:14:36.399 --> 00:14:39.080
<v Speaker 1>A live weapon just sitting in the mud subject to

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00:14:39.120 --> 00:14:43.159
<v Speaker 1>saltwater corrosion for decades. Yeah, I am struck by the

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00:14:43.200 --> 00:14:45.919
<v Speaker 1>sheer audacity of the line. I mean, I have vacationed

305
00:14:45.960 --> 00:14:48.080
<v Speaker 1>on the Georgia Coast. I've walked those beaches.

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00:14:48.120 --> 00:14:49.080
<v Speaker 2>It's a beautiful area.

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00:14:49.200 --> 00:14:52.279
<v Speaker 1>It is. Imagine taking your family to Tybee Island, building

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00:14:52.279 --> 00:14:55.600
<v Speaker 1>a sand castle, swimming in the surf, and less than

309
00:14:55.600 --> 00:14:59.559
<v Speaker 1>a few miles away, a fully assembled Mark fifteen thermonuclear

310
00:14:59.600 --> 00:15:02.200
<v Speaker 1>weapon is just chillin' offshore in the silt. It's a

311
00:15:02.279 --> 00:15:04.799
<v Speaker 1>very unsettling image, and the government now admits it's real,

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00:15:04.840 --> 00:15:06.840
<v Speaker 1>but claims it's safer to just leave it there.

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00:15:07.000 --> 00:15:10.519
<v Speaker 2>Well, if we evaluate the government's current stance from a

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00:15:10.559 --> 00:15:14.120
<v Speaker 2>purely physical engineering perspective, they do have an argument.

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00:15:14.320 --> 00:15:15.720
<v Speaker 1>Okay, what is their argument?

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00:15:15.919 --> 00:15:18.440
<v Speaker 2>They argue that the bomb is buried under several feet

317
00:15:18.480 --> 00:15:24.039
<v Speaker 2>of dense silt. Attempting to excavate it could be extraordinarily dangerous.

318
00:15:23.720 --> 00:15:25.399
<v Speaker 1>Because of the conventional explosives.

319
00:15:25.480 --> 00:15:29.080
<v Speaker 2>Yes, the conventional high explosives inside the casing, the materials

320
00:15:29.360 --> 00:15:32.600
<v Speaker 2>meant to trigger the nuclear reaction. They have been degrading

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00:15:32.639 --> 00:15:35.519
<v Speaker 2>in salt water for over sixty years.

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00:15:35.559 --> 00:15:37.320
<v Speaker 1>So they might be super unstable.

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00:15:37.519 --> 00:15:43.000
<v Speaker 2>Extremely unstable. A salvage operation could accidentally trigger those conventional explosives,

324
00:15:43.120 --> 00:15:46.639
<v Speaker 2>which would scatter the plutonium core into the local marine.

325
00:15:46.360 --> 00:15:49.919
<v Speaker 1>Ecosystem, creating a massive ecological disaster.

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00:15:49.759 --> 00:15:53.240
<v Speaker 2>Exactly the exact environmental catastrophe they want to avoid. From

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00:15:53.279 --> 00:15:57.000
<v Speaker 2>a utilitarian risk assessment standpoint, leaving it undisturbed might actually

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00:15:57.039 --> 00:15:58.559
<v Speaker 2>be the mathematically safer option.

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00:15:58.799 --> 00:16:01.960
<v Speaker 1>Okay, I understand the phys of leaving it alone, but

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00:16:02.039 --> 00:16:04.279
<v Speaker 1>I strongly disagree with the sociology of it.

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00:16:04.399 --> 00:16:05.000
<v Speaker 2>Trust factor.

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00:16:05.200 --> 00:16:09.279
<v Speaker 1>Yes, the engineering risk entirely misses the point of the

333
00:16:09.320 --> 00:16:13.000
<v Speaker 1>societal damage. What does it do to the social contract?

334
00:16:13.360 --> 00:16:17.080
<v Speaker 1>When an administration flat out lies to its citizens for

335
00:16:17.080 --> 00:16:20.159
<v Speaker 1>forty three years, it destroys it. They didn't come out

336
00:16:20.200 --> 00:16:22.879
<v Speaker 1>in nineteen fifty eight and say, hey, we lost a

337
00:16:22.879 --> 00:16:25.639
<v Speaker 1>live bomb, but we believe it's safely buried and here's

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00:16:25.679 --> 00:16:27.080
<v Speaker 1>the data to prove it right.

339
00:16:27.399 --> 00:16:28.240
<v Speaker 2>They chose deception.

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00:16:28.399 --> 00:16:31.000
<v Speaker 1>They said it's a dummy. You are foolish for worrying

341
00:16:31.000 --> 00:16:34.159
<v Speaker 1>about it. When the truth finally leaks out, it validates

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00:16:34.200 --> 00:16:37.799
<v Speaker 1>every conspiracy theorist in the country. It deeply damages the

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00:16:37.799 --> 00:16:38.600
<v Speaker 1>credibility of.

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00:16:38.519 --> 00:16:41.440
<v Speaker 2>The military because if they lied about a nuclear bomb

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00:16:41.480 --> 00:16:43.919
<v Speaker 2>sitting off the coast of Georgia for four decades.

346
00:16:44.080 --> 00:16:47.000
<v Speaker 1>The average citizen naturally asks, what else are they lying

347
00:16:47.039 --> 00:16:47.759
<v Speaker 1>about right now?

348
00:16:47.799 --> 00:16:51.679
<v Speaker 2>Exactly? That erosion of trust is incredibly difficult to repair,

349
00:16:52.240 --> 00:16:55.240
<v Speaker 2>and it is a direct consequence of prioritizing short term

350
00:16:55.240 --> 00:16:58.000
<v Speaker 2>public relations over long term transparency.

351
00:16:58.080 --> 00:16:59.240
<v Speaker 1>It's just bad leadership.

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00:16:59.279 --> 00:17:02.080
<v Speaker 2>It is now. The events we've discussed so far, these

353
00:17:02.279 --> 00:17:06.279
<v Speaker 2>broken arrows falling through the sky are essentially accidents of transport.

354
00:17:06.039 --> 00:17:07.759
<v Speaker 1>Right planes failing crashing.

355
00:17:07.839 --> 00:17:11.160
<v Speaker 2>They are the result of collisions or severe weather. But

356
00:17:11.319 --> 00:17:14.359
<v Speaker 2>as we move deeper into the historical record, we find

357
00:17:14.359 --> 00:17:19.039
<v Speaker 2>that the systemic long term disasters occurred long before these

358
00:17:19.079 --> 00:17:20.559
<v Speaker 2>bombs ever left the tarmac.

359
00:17:20.720 --> 00:17:24.880
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, dropping these by accident is terrifying, but the danger

360
00:17:24.960 --> 00:17:27.519
<v Speaker 1>didn't start in the sky. The sheer act of just

361
00:17:27.559 --> 00:17:30.440
<v Speaker 1>trying to build these weapons was poisoning people before a

362
00:17:30.480 --> 00:17:31.599
<v Speaker 1>bomber ever took off.

363
00:17:31.720 --> 00:17:33.839
<v Speaker 2>The production side is incredibly dark.

364
00:17:33.920 --> 00:17:36.759
<v Speaker 1>We are moving our focus to the factories of armageddon.

365
00:17:37.200 --> 00:17:40.079
<v Speaker 1>Let's look at the Rocky Flats plant. This was located

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<v Speaker 1>on a windy plateau just south of Boulder.

367
00:17:42.400 --> 00:17:46.039
<v Speaker 2>Colorado, practically right next door to the Denver metropolitan.

368
00:17:45.480 --> 00:17:46.640
<v Speaker 1>Area, which is insane.

369
00:17:46.799 --> 00:17:50.759
<v Speaker 2>Rocky Flats was a massive, highly secretive US government facility.

370
00:17:51.279 --> 00:17:54.799
<v Speaker 2>Its primary purpose was to manufacture the plutonium pits or

371
00:17:54.839 --> 00:17:56.640
<v Speaker 2>triggers for nuclear weapons.

372
00:17:56.680 --> 00:17:58.400
<v Speaker 1>What exactly is a plutonium pit?

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00:17:58.559 --> 00:18:01.039
<v Speaker 2>Think of it like the essential great fruit sized core

374
00:18:01.119 --> 00:18:05.119
<v Speaker 2>that initiates the fission reaction which then ignites the much

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00:18:05.240 --> 00:18:07.759
<v Speaker 2>larger fusion reaction in a hydrogen bomb.

376
00:18:07.839 --> 00:18:09.559
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so it's the spark plug for the nuke.

377
00:18:09.720 --> 00:18:10.839
<v Speaker 2>That's a great way to put it.

378
00:18:11.000 --> 00:18:15.640
<v Speaker 1>Now, the declassified reports detail a specific scientific property of

379
00:18:15.680 --> 00:18:21.519
<v Speaker 1>plutonium that I find absolutely harrowing. Plutonium is pyrophoric.

380
00:18:22.200 --> 00:18:24.559
<v Speaker 2>Yes, it is explain that for the listener.

381
00:18:24.599 --> 00:18:28.200
<v Speaker 1>When plutonium is exposed to ambient air and moisture, it

382
00:18:28.279 --> 00:18:32.960
<v Speaker 1>oxidizes rapidly, and that oxidation process generates intense heat. Okay,

383
00:18:33.000 --> 00:18:35.960
<v Speaker 1>if it isn't managed perfectly in an inert atmosphere, the

384
00:18:36.039 --> 00:18:38.119
<v Speaker 1>metal can spontaneously ignite.

385
00:18:38.240 --> 00:18:40.319
<v Speaker 2>Wait, it literally sets itself on fire.

386
00:18:40.440 --> 00:18:41.519
<v Speaker 1>It sets itself on fire.

387
00:18:42.000 --> 00:18:44.839
<v Speaker 2>Let's just pause and absorb the geography of that decision.

388
00:18:45.400 --> 00:18:49.160
<v Speaker 2>We built a massive industrial factory to machine cut and

389
00:18:49.279 --> 00:18:54.000
<v Speaker 2>shave a highly radioactive metal that actively wants to spontaneously combust,

390
00:18:54.599 --> 00:18:56.720
<v Speaker 2>and we built it upwind of Denver Colorado.

391
00:18:56.839 --> 00:18:59.680
<v Speaker 1>The audacity of the site selection is staggering, but it

392
00:18:59.680 --> 00:19:01.559
<v Speaker 1>reflect the singular focus of the era.

393
00:19:01.799 --> 00:19:02.640
<v Speaker 2>They just didn't care.

394
00:19:02.880 --> 00:19:05.839
<v Speaker 1>They needed a location inland, away from vulnerable coasts, with

395
00:19:05.920 --> 00:19:08.559
<v Speaker 1>access to water. In a workforce, the environmental risks were

396
00:19:08.720 --> 00:19:10.599
<v Speaker 1>entirely secondary to the production schedule.

397
00:19:10.720 --> 00:19:12.880
<v Speaker 2>Predictably, when you machine a metal that catches fire in

398
00:19:12.920 --> 00:19:14.920
<v Speaker 2>the air, you get fires, frequent fires.

399
00:19:14.920 --> 00:19:18.000
<v Speaker 1>In September nineteen fifty seven, a major fire broke out

400
00:19:18.039 --> 00:19:21.000
<v Speaker 1>in one of the plutonium processing buildings at Rocky Flats.

401
00:19:21.440 --> 00:19:23.200
<v Speaker 1>The fire started in a glove box.

402
00:19:23.440 --> 00:19:26.119
<v Speaker 2>Those are the seal boxes where technicians handle the material

403
00:19:26.240 --> 00:19:27.759
<v Speaker 2>using heavy rubber gloves.

404
00:19:27.519 --> 00:19:31.119
<v Speaker 1>Right, and the fire burned for thirteen solid.

405
00:19:30.799 --> 00:19:32.759
<v Speaker 2>Hours, a radioactive inferno.

406
00:19:33.039 --> 00:19:36.319
<v Speaker 1>The intense heat breached the filtration systems. It released a

407
00:19:36.440 --> 00:19:41.160
<v Speaker 1>massive plume of toxic plutonium particulates directly into the atmosphere,

408
00:19:41.319 --> 00:19:44.160
<v Speaker 1>catching the wind blowing toward populated areas.

409
00:19:44.240 --> 00:19:46.759
<v Speaker 2>And the public was not informed, not a word.

410
00:19:47.079 --> 00:19:50.400
<v Speaker 1>The Colorado State government wasn't even given the true details

411
00:19:50.400 --> 00:19:51.200
<v Speaker 1>of the contamination.

412
00:19:51.400 --> 00:19:54.400
<v Speaker 2>It was a massive failure of containment. But instead of

413
00:19:54.440 --> 00:19:58.839
<v Speaker 2>fundamentally redesigning the facility to prioritize safety, they just rebuilt

414
00:19:58.839 --> 00:20:00.880
<v Speaker 2>it and kept pushing for higher quotas.

415
00:20:00.640 --> 00:20:03.680
<v Speaker 1>Which leads directly to the much larger disaster.

416
00:20:03.440 --> 00:20:05.799
<v Speaker 2>Twelve years later, the nineteen sixty nine fire.

417
00:20:05.960 --> 00:20:09.160
<v Speaker 1>Right May eleventh, nineteen sixty nine, another fire breaks out

418
00:20:09.200 --> 00:20:12.559
<v Speaker 1>into a plutonium building, but this time it was infinitely worse.

419
00:20:12.680 --> 00:20:13.960
<v Speaker 2>The scale was terrifying.

420
00:20:14.240 --> 00:20:18.480
<v Speaker 1>The fire ignited the massive plexiglass shielding used throughout the facility.

421
00:20:19.160 --> 00:20:23.200
<v Speaker 1>It raged completely out of control. Firefighters were battling a

422
00:20:23.240 --> 00:20:26.160
<v Speaker 1>blaze involving hundreds of pounds of plutonium, and it.

423
00:20:26.119 --> 00:20:30.039
<v Speaker 2>Came dangerously close to a critical vulnerability the storage vault. Yes,

424
00:20:30.440 --> 00:20:33.039
<v Speaker 2>a massive storage vault in the roof that contained thousands

425
00:20:33.079 --> 00:20:34.960
<v Speaker 2>of pounds of plutonium.

426
00:20:34.319 --> 00:20:36.759
<v Speaker 1>Thousands of pounds upwind of Denver.

427
00:20:37.000 --> 00:20:40.079
<v Speaker 2>If that vault had breached or the roof had completely

428
00:20:40.119 --> 00:20:43.200
<v Speaker 2>collapsed and allowed the ambient winds to scatter that much

429
00:20:43.240 --> 00:20:46.119
<v Speaker 2>plutonium two thirty nine over the Denver metro area, what

430
00:20:46.160 --> 00:20:49.240
<v Speaker 2>would have happened. The resulting contamination would have been apocalyptic.

431
00:20:49.319 --> 00:20:52.119
<v Speaker 1>We were talking about permanently evacuating millions of people.

432
00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:55.160
<v Speaker 2>Right Denver would have become an American exclusion zone similar

433
00:20:55.200 --> 00:20:56.440
<v Speaker 2>to Chernobyl.

434
00:20:56.079 --> 00:20:58.599
<v Speaker 1>And once again the public was kept entirely in the

435
00:20:58.680 --> 00:21:01.440
<v Speaker 1>dark about how close they came to losing their city.

436
00:21:01.559 --> 00:21:02.960
<v Speaker 2>The secrecy was absolute.

437
00:21:03.160 --> 00:21:05.920
<v Speaker 1>The full extent of the contamination from both the fifty

438
00:21:05.960 --> 00:21:09.079
<v Speaker 1>seven and sixty nine fires, and the routine leaking of

439
00:21:09.160 --> 00:21:12.279
<v Speaker 1>contaminated oil into the soil in an area known as

440
00:21:12.319 --> 00:21:16.079
<v Speaker 1>the nine O three pad, was classified and obscured for decades.

441
00:21:16.400 --> 00:21:20.240
<v Speaker 2>When you look at the declassified environmental reports from Rocky Flats,

442
00:21:20.680 --> 00:21:25.079
<v Speaker 2>you see the institutional mindset at play. Safety protocols were

443
00:21:25.079 --> 00:21:29.480
<v Speaker 2>often viewed by management as frustrating bureaucratic obstacles.

444
00:21:28.839 --> 00:21:31.119
<v Speaker 1>Just getting in the way of building bombs exactly.

445
00:21:31.599 --> 00:21:35.160
<v Speaker 2>The underlying philosophy was that American citizens living downwind of

446
00:21:35.200 --> 00:21:39.039
<v Speaker 2>these plants were an acceptable collateral risk and the broader

447
00:21:39.079 --> 00:21:43.079
<v Speaker 2>struggle against communism that is sickening. The government decided that

448
00:21:43.119 --> 00:21:46.039
<v Speaker 2>telling the residents of Dender about the plutonium raining down

449
00:21:46.119 --> 00:21:51.000
<v Speaker 2>on their lawns would cause political pushback, which might lead

450
00:21:51.079 --> 00:21:52.680
<v Speaker 2>to congressional hearings.

451
00:21:52.319 --> 00:21:54.480
<v Speaker 1>Which would slow down the production of weapons.

452
00:21:54.680 --> 00:21:56.720
<v Speaker 2>They chose silence to protect the quota.

453
00:21:56.640 --> 00:21:59.519
<v Speaker 1>Which is chilling. But Rocky Flats isn't even the most

454
00:21:59.559 --> 00:22:02.440
<v Speaker 1>contamatminated site in the American nuclear complex. Woh it was

455
00:22:02.480 --> 00:22:05.160
<v Speaker 1>not that dark. Honour goes to the Hanford site in

456
00:22:05.240 --> 00:22:08.559
<v Speaker 1>Washington State. I have spent time in the Pacific Northwest,

457
00:22:08.680 --> 00:22:11.640
<v Speaker 1>and the Columbia River is the lifeblood of that entire region.

458
00:22:11.759 --> 00:22:14.119
<v Speaker 2>It's vital to the ecosystem.

459
00:22:13.440 --> 00:22:16.799
<v Speaker 1>And Hanford sits right on its banks. This facility has

460
00:22:16.839 --> 00:22:20.559
<v Speaker 1>a massive historical footprint. It produced the plutonium for the

461
00:22:20.599 --> 00:22:24.160
<v Speaker 1>fat Man bomb dropped on Nagasaki in nineteen forty five.

462
00:22:24.400 --> 00:22:27.279
<v Speaker 2>Hanford was the cradle of industrial scale and nuclear production.

463
00:22:27.559 --> 00:22:29.680
<v Speaker 2>But from its inception in nineteen forty four all the

464
00:22:29.680 --> 00:22:32.599
<v Speaker 2>way through nineteen seventy one, it operated with the level

465
00:22:32.640 --> 00:22:37.640
<v Speaker 2>of environmental recklessness that is just it's difficult to fully comprehend.

466
00:22:37.680 --> 00:22:39.839
<v Speaker 1>Today, Let's talk about the cooling system, because this blew

467
00:22:39.880 --> 00:22:43.319
<v Speaker 1>my mind. The early reactors at Hanford, like the B reactor,

468
00:22:43.559 --> 00:22:46.720
<v Speaker 1>were designed with what is called a once through cooling system.

469
00:22:46.480 --> 00:22:50.160
<v Speaker 2>Right because nuclear fission generates an unbelievable amount of heat.

470
00:22:50.279 --> 00:22:53.119
<v Speaker 1>To keep the reactors from melting down, they pumped massive

471
00:22:53.119 --> 00:22:55.839
<v Speaker 1>amounts of cold water directly out of the Columbia River.

472
00:22:55.960 --> 00:22:58.079
<v Speaker 2>That water flowed right through the reactor core.

473
00:22:58.200 --> 00:23:01.000
<v Speaker 1>It absorbed the intense heat, but it also absorbed massive

474
00:23:01.000 --> 00:23:05.599
<v Speaker 1>amounts of radiation, creating highly radioactive isotopes like phosphorus thirty

475
00:23:05.640 --> 00:23:09.519
<v Speaker 1>two and zinc sixty five, and then instead of treating

476
00:23:09.559 --> 00:23:11.960
<v Speaker 1>it or containing it in the closed loop, they just

477
00:23:12.039 --> 00:23:16.119
<v Speaker 1>pumped that boiling, highly radioactive water straight back out into

478
00:23:16.160 --> 00:23:16.519
<v Speaker 1>the river.

479
00:23:16.799 --> 00:23:20.359
<v Speaker 2>The volume of contaminated water was staggering. We are talking

480
00:23:20.359 --> 00:23:24.079
<v Speaker 2>about tens of thousands of gallons per minute, day after day,

481
00:23:24.480 --> 00:23:25.240
<v Speaker 2>year after year.

482
00:23:25.319 --> 00:23:29.599
<v Speaker 1>And downstream from Hanford you had communities, Native American tribes

483
00:23:29.640 --> 00:23:32.640
<v Speaker 1>and major cities that relied entirely on the Columbia River.

484
00:23:32.720 --> 00:23:33.799
<v Speaker 2>It was their drinking water.

485
00:23:34.039 --> 00:23:36.640
<v Speaker 1>They used it for municipal drinking water. They used it

486
00:23:36.680 --> 00:23:40.240
<v Speaker 1>to irrigate the massive agricultural basins of Washington and Oregon.

487
00:23:40.480 --> 00:23:42.000
<v Speaker 1>They fished the salmon, and.

488
00:23:41.920 --> 00:23:45.839
<v Speaker 2>Those radioactive isotopes bioaccumulate.

489
00:23:44.960 --> 00:23:48.240
<v Speaker 1>Right, They bioaccumulated in the algae which was eaten by

490
00:23:48.240 --> 00:23:50.759
<v Speaker 1>the fish, which were eaten by the people. The radiation

491
00:23:50.960 --> 00:23:52.559
<v Speaker 1>moved directly into the food chain.

492
00:23:52.720 --> 00:23:55.279
<v Speaker 2>And what makes Hanford a unique entry in our exploration

493
00:23:55.319 --> 00:23:59.880
<v Speaker 2>today is the sheer weight of the documentary evidence regarding intent.

494
00:24:00.240 --> 00:24:02.720
<v Speaker 2>This wasn't a mistake, No, this wasn't a case of

495
00:24:02.799 --> 00:24:07.119
<v Speaker 2>nineteen forties scientists simply not understanding the long term effects

496
00:24:07.160 --> 00:24:07.759
<v Speaker 2>of radiation.

497
00:24:08.200 --> 00:24:10.680
<v Speaker 1>I read the declassified memos, and that is what makes

498
00:24:10.680 --> 00:24:12.559
<v Speaker 1>me so angry on behalf of anyone who lived in

499
00:24:12.559 --> 00:24:13.039
<v Speaker 1>that region.

500
00:24:13.160 --> 00:24:13.640
<v Speaker 2>They knew.

501
00:24:13.920 --> 00:24:17.160
<v Speaker 1>The government's own internal scientists were fully aware of the

502
00:24:17.200 --> 00:24:20.599
<v Speaker 1>severe health risks to the downstream populations as early as

503
00:24:20.599 --> 00:24:21.920
<v Speaker 1>the late nineteen forties.

504
00:24:22.200 --> 00:24:25.400
<v Speaker 2>They were actively tracking the bioaccumulation in the fish. They

505
00:24:25.480 --> 00:24:27.279
<v Speaker 2>knew the hazard, and yet.

506
00:24:27.119 --> 00:24:30.799
<v Speaker 1>The military and the Atomic Energy Commission chose to continue

507
00:24:30.839 --> 00:24:35.200
<v Speaker 1>pumping radioactive waste into the drinking water for nearly three decades.

508
00:24:35.880 --> 00:24:38.319
<v Speaker 1>I push back strongly on anyone who claims this was

509
00:24:38.400 --> 00:24:39.640
<v Speaker 1>just a Cold War necessity.

510
00:24:39.759 --> 00:24:41.000
<v Speaker 2>It's hard argument to defend.

511
00:24:41.279 --> 00:24:44.400
<v Speaker 1>At what point does a national security mandate cross the

512
00:24:44.440 --> 00:24:47.680
<v Speaker 1>line and become an outright crime against your own citizens.

513
00:24:47.920 --> 00:24:51.000
<v Speaker 2>Your frustration is highly justified, and it points to a

514
00:24:51.039 --> 00:24:53.079
<v Speaker 2>phenomenon we call bureaucratic inertia.

515
00:24:53.119 --> 00:24:56.440
<v Speaker 1>Bureaucratic inertia, what does that look like in this context?

516
00:24:56.599 --> 00:24:59.759
<v Speaker 2>Well, once a system as massive, well funded, and deeply

517
00:24:59.799 --> 00:25:03.240
<v Speaker 2>in grained in the military industrial complex as Hanford is

518
00:25:03.279 --> 00:25:06.480
<v Speaker 2>up and running halting, it is viewed by the people

519
00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:09.640
<v Speaker 2>inside the system as virtually.

520
00:25:09.240 --> 00:25:11.519
<v Speaker 1>Impossible, like trying to stop a freight train.

521
00:25:11.480 --> 00:25:15.359
<v Speaker 2>Exactly, admitting the environmental harm would require shutting down the reactors.

522
00:25:15.759 --> 00:25:18.160
<v Speaker 2>Shutting down the reactors halts plutonium.

523
00:25:17.640 --> 00:25:19.960
<v Speaker 1>Production, which angers the pentagon.

524
00:25:19.759 --> 00:25:22.960
<v Speaker 2>Which threatens the funding and prestige of the entire bureaucracy.

525
00:25:23.720 --> 00:25:26.960
<v Speaker 2>So it is always easier for the individual decision makers

526
00:25:27.000 --> 00:25:31.039
<v Speaker 2>to just keep the machine running, classify the environmental impact reports,

527
00:25:31.440 --> 00:25:33.440
<v Speaker 2>and pass the consequences to the next generation.

528
00:25:33.960 --> 00:25:36.839
<v Speaker 1>They sacrifice the health of their own people to maintain

529
00:25:36.880 --> 00:25:39.920
<v Speaker 1>the budget and the schedule. Yes, and let's look at

530
00:25:39.920 --> 00:25:44.759
<v Speaker 1>the financial reality of that choice today. Ignoring environmental reality

531
00:25:44.799 --> 00:25:46.920
<v Speaker 1>to save time and money in the short term is

532
00:25:46.960 --> 00:25:48.559
<v Speaker 1>a catastrophic mistake.

533
00:25:48.720 --> 00:25:50.000
<v Speaker 2>We are paying for it right now.

534
00:25:50.039 --> 00:25:52.880
<v Speaker 1>The cleanup at the Hanford site, the process of trying

535
00:25:52.880 --> 00:25:56.960
<v Speaker 1>to stabilize millions of gallons of boiling toxic sludge and

536
00:25:57.039 --> 00:26:01.880
<v Speaker 1>underground tanks through vitrification, is currently the most expensive environmental

537
00:26:01.920 --> 00:26:04.519
<v Speaker 1>remediation project in United States history.

538
00:26:04.599 --> 00:26:07.160
<v Speaker 2>The current estimates put the cost at over fifty billion

539
00:26:07.200 --> 00:26:09.880
<v Speaker 2>dollars spent so far, and the cleanup is expected to

540
00:26:09.920 --> 00:26:13.279
<v Speaker 2>take decades more, potentially costing hundreds of billions more.

541
00:26:13.400 --> 00:26:15.599
<v Speaker 1>The cost of arrogance and secrecy is.

542
00:26:15.839 --> 00:26:17.640
<v Speaker 2>Astronomical, it's an unpayable debt.

543
00:26:17.839 --> 00:26:20.279
<v Speaker 1>So at Hanford and Rocky Flats, we are looking at

544
00:26:20.359 --> 00:26:24.240
<v Speaker 1>massive contamination that was essentially a byproduct of the system

545
00:26:24.319 --> 00:26:27.440
<v Speaker 1>working exactly as it was designed to right. But what

546
00:26:27.680 --> 00:26:34.000
<v Speaker 1>happens when these early, highly experimental nuclear production systems actually

547
00:26:34.079 --> 00:26:37.400
<v Speaker 1>catch fire and fail catastrophically, The panic is different. The

548
00:26:37.440 --> 00:26:42.480
<v Speaker 1>transition from production by products to catastrophic system failures reveals

549
00:26:42.519 --> 00:26:46.480
<v Speaker 1>a very different kind of panic within these institutions. Let's

550
00:26:46.480 --> 00:26:48.720
<v Speaker 1>cross the Atlantic for our next event to the UK.

551
00:26:48.880 --> 00:26:53.119
<v Speaker 1>October tenth, nineteen fifty seven, we were in Cumbria, located

552
00:26:53.119 --> 00:26:57.039
<v Speaker 1>in the northwest of England, at the Windscale Nuclear reactor facility.

553
00:26:57.160 --> 00:27:01.279
<v Speaker 2>This incident remains the United Kingdom's worst ever nuclear disaster,

554
00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:05.039
<v Speaker 2>and it centers heavily on a specific quirk of early

555
00:27:05.119 --> 00:27:05.960
<v Speaker 2>reactor physics.

556
00:27:06.279 --> 00:27:08.799
<v Speaker 1>Let's get into the science of this, because it's fascinating.

557
00:27:09.160 --> 00:27:12.119
<v Speaker 1>The Windscale piles were built hastily by the British government

558
00:27:12.119 --> 00:27:15.160
<v Speaker 1>after World War Two to produce plutonium for their own

559
00:27:15.240 --> 00:27:17.000
<v Speaker 1>atomic bomb program.

560
00:27:16.599 --> 00:27:19.119
<v Speaker 2>Because the US had cut off sharing nuclear technology.

561
00:27:19.240 --> 00:27:21.319
<v Speaker 1>Right, the reactor was graphite moderated.

562
00:27:21.440 --> 00:27:24.720
<v Speaker 2>Let's explain how a graphite moderator works. In a reactor,

563
00:27:24.799 --> 00:27:27.079
<v Speaker 2>you need to slow down the neutrons emitted by the

564
00:27:27.200 --> 00:27:30.279
<v Speaker 2>uranium so they can collide with other uranium atoms and

565
00:27:30.359 --> 00:27:31.599
<v Speaker 2>sustain the chain reaction.

566
00:27:31.759 --> 00:27:34.319
<v Speaker 1>They're moving too fast otherwise, exactly.

567
00:27:34.480 --> 00:27:37.799
<v Speaker 2>So at windscale they used massive blocks of graphite to

568
00:27:37.920 --> 00:27:41.519
<v Speaker 2>slow those neutrons down. But there's a physical side effect

569
00:27:41.599 --> 00:27:45.319
<v Speaker 2>to bombarding graphite with radiation over time. It was discovered

570
00:27:45.319 --> 00:27:48.160
<v Speaker 2>by a physicist named Eugene Wigner.

571
00:27:47.759 --> 00:27:50.599
<v Speaker 1>Known as Wigner energy. Right I found the mechanics of

572
00:27:50.640 --> 00:27:55.759
<v Speaker 1>Wigner energy fascinating. Basically, as the neutrons smash into the graphite,

573
00:27:55.799 --> 00:27:58.960
<v Speaker 1>they physically knock the carbon atoms out of their normal

574
00:27:59.039 --> 00:27:59.920
<v Speaker 1>lattice structure.

575
00:28:00.079 --> 00:28:03.079
<v Speaker 2>The disrupting the physical structure of the material itself.

576
00:28:03.160 --> 00:28:06.799
<v Speaker 1>It creates a build up of potential energy within the material.

577
00:28:07.200 --> 00:28:10.599
<v Speaker 1>Think of it like compressing thousands of tiny coil springs

578
00:28:10.640 --> 00:28:13.519
<v Speaker 1>into a tight box. If you knock them out of alignment,

579
00:28:13.559 --> 00:28:15.519
<v Speaker 1>they store physical tension, a very.

580
00:28:15.440 --> 00:28:19.359
<v Speaker 2>Apt mechanical analogy, and to release that tension safely, the

581
00:28:19.440 --> 00:28:22.000
<v Speaker 2>operators had to periodically heat the reactor up in a

582
00:28:22.039 --> 00:28:23.160
<v Speaker 2>controlled manner.

583
00:28:22.920 --> 00:28:24.079
<v Speaker 1>A process called anneiling.

584
00:28:24.359 --> 00:28:27.319
<v Speaker 2>Yes, the heat allows the carbon atoms to slip back

585
00:28:27.359 --> 00:28:30.759
<v Speaker 2>into their proper places, releasing the stored weightener energy safely

586
00:28:31.000 --> 00:28:32.680
<v Speaker 2>as a gradual increase in temperature.

587
00:28:32.720 --> 00:28:35.759
<v Speaker 1>But in October nineteen fifty seven, the operators botched the

588
00:28:35.799 --> 00:28:36.759
<v Speaker 1>annealing process.

589
00:28:36.839 --> 00:28:38.119
<v Speaker 2>They made a critical error.

590
00:28:38.160 --> 00:28:41.440
<v Speaker 1>They heated the reactor too quickly. The stored energy released

591
00:28:41.480 --> 00:28:44.680
<v Speaker 1>all at once, creating a massive spike in temperature.

592
00:28:44.200 --> 00:28:48.079
<v Speaker 2>And the uranium fuel cartridges essentially caught fire inside the core.

593
00:28:48.240 --> 00:28:51.240
<v Speaker 1>And this wasn't a quick flash fire. The massive graphite

594
00:28:51.240 --> 00:28:55.759
<v Speaker 1>core burned completely out of control for three entire days.

595
00:28:55.519 --> 00:28:59.519
<v Speaker 2>Three days of a burning nuclear reactor. The deputy general manager,

596
00:28:59.599 --> 00:29:03.799
<v Speaker 2>Tom Tis Tuei, displayed incredible personal heroism during this.

597
00:29:04.079 --> 00:29:04.640
<v Speaker 1>What did he do?

598
00:29:05.079 --> 00:29:08.359
<v Speaker 2>He repeatedly suited up and walked directly to the reactor face.

599
00:29:08.839 --> 00:29:11.279
<v Speaker 2>He was looking through inspection holes at the white hot

600
00:29:11.319 --> 00:29:14.160
<v Speaker 2>burning core, trying to figure out how to extinguish a

601
00:29:14.200 --> 00:29:17.440
<v Speaker 2>graphite fire, because if you just spray water on it,

602
00:29:17.440 --> 00:29:20.279
<v Speaker 2>it might instantly turn into a volatile hydrogen explosion.

603
00:29:20.440 --> 00:29:24.039
<v Speaker 1>Oh man, So he's staring into a radioactive volcano trying

604
00:29:24.039 --> 00:29:26.599
<v Speaker 1>to figure out how to put it out exactly. Eventually,

605
00:29:26.640 --> 00:29:30.200
<v Speaker 1>they starved it of oxygen and carefully applied water, stopping

606
00:29:30.240 --> 00:29:33.200
<v Speaker 1>the immediate meltdown, but the damage to the atmosphere was

607
00:29:33.240 --> 00:29:33.880
<v Speaker 1>already done.

608
00:29:33.920 --> 00:29:35.160
<v Speaker 2>The plume was already.

609
00:29:34.920 --> 00:29:39.720
<v Speaker 1>Out radioactive material, specifically iodine one thirty one, was forcefully

610
00:29:39.759 --> 00:29:43.720
<v Speaker 1>ejected from the ventilation stacks. It spread a massive plume

611
00:29:43.759 --> 00:29:47.559
<v Speaker 1>of radiation across the British countryside and reached deep into

612
00:29:47.680 --> 00:29:48.799
<v Speaker 1>mainland Europe.

613
00:29:49.119 --> 00:29:51.720
<v Speaker 2>And how did the British government of Prime Minister Harold

614
00:29:51.759 --> 00:29:55.279
<v Speaker 2>McMillan respond to this unprecedented crisis.

615
00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:58.559
<v Speaker 1>By heavily redacting the official report to suppress the true

616
00:29:58.599 --> 00:30:00.720
<v Speaker 1>cause and the full scale of the disaster.

617
00:30:01.039 --> 00:30:03.880
<v Speaker 2>Britain was desperate to prove to the United States that

618
00:30:03.920 --> 00:30:07.559
<v Speaker 2>it was a competent advanced nuclear power. They wanted the

619
00:30:07.680 --> 00:30:10.559
<v Speaker 2>US to resume sharing weapons technology.

620
00:30:10.200 --> 00:30:12.319
<v Speaker 1>So they couldn't look foolish.

621
00:30:11.880 --> 00:30:15.960
<v Speaker 2>Admitting that a fundamental misunderstanding of physics caused their flagship

622
00:30:15.960 --> 00:30:18.599
<v Speaker 2>reactor to catch fire. It would have humiliated them on

623
00:30:18.640 --> 00:30:19.680
<v Speaker 2>the global stage.

624
00:30:19.839 --> 00:30:22.200
<v Speaker 1>But the cover up went far beyond just redacting a

625
00:30:22.240 --> 00:30:24.279
<v Speaker 1>technical report. And this is the part that makes my

626
00:30:24.319 --> 00:30:28.279
<v Speaker 1>stomach turn milk. The surrounding agricultural areas in Cumbria were

627
00:30:28.359 --> 00:30:33.599
<v Speaker 1>heavily contaminated with radioactive iodine. This meant the grass was contaminated.

628
00:30:32.920 --> 00:30:34.880
<v Speaker 2>That a dairy cows ate the grass.

629
00:30:34.759 --> 00:30:39.000
<v Speaker 1>And their milk became highly dangerous, particularly to the thyroid

630
00:30:39.039 --> 00:30:42.559
<v Speaker 1>glands of growing children. We are talking about the milk

631
00:30:42.599 --> 00:30:44.920
<v Speaker 1>supply from hundreds of surrounding farms.

632
00:30:44.960 --> 00:30:46.240
<v Speaker 2>It was heavily poisoned.

633
00:30:46.440 --> 00:30:49.559
<v Speaker 1>The logical humane thing to do would be to seize

634
00:30:49.599 --> 00:30:53.240
<v Speaker 1>the milk, pour it down the drain, and financially compensate

635
00:30:53.279 --> 00:30:53.880
<v Speaker 1>the farmers.

636
00:30:54.119 --> 00:30:56.960
<v Speaker 2>That is the only acceptable public health imperative.

637
00:30:57.119 --> 00:30:59.920
<v Speaker 1>But the government realized that seizing the milk and it

638
00:31:00.039 --> 00:31:03.799
<v Speaker 1>admitting it was too radioactive to consume would cause widespread

639
00:31:03.880 --> 00:31:05.160
<v Speaker 1>national panic.

640
00:31:05.160 --> 00:31:07.200
<v Speaker 2>So they made a horrific calculation.

641
00:31:07.519 --> 00:31:11.319
<v Speaker 1>Instead of discarding the poison, they deliberately diluted it. They

642
00:31:11.400 --> 00:31:15.000
<v Speaker 1>took the heavily contaminated milk from the local farms, transported

643
00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:17.720
<v Speaker 1>it and mixed it into the national milk supply with

644
00:31:17.920 --> 00:31:21.279
<v Speaker 1>clean milk from other regions just ready it out. Their

645
00:31:21.319 --> 00:31:24.880
<v Speaker 1>goal was to lower the overall radiation concentration to what

646
00:31:24.960 --> 00:31:27.960
<v Speaker 1>they deemed an acceptable level, and then they shipped it

647
00:31:27.960 --> 00:31:30.039
<v Speaker 1>out to grocery stores for families to drink.

648
00:31:30.240 --> 00:31:34.440
<v Speaker 2>It is a breathtakingly cynical calculation. You are literally spreading

649
00:31:34.519 --> 00:31:38.160
<v Speaker 2>a localized toxin across an entire population to hide a

650
00:31:38.200 --> 00:31:39.079
<v Speaker 2>political failure.

651
00:31:39.440 --> 00:31:43.079
<v Speaker 1>It is exactly like finding deadly poison in a town well,

652
00:31:43.680 --> 00:31:45.839
<v Speaker 1>and instead of closing the well, the mayor decides to

653
00:31:46.000 --> 00:31:48.680
<v Speaker 1>just stir it really thoroughly, so everyone in town gets

654
00:31:48.680 --> 00:31:49.519
<v Speaker 1>a little bit of poison.

655
00:31:49.720 --> 00:31:52.279
<v Speaker 2>When you analyze the chilling logic of the Cold War

656
00:31:52.359 --> 00:31:56.559
<v Speaker 2>state here you see their true priorities, which were to

657
00:31:56.599 --> 00:31:59.599
<v Speaker 2>the authorities in London, public panic was viewed as a

658
00:31:59.720 --> 00:32:03.279
<v Speaker 2>far more dangerous immediate threat to national stability than the

659
00:32:03.319 --> 00:32:05.119
<v Speaker 2>actual physical radiation.

660
00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:07.440
<v Speaker 1>Because panic is loud and radiation is silent.

661
00:32:07.599 --> 00:32:11.839
<v Speaker 2>Exactly, panic disrupts the economy, it causes political upheaval, and

662
00:32:11.880 --> 00:32:15.920
<v Speaker 2>makes the government look weak to its adversaries. Radiation takes

663
00:32:16.039 --> 00:32:18.240
<v Speaker 2>decades to manifest as thyroid cancer.

664
00:32:18.359 --> 00:32:22.680
<v Speaker 1>From a purely bureaucratic survival standpoint, diluting the milk solves

665
00:32:22.720 --> 00:32:26.279
<v Speaker 1>the immediate political problem, even if it creates a horrific,

666
00:32:26.480 --> 00:32:28.599
<v Speaker 1>untraceable public health crisis down.

667
00:32:28.519 --> 00:32:31.359
<v Speaker 2>The line, and the full report proving this action wasn't

668
00:32:31.359 --> 00:32:33.480
<v Speaker 2>declassified until nineteen eighty eight.

669
00:32:33.400 --> 00:32:36.160
<v Speaker 1>Thirty one years later, long after anyone who drank that

670
00:32:36.200 --> 00:32:37.680
<v Speaker 1>milk could do anything about it.

671
00:32:38.000 --> 00:32:40.960
<v Speaker 2>The arrogance to make that biological choice for millions of

672
00:32:40.960 --> 00:32:43.480
<v Speaker 2>families without their consent is staggering.

673
00:32:43.640 --> 00:32:46.680
<v Speaker 1>Now, Windscale was a massive cover up of a large

674
00:32:46.680 --> 00:32:50.440
<v Speaker 1>scale event, But looking at the historical record, our next

675
00:32:50.440 --> 00:32:55.359
<v Speaker 1>event is incredibly intimate, highly localized, and frankly, it sounds

676
00:32:55.400 --> 00:32:56.759
<v Speaker 1>like a psychological thriller.

677
00:32:57.279 --> 00:32:58.240
<v Speaker 2>The SL one.

678
00:32:58.319 --> 00:33:02.400
<v Speaker 1>January third, nineteen sixty one the SL one nuclear reactor

679
00:33:02.720 --> 00:33:06.119
<v Speaker 1>located at the National Reactor Test Station in the desolate,

680
00:33:06.200 --> 00:33:07.599
<v Speaker 1>freezing planes of Idaho.

681
00:33:08.079 --> 00:33:11.759
<v Speaker 2>The SL one represents a very different era of nuclear development.

682
00:33:11.759 --> 00:33:16.160
<v Speaker 2>It wasn't a massive production facility hin relatively yes, it

683
00:33:16.200 --> 00:33:20.359
<v Speaker 2>was the Argonne Low Power Reactor, a small experimental military

684
00:33:20.359 --> 00:33:24.119
<v Speaker 2>prototype designed to be deployed to remote, isolated radar stations

685
00:33:24.119 --> 00:33:24.680
<v Speaker 2>in the Arctic.

686
00:33:24.880 --> 00:33:27.759
<v Speaker 1>It was essentially a nuclear battery for extreme environments.

687
00:33:27.920 --> 00:33:28.160
<v Speaker 2>Right.

688
00:33:28.279 --> 00:33:31.240
<v Speaker 1>So, three military operators were working the night shift. The

689
00:33:31.319 --> 00:33:33.799
<v Speaker 1>reactor had been shut down for maintenance over the holidays,

690
00:33:33.839 --> 00:33:36.359
<v Speaker 1>and their job was to reconnect the control rods to

691
00:33:36.400 --> 00:33:38.039
<v Speaker 1>the automated system to restart it.

692
00:33:38.119 --> 00:33:40.759
<v Speaker 2>And the SL one design was uniquely unforgiving.

693
00:33:41.039 --> 00:33:42.160
<v Speaker 1>Explain the design flaw.

694
00:33:42.480 --> 00:33:44.519
<v Speaker 2>To restart it, an operator had to stand on top

695
00:33:44.519 --> 00:33:47.240
<v Speaker 2>of the reactive vessel and manually pull the heavy central

696
00:33:47.240 --> 00:33:49.759
<v Speaker 2>control rod out by just a few inches to hook it.

697
00:33:49.759 --> 00:33:51.440
<v Speaker 1>Up, stand physically on top of it.

698
00:33:51.559 --> 00:33:54.839
<v Speaker 2>Yes, and the control rod absorbs neutrons. When you pull

699
00:33:54.839 --> 00:33:58.599
<v Speaker 2>it out, the fission reaction increases. The fatal flaw of

700
00:33:58.640 --> 00:34:02.039
<v Speaker 2>the sl one design was that this single central control

701
00:34:02.160 --> 00:34:04.519
<v Speaker 2>rod controlled an enormous amount of.

702
00:34:04.440 --> 00:34:07.079
<v Speaker 1>Reactivity, meaning if it comes out too far, if it was.

703
00:34:07.039 --> 00:34:09.960
<v Speaker 2>Pulled out too far, there were absolutely no secondary failsafes

704
00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:11.440
<v Speaker 2>to stop the reaction none.

705
00:34:11.960 --> 00:34:15.280
<v Speaker 1>So the operator, John Burns, was supposed to lift the

706
00:34:15.400 --> 00:34:19.039
<v Speaker 1>rod four inches, but for reasons we will never truly know,

707
00:34:19.400 --> 00:34:22.239
<v Speaker 1>the rod was withdrawn nearly twenty inches.

708
00:34:21.960 --> 00:34:26.000
<v Speaker 2>And the reactor went what physicists call prompt critical.

709
00:34:25.639 --> 00:34:29.400
<v Speaker 1>Going prompt critical. That means the nuclear chain reaction multiplies

710
00:34:29.440 --> 00:34:32.360
<v Speaker 1>at an exponential rate so fast.

711
00:34:32.199 --> 00:34:36.119
<v Speaker 2>That the resulting energy release is virtually instantaneous. It goes

712
00:34:36.119 --> 00:34:39.280
<v Speaker 2>from a dormant state to a violent thermal explosion in

713
00:34:39.320 --> 00:34:40.559
<v Speaker 2>a matter of milliseconds.

714
00:34:40.599 --> 00:34:42.800
<v Speaker 1>The fuel plates melted instantly.

715
00:34:42.320 --> 00:34:45.920
<v Speaker 2>Instantly vaporizing the surrounding water coolant into high pressure steam.

716
00:34:45.800 --> 00:34:49.199
<v Speaker 1>And that steam expansion caused a massive water hammer effect.

717
00:34:49.519 --> 00:34:51.920
<v Speaker 1>The water slammed into the lid of the reactor vessel

718
00:34:51.960 --> 00:34:54.920
<v Speaker 1>with such force that the entire twenty six thousand pound

719
00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:57.159
<v Speaker 1>reactor jumped nine feet into the air.

720
00:34:57.400 --> 00:34:59.760
<v Speaker 2>Twenty six thousand pounds jumped nine feet.

721
00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:03.599
<v Speaker 1>The three men were killed instantly in a horrific combination

722
00:35:03.719 --> 00:35:06.840
<v Speaker 1>of physical trauma and massive radiation exposure.

723
00:35:06.960 --> 00:35:08.079
<v Speaker 2>It was a brutal scene.

724
00:35:08.119 --> 00:35:10.880
<v Speaker 1>The force of the explosion was so violent that one

725
00:35:10.880 --> 00:35:14.440
<v Speaker 1>of the operators, Richard Legg, was literally pinned to the

726
00:35:14.480 --> 00:35:17.960
<v Speaker 1>ceiling of the containment building by a heavy shield plug

727
00:35:18.000 --> 00:35:19.880
<v Speaker 1>that was ejected from the top of the reactor.

728
00:35:20.039 --> 00:35:22.880
<v Speaker 2>The rescue teams couldn't even safely approach the bodies for

729
00:35:23.039 --> 00:35:24.880
<v Speaker 2>days due to the radiation fields.

730
00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:28.480
<v Speaker 1>They eventually had to bury the men in lead lined caskets,

731
00:35:28.559 --> 00:35:32.360
<v Speaker 1>which were then completely sealed in concrete. These remain the

732
00:35:32.400 --> 00:35:35.679
<v Speaker 1>only fatal reactor accidents in United States history.

733
00:35:35.880 --> 00:35:39.039
<v Speaker 2>It is a profound tragedy on every level, but the

734
00:35:39.119 --> 00:35:43.199
<v Speaker 2>aftermath is where the culture of secrecy breeds something deeply unsettling.

735
00:35:43.440 --> 00:35:46.960
<v Speaker 1>The military immediately locked down the facility, sealed all the records,

736
00:35:47.000 --> 00:35:51.840
<v Speaker 1>and eventually released a brief, sterile official conclusion operator error.

737
00:35:52.119 --> 00:35:52.960
<v Speaker 2>Just they messed up.

738
00:35:53.000 --> 00:35:55.199
<v Speaker 1>They placed the blame entirely on the dead men and

739
00:35:55.199 --> 00:35:57.639
<v Speaker 1>shut the book. But because the truth and the technical

740
00:35:57.679 --> 00:36:01.320
<v Speaker 1>specifics were locked away in classified vaults, the silence bred

741
00:36:01.400 --> 00:36:02.559
<v Speaker 1>absolute madness.

742
00:36:02.760 --> 00:36:06.440
<v Speaker 2>When you remove transparency, conspiracy fills the void exactly.

743
00:36:07.280 --> 00:36:10.239
<v Speaker 1>Rumors began to swirl through the tight knit military and

744
00:36:10.320 --> 00:36:14.639
<v Speaker 1>nuclear communities that the explosion wasn't a mechanical accident at all.

745
00:36:14.760 --> 00:36:16.280
<v Speaker 2>The murder suicide rumor.

746
00:36:16.360 --> 00:36:19.079
<v Speaker 1>The rumor was that one of the operators had deliberately

747
00:36:19.159 --> 00:36:22.199
<v Speaker 1>pulled the rod to commit a murder suicide because of

748
00:36:22.239 --> 00:36:27.119
<v Speaker 1>a bitter romantic jealousy involving a colleague's wife, a nuclear

749
00:36:27.239 --> 00:36:28.039
<v Speaker 1>love triangle.

750
00:36:28.159 --> 00:36:31.199
<v Speaker 2>I mean, it sounds absurd, but it gained incredible traction

751
00:36:31.400 --> 00:36:35.239
<v Speaker 2>whack because the more likely technical explanation that the boron

752
00:36:35.320 --> 00:36:38.800
<v Speaker 2>strips on the control rod had swollen or corroded, causing

753
00:36:38.840 --> 00:36:41.719
<v Speaker 2>the rod to stick and burn, simply yanked it too

754
00:36:41.760 --> 00:36:42.519
<v Speaker 2>hard to free it.

755
00:36:42.639 --> 00:36:45.079
<v Speaker 1>That truth was buried, so people just made up a

756
00:36:45.079 --> 00:36:47.280
<v Speaker 1>story to make sense of it. How does a government

757
00:36:47.320 --> 00:36:50.719
<v Speaker 1>investigation into a reactor explosion turn into a true crime

758
00:36:50.880 --> 00:36:52.159
<v Speaker 1>sci fi horror story.

759
00:36:52.239 --> 00:36:55.239
<v Speaker 2>It happens because the very nature of secrecy itself right.

760
00:36:55.360 --> 00:37:00.000
<v Speaker 1>When authorities seal records and offer incredibly sterile unsatisfying conclusions

761
00:37:00.199 --> 00:37:03.719
<v Speaker 1>like operator error. For events that are fundamentally violent, chaotic,

762
00:37:03.800 --> 00:37:07.599
<v Speaker 1>and catastrophic, they create a massive psychological vacuum in the

763
00:37:07.639 --> 00:37:08.639
<v Speaker 1>public consciousness.

764
00:37:08.960 --> 00:37:12.840
<v Speaker 2>Operator error just doesn't adequately explain a man pinned to

765
00:37:12.880 --> 00:37:14.719
<v Speaker 2>a ceiling by a nuclear explosion.

766
00:37:14.920 --> 00:37:18.920
<v Speaker 1>The human mind of whores a vacuum, especially when trauma

767
00:37:18.960 --> 00:37:22.599
<v Speaker 1>and mystery are involved. We crave a narrative, We crave

768
00:37:22.639 --> 00:37:25.079
<v Speaker 1>a reason why something terrible happened, and.

769
00:37:25.000 --> 00:37:29.000
<v Speaker 2>In the absence of institutional transparency, human beings will naturally

770
00:37:29.000 --> 00:37:33.599
<v Speaker 2>fill that vacuum with rumors, with projections, and with dramatic narratives.

771
00:37:33.760 --> 00:37:36.840
<v Speaker 1>The military thought sealing the records would make the story

772
00:37:36.840 --> 00:37:37.920
<v Speaker 1>go away quietly.

773
00:37:38.280 --> 00:37:41.920
<v Speaker 2>Instead, the secrecy acted as a fertile incubator for a

774
00:37:42.039 --> 00:37:43.159
<v Speaker 2>much darker narrative.

775
00:37:43.320 --> 00:37:46.440
<v Speaker 1>Most modern historians and nuclear engineers believe it was indeed

776
00:37:46.480 --> 00:37:49.719
<v Speaker 1>just a tragic mechanical flaw combined with human error. Right.

777
00:37:49.880 --> 00:37:52.280
<v Speaker 2>Yes, a stuck rod that was pulled too.

778
00:37:52.159 --> 00:37:56.039
<v Speaker 1>Hard, But the fact that the murder suicide rumor existed

779
00:37:56.039 --> 00:37:59.199
<v Speaker 1>and persisted for decades is a direct indictment of government's

780
00:37:59.199 --> 00:38:02.199
<v Speaker 1>refusal to beat tree transparent. The cover up didn't hide

781
00:38:02.239 --> 00:38:05.039
<v Speaker 1>the truth. It just created a much more damaging lie.

782
00:38:05.079 --> 00:38:07.960
<v Speaker 1>Exactly up to this point in our exploration, the events

783
00:38:07.960 --> 00:38:11.280
<v Speaker 1>we've discussed that dropped bombs, the factory fires, the localized

784
00:38:11.320 --> 00:38:14.599
<v Speaker 1>reactor explosions, these were fundamentally accidents.

785
00:38:14.880 --> 00:38:17.960
<v Speaker 2>There were terrible mistakes exacerbated by secrecy.

786
00:38:18.159 --> 00:38:20.239
<v Speaker 1>But as we move into the final stage of the

787
00:38:20.320 --> 00:38:24.079
<v Speaker 1>historical record, we take the darkest turn yet because these

788
00:38:24.079 --> 00:38:27.280
<v Speaker 1>final events were not accidents. We are now looking at

789
00:38:27.320 --> 00:38:33.079
<v Speaker 1>populations that were intentionally used or disregarded as living test subjects.

790
00:38:33.280 --> 00:38:38.400
<v Speaker 2>The transition from accidental exposure to intentional geographic sacrifice highlights

791
00:38:38.400 --> 00:38:40.920
<v Speaker 2>the ultimate hubris of the nuclear age.

792
00:38:41.159 --> 00:38:43.880
<v Speaker 1>Let's start on March first, nineteen fifty four, at the

793
00:38:43.920 --> 00:38:45.719
<v Speaker 1>Bikini Atoll in the Marshall.

794
00:38:45.360 --> 00:38:47.519
<v Speaker 2>Islands, the Castle Bravo Test.

795
00:38:47.880 --> 00:38:50.920
<v Speaker 1>The United States is conducting its largest nuclear test ever.

796
00:38:51.440 --> 00:38:55.559
<v Speaker 1>They are detonating a thermonuclear device, a hydrogen bomb known

797
00:38:55.599 --> 00:38:56.880
<v Speaker 1>as the Shrimp device.

798
00:38:57.119 --> 00:38:59.880
<v Speaker 2>Castle Bravo was designed to test a dry fuel thermonu

799
00:39:00.039 --> 00:39:02.119
<v Speaker 2>clear weapon using lithium deuteride.

800
00:39:02.199 --> 00:39:04.880
<v Speaker 1>It was meant to be a demonstration of absolute world

801
00:39:04.960 --> 00:39:07.559
<v Speaker 1>ending power, a clear signal to the Soviet Union.

802
00:39:07.639 --> 00:39:10.480
<v Speaker 2>The physicists at Los Alamos predicted a yield of roughly

803
00:39:10.559 --> 00:39:11.599
<v Speaker 2>six megatons.

804
00:39:11.800 --> 00:39:14.119
<v Speaker 1>But they got the math wrong, completely wrong, and they

805
00:39:14.119 --> 00:39:17.039
<v Speaker 1>didn't get it wrong by a small margin. The actual

806
00:39:17.079 --> 00:39:20.599
<v Speaker 1>explosion was fifteen megatons. It was a thousand times the

807
00:39:20.599 --> 00:39:22.559
<v Speaker 1>power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshma.

808
00:39:22.639 --> 00:39:25.119
<v Speaker 2>They underestimated the yield of their own weapon by a

809
00:39:25.119 --> 00:39:26.480
<v Speaker 2>factor of nearly three.

810
00:39:26.679 --> 00:39:30.679
<v Speaker 1>The fireball was so massive, so incredibly hot, that it

811
00:39:30.840 --> 00:39:34.599
<v Speaker 1>literally vaporized a portion of the coral atol or, erasing

812
00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:38.400
<v Speaker 1>entire small islands from the map and pulling millions of

813
00:39:38.519 --> 00:39:43.199
<v Speaker 1>tons of irradiated coral sand and water high into the stratosphere.

814
00:39:43.360 --> 00:39:47.320
<v Speaker 2>The scientific error here is fascinating but also terrifying.

815
00:39:47.400 --> 00:39:49.000
<v Speaker 1>How did they mess it up that badly?

816
00:39:49.119 --> 00:39:51.480
<v Speaker 2>Well? They used two isotopes of lithium in the fuel,

817
00:39:51.840 --> 00:39:55.480
<v Speaker 2>lithium six and lithium seven. They assumed that the lithium

818
00:39:55.480 --> 00:39:57.440
<v Speaker 2>seven would be inert in the nuclear reaction.

819
00:39:57.599 --> 00:39:59.559
<v Speaker 1>They thought it would just sit there exactly.

820
00:40:00.079 --> 00:40:03.719
<v Speaker 2>Instead, the intense neutron bombardment caused the lithium seven to

821
00:40:03.760 --> 00:40:08.320
<v Speaker 2>absorb a neutron, split apart and produce massive amounts of tritium.

822
00:40:07.880 --> 00:40:10.079
<v Speaker 1>Which is highly combustible in a fusion reaction.

823
00:40:10.280 --> 00:40:14.599
<v Speaker 2>Yes, the inert material aggressively fueled a runaway thermal chain reaction.

824
00:40:14.920 --> 00:40:19.000
<v Speaker 1>They were literally treating the Earth's atmosphere as an experimental laboratory,

825
00:40:19.119 --> 00:40:22.639
<v Speaker 1>playing with physical forces. They fundamentally did not fully understand.

826
00:40:22.719 --> 00:40:25.239
<v Speaker 2>It's hubris on an unimaginable scale.

827
00:40:25.320 --> 00:40:28.800
<v Speaker 1>That is deeply unsettling. But the physics error pales in

828
00:40:28.840 --> 00:40:32.920
<v Speaker 1>comparison to the moral failure regarding the fallout the human costs. Yes,

829
00:40:33.760 --> 00:40:38.280
<v Speaker 1>because of the massive, unexpected yield, a colossal cloud of

830
00:40:38.440 --> 00:40:42.079
<v Speaker 1>highly radioactive ash was blasted into the air, and the

831
00:40:42.119 --> 00:40:45.079
<v Speaker 1>military meteorologists knew before they pushed the button that the

832
00:40:45.119 --> 00:40:49.119
<v Speaker 1>high altitude winds were blowing directly toward inhabited.

833
00:40:48.559 --> 00:40:50.599
<v Speaker 2>Islands, including the wrong slap Atal.

834
00:40:50.800 --> 00:40:53.599
<v Speaker 1>They checked the weather, they saw the wind was carrying

835
00:40:53.599 --> 00:40:56.559
<v Speaker 1>the fallout toward human beings, and they made the conscious

836
00:40:56.559 --> 00:40:58.159
<v Speaker 1>decision to detonate it anyway.

837
00:40:58.320 --> 00:41:01.239
<v Speaker 2>They prioritized the test schedule over the safety of the

838
00:41:01.239 --> 00:41:04.639
<v Speaker 2>Marshal Ease people. They did not evacuate Rongja Lap for

839
00:41:04.719 --> 00:41:06.679
<v Speaker 2>two full days after the explosion.

840
00:41:06.800 --> 00:41:10.599
<v Speaker 1>Two days while radioactive ash rained down like thick.

841
00:41:10.440 --> 00:41:13.199
<v Speaker 2>Snow, children not knowing what it was, played in it.

842
00:41:13.199 --> 00:41:17.159
<v Speaker 1>It contaminated their drinking water. Their food supply, their entire ecosystem.

843
00:41:17.239 --> 00:41:19.199
<v Speaker 1>And it wasn't just the marshal ease people who were hit.

844
00:41:19.360 --> 00:41:21.719
<v Speaker 2>The Japanese fishing boat yes, the.

845
00:41:21.760 --> 00:41:25.079
<v Speaker 1>Dago Fukui Maru or the Lucky Dragon number five. It

846
00:41:25.119 --> 00:41:29.119
<v Speaker 1>was operating roughly eighty miles away outside the official danger zone.

847
00:41:29.199 --> 00:41:31.719
<v Speaker 2>The crew was completely covered in radioactive ash.

848
00:41:31.920 --> 00:41:35.559
<v Speaker 1>They suffered acute radiation sickness, their skin burning, their hair

849
00:41:35.599 --> 00:41:38.360
<v Speaker 1>falling out. One crew member died shortly after.

850
00:41:39.480 --> 00:41:42.760
<v Speaker 2>I have to ask, if you are a commander and

851
00:41:42.800 --> 00:41:45.760
<v Speaker 2>you see the wind is blowing poison toward a populated area,

852
00:41:47.000 --> 00:41:49.360
<v Speaker 2>why in God's name do you push the button?

853
00:41:49.480 --> 00:41:53.000
<v Speaker 1>You push the button Because of the profound dehumanization inherent

854
00:41:53.039 --> 00:41:54.360
<v Speaker 1>in the Cold War testing.

855
00:41:54.079 --> 00:41:56.039
<v Speaker 2>Program, meaning the people didn't matter.

856
00:41:55.800 --> 00:41:58.920
<v Speaker 1>To them, the test schedule, the massive logistical effort of

857
00:41:58.960 --> 00:42:03.320
<v Speaker 1>bringing military brands and scientists to the geopolitical message they

858
00:42:03.400 --> 00:42:07.159
<v Speaker 1>desperately wanted to descend to Moscow. All of these abstract,

859
00:42:07.320 --> 00:42:12.280
<v Speaker 1>high level strategic concepts were given absolute priority over the concrete,

860
00:42:12.440 --> 00:42:14.480
<v Speaker 1>flesh and blood lives of the Marshalisee people.

861
00:42:14.519 --> 00:42:15.960
<v Speaker 2>They just treated them as expendable.

862
00:42:16.199 --> 00:42:20.639
<v Speaker 1>The indigenous populations were treated at best as an inconvenience

863
00:42:20.639 --> 00:42:23.920
<v Speaker 1>to the testing schedule, and at worst, as an opportunity.

864
00:42:24.440 --> 00:42:26.480
<v Speaker 2>What do you mean an opportunity after the exposure?

865
00:42:26.559 --> 00:42:28.880
<v Speaker 1>The US government set up Project four point one.

866
00:42:29.039 --> 00:42:30.039
<v Speaker 2>Oh I read about this.

867
00:42:30.239 --> 00:42:32.239
<v Speaker 1>It was a medical program to study the effects of

868
00:42:32.320 --> 00:42:36.000
<v Speaker 1>radiation on the Marshalies for decades. They literally gathered data

869
00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:39.280
<v Speaker 1>from a population they poisoned. That makes me sick. The

870
00:42:39.360 --> 00:42:42.599
<v Speaker 1>devastating human cost on the people of the Marshall Islands

871
00:42:42.679 --> 00:42:49.039
<v Speaker 1>is incalculable. Entire generations plagued by thyroid cancers, horrific birth defects,

872
00:42:49.280 --> 00:42:53.159
<v Speaker 1>and forced permanent relocation from their ancestral homes, and.

873
00:42:53.079 --> 00:42:54.480
<v Speaker 2>They had to fight for basic care.

874
00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:57.079
<v Speaker 1>The fact that the marshaliese had to fight the US

875
00:42:57.159 --> 00:43:00.360
<v Speaker 1>government and courts for decades to secure basic metical care

876
00:43:00.400 --> 00:43:03.840
<v Speaker 1>and compensation proves that the government knew exactly what it

877
00:43:03.880 --> 00:43:07.559
<v Speaker 1>was doing and knew that admitting liability would be politically

878
00:43:07.599 --> 00:43:08.880
<v Speaker 1>and financially costly.

879
00:43:09.239 --> 00:43:12.519
<v Speaker 2>Secrecy here wasn't about national security. It was a tool

880
00:43:12.679 --> 00:43:15.320
<v Speaker 2>to evade moral and financial responsibility.

881
00:43:15.480 --> 00:43:19.280
<v Speaker 1>Evasion of responsibility seems to be a universal tactic, regardless

882
00:43:19.280 --> 00:43:20.880
<v Speaker 1>of which superpower we examine.

883
00:43:20.920 --> 00:43:23.000
<v Speaker 2>Which brings us to the Soviet Union.

884
00:43:23.320 --> 00:43:25.760
<v Speaker 1>During the height of the Cold War, the Soviet nuclear

885
00:43:25.800 --> 00:43:29.119
<v Speaker 1>program was operating at a breakneck desperate pace to match

886
00:43:29.159 --> 00:43:30.639
<v Speaker 1>the United States, and they.

887
00:43:30.639 --> 00:43:33.400
<v Speaker 2>Ran into a massive logistical problem what to do with

888
00:43:33.440 --> 00:43:36.719
<v Speaker 2>the astronomical volume of highly radioactive liquid waste they were

889
00:43:36.800 --> 00:43:39.760
<v Speaker 2>generating from reprocessing spent nuclear fuel.

890
00:43:40.119 --> 00:43:43.239
<v Speaker 1>Because the American sites like Hanford pumped it into rivers

891
00:43:43.320 --> 00:43:47.960
<v Speaker 1>or underground tanks, the Soviet solution was shockingly rudimentary.

892
00:43:47.559 --> 00:43:48.920
<v Speaker 2>Just horrifyingly simple.

893
00:43:49.039 --> 00:43:52.039
<v Speaker 1>They chose a small natural body of water near the

894
00:43:52.079 --> 00:43:55.760
<v Speaker 1>Mayak Production Association in the Ural Mountains. It was called

895
00:43:55.840 --> 00:43:56.559
<v Speaker 1>Lake Karace.

896
00:43:56.920 --> 00:44:00.559
<v Speaker 2>From nineteen fifty one onward, the Soviet government used this

897
00:44:00.679 --> 00:44:03.840
<v Speaker 2>lake as an open air dumping ground for high level

898
00:44:03.920 --> 00:44:05.039
<v Speaker 2>radioactive waste.

899
00:44:05.079 --> 00:44:08.559
<v Speaker 1>No containment vessels, no deep geological storage.

900
00:44:08.119 --> 00:44:11.679
<v Speaker 2>No safety protocols whatsoever. They literally just ran pipes out

901
00:44:11.719 --> 00:44:15.079
<v Speaker 2>to the lake and dumped the glowing toxic sledge directly

902
00:44:15.119 --> 00:44:16.119
<v Speaker 2>into the open water.

903
00:44:16.320 --> 00:44:20.760
<v Speaker 1>The environmental degradation is almost impossible to overstate. They poured

904
00:44:20.840 --> 00:44:24.400
<v Speaker 1>so much radioactive material into that specific basin that the

905
00:44:24.480 --> 00:44:26.840
<v Speaker 1>hydrology of the lake fundamentally changed.

906
00:44:26.880 --> 00:44:29.559
<v Speaker 2>By the nineteen nineties, when the Soviet Union fell and

907
00:44:29.639 --> 00:44:33.079
<v Speaker 2>outside scientists finally got access to test the area with decimeters.

908
00:44:33.480 --> 00:44:36.079
<v Speaker 2>Lake Karajo was deemed the most polluted place on Earth.

909
00:44:36.199 --> 00:44:39.280
<v Speaker 1>Listen to the statistic from the declassified sources. The radiation

910
00:44:39.360 --> 00:44:41.880
<v Speaker 1>fields on the shoreline were measured at six hundred runchins

911
00:44:41.920 --> 00:44:44.639
<v Speaker 1>per hour. If you simply walked up and stood on

912
00:44:44.679 --> 00:44:47.280
<v Speaker 1>the shore of the lake for one single hour, you

913
00:44:47.320 --> 00:44:51.719
<v Speaker 1>would receive a lethal fatal dose of radiation one hour.

914
00:44:51.960 --> 00:44:55.760
<v Speaker 1>The lake was so incredibly radioactive that it could kill

915
00:44:55.760 --> 00:44:57.719
<v Speaker 1>a human being in less time than it takes to

916
00:44:57.760 --> 00:44:59.519
<v Speaker 1>sit down and watch an episode of television.

917
00:44:59.559 --> 00:45:01.840
<v Speaker 2>And of course, the fundamental law of nature is that

918
00:45:01.920 --> 00:45:05.719
<v Speaker 2>water and the elements it carries never stay in one place. Yeah,

919
00:45:05.840 --> 00:45:07.599
<v Speaker 2>ecosystems are dynamic.

920
00:45:07.239 --> 00:45:10.760
<v Speaker 1>Right, Because in nineteen sixty seven the region experienced a severe,

921
00:45:10.920 --> 00:45:12.480
<v Speaker 1>prolonged drought, the.

922
00:45:12.400 --> 00:45:15.639
<v Speaker 2>Water levels in Lake Karace dropped drastically.

923
00:45:15.159 --> 00:45:18.840
<v Speaker 1>Exposing the highly radioactive sediment on the lake bed. The

924
00:45:18.880 --> 00:45:22.559
<v Speaker 1>wind picked up and blew massive clouds of radioactive dust

925
00:45:22.559 --> 00:45:26.719
<v Speaker 1>across the surrounding region, heavily irradiating thousands and thousands of

926
00:45:26.719 --> 00:45:28.599
<v Speaker 1>people across hundreds of square miles.

927
00:45:28.760 --> 00:45:30.159
<v Speaker 2>And what did the Soviet government do?

928
00:45:30.679 --> 00:45:34.800
<v Speaker 1>They said absolutely nothing. There were no warnings, no medical interventions,

929
00:45:34.800 --> 00:45:38.320
<v Speaker 1>no evacuations. They just let the population absorb the fallout.

930
00:45:38.440 --> 00:45:41.920
<v Speaker 2>And how did Soviet engineering eventually attempt to fix this

931
00:45:42.039 --> 00:45:44.320
<v Speaker 2>open air radiological weapon they had created.

932
00:45:44.519 --> 00:45:46.880
<v Speaker 1>This part is almost comical if it wasn't so tragic

933
00:45:47.199 --> 00:45:49.840
<v Speaker 1>and the nineteen seventies and eighties that their brilliant solution

934
00:45:50.079 --> 00:45:53.960
<v Speaker 1>was to just start dumping massive hollow concrete blocks and

935
00:45:54.000 --> 00:45:54.960
<v Speaker 1>dirt into the lake.

936
00:45:55.159 --> 00:45:57.079
<v Speaker 2>They spent years just filling it in.

937
00:45:57.239 --> 00:45:58.920
<v Speaker 1>So their solution to a lake that can kill you

938
00:45:58.960 --> 00:46:01.360
<v Speaker 1>in an hour is to just poor concrete on it.

939
00:46:01.360 --> 00:46:05.039
<v Speaker 1>It's absurd. The highly radioactive waste is still down there.

940
00:46:05.119 --> 00:46:08.920
<v Speaker 2>It is entirely still there, slowly leaching into the groundwater

941
00:46:09.000 --> 00:46:12.480
<v Speaker 2>table that connects to the Teca River and eventually the Arctic.

942
00:46:12.159 --> 00:46:14.519
<v Speaker 1>Ocean, putting a band aid on a gaping wound.

943
00:46:14.960 --> 00:46:19.400
<v Speaker 2>What Lake Karace represents is the sheer, unbridled desperation of

944
00:46:19.440 --> 00:46:23.440
<v Speaker 2>the Soviet nuclear program. They lack the resources, the time,

945
00:46:23.519 --> 00:46:26.920
<v Speaker 2>and the technological finesse to manage waste properly, so they

946
00:46:26.960 --> 00:46:29.199
<v Speaker 2>resorted to barbaric environmental dumping.

947
00:46:29.440 --> 00:46:30.719
<v Speaker 1>It's just reckless.

948
00:46:30.840 --> 00:46:35.679
<v Speaker 2>Furthermore, this highlights the specific unchecked danger of authoritarian regimes

949
00:46:35.800 --> 00:46:37.719
<v Speaker 2>operating without any public oversight.

950
00:46:38.079 --> 00:46:40.400
<v Speaker 1>In a close society where the press is an arm

951
00:46:40.440 --> 00:46:43.159
<v Speaker 1>of the state and protesting the government can mean imprisonment

952
00:46:43.280 --> 00:46:47.119
<v Speaker 1>or death, a bureaucracy can create an absolute ecological dead

953
00:46:47.199 --> 00:46:49.079
<v Speaker 1>zone with zero accountability.

954
00:46:49.440 --> 00:46:51.800
<v Speaker 2>The state doesn't have to answer to the people living

955
00:46:51.840 --> 00:46:54.440
<v Speaker 2>near Lake Karchai, so the state simply ignores their.

956
00:46:54.360 --> 00:46:57.840
<v Speaker 1>Existence, which is a perfect tragic segue to our final

957
00:46:57.960 --> 00:47:01.880
<v Speaker 1>historical event today, the ultimate example of ignoring your own

958
00:47:02.000 --> 00:47:05.519
<v Speaker 1>citizens on an industrial scale. We are staying in the

959
00:47:05.559 --> 00:47:09.519
<v Speaker 1>Soviet Union, but moving to the vast, wind swept eastern

960
00:47:09.559 --> 00:47:11.079
<v Speaker 1>step of Kazakhstan.

961
00:47:10.679 --> 00:47:11.320
<v Speaker 2>The Polygon.

962
00:47:11.519 --> 00:47:15.519
<v Speaker 1>Yes, there is a massive, geographically isolated area there that

963
00:47:15.559 --> 00:47:19.280
<v Speaker 1>the Soviet military simply called the Polygon. This was the

964
00:47:19.360 --> 00:47:21.400
<v Speaker 1>Semipalatinsk Test Site.

965
00:47:21.639 --> 00:47:26.679
<v Speaker 2>Semipalatinsk was the absolute epicenter of Soviet nuclear testing. It

966
00:47:26.719 --> 00:47:29.559
<v Speaker 2>was their equivalent of the Nevada Test Site, but on

967
00:47:29.599 --> 00:47:32.239
<v Speaker 2>a much more devastating scale regarding the local population.

968
00:47:32.559 --> 00:47:35.000
<v Speaker 1>For forty straight years, from nineteen forty nine all the

969
00:47:35.039 --> 00:47:37.920
<v Speaker 1>way to nineteen eighty nine, the Soviet Union conducted an

970
00:47:38.039 --> 00:47:41.719
<v Speaker 1>unbelievable four hundred and fifty six nuclear tests at the Polygon.

971
00:47:41.800 --> 00:47:43.159
<v Speaker 2>Four hundred and fifty six.

972
00:47:43.000 --> 00:47:45.679
<v Speaker 1>And one hundred and sixteen of those were atmospheric tests,

973
00:47:45.840 --> 00:47:48.280
<v Speaker 1>meaning the bombs were detonated in the open air, above

974
00:47:48.320 --> 00:47:50.960
<v Speaker 1>ground or just slightly elevated on towers.

975
00:47:50.559 --> 00:47:54.760
<v Speaker 2>Producing massive, unfiltered radioactive fallout that was carried entirely by

976
00:47:54.800 --> 00:47:55.719
<v Speaker 2>the prevailing winds.

977
00:47:56.320 --> 00:48:00.000
<v Speaker 1>And the surrounding area was not an empty, uninhabited desert.

978
00:48:00.559 --> 00:48:04.440
<v Speaker 1>There were farming communities, villages, and towns scattered all across

979
00:48:04.480 --> 00:48:06.519
<v Speaker 1>the Kazakhs step nearby, and.

980
00:48:06.480 --> 00:48:09.559
<v Speaker 2>The Soviet government never told the people of Kazakhstan what

981
00:48:09.599 --> 00:48:10.119
<v Speaker 2>they were doing.

982
00:48:10.239 --> 00:48:13.719
<v Speaker 1>They never provided any warnings before a detonation. There were

983
00:48:13.760 --> 00:48:17.400
<v Speaker 1>no evacuations, There were absolutely no protective measures given to

984
00:48:17.440 --> 00:48:20.320
<v Speaker 1>the locals. For decades, they just dropped bombs.

985
00:48:20.599 --> 00:48:23.559
<v Speaker 2>The physical reality of living near the Polygon during those

986
00:48:23.599 --> 00:48:27.079
<v Speaker 2>forty years is harrowing. It is a study in chronic,

987
00:48:27.440 --> 00:48:29.800
<v Speaker 2>long term exposure to varying isotopes.

988
00:48:29.880 --> 00:48:32.400
<v Speaker 1>It is the most heartbreaking part of all the historical

989
00:48:32.400 --> 00:48:35.000
<v Speaker 1>records we've looked at today. I want you listening right

990
00:48:35.039 --> 00:48:36.119
<v Speaker 1>now to just picture this.

991
00:48:36.320 --> 00:48:37.400
<v Speaker 2>Put yourself in their shoes.

992
00:48:37.480 --> 00:48:40.119
<v Speaker 1>Picture being a young kid in one of these rural villages.

993
00:48:40.159 --> 00:48:42.960
<v Speaker 1>It's the middle of summer, you are outside playing. Suddenly

994
00:48:42.960 --> 00:48:45.960
<v Speaker 1>the skylight's up brighter than the sun. The ground shakes violently,

995
00:48:46.000 --> 00:48:49.440
<v Speaker 1>and then hours later, white flakes start falling from the

996
00:48:49.480 --> 00:48:53.159
<v Speaker 1>sky radioactive ash. The children, having no idea what is happening,

997
00:48:53.239 --> 00:48:55.519
<v Speaker 1>run outside, they play in it, They try to catch

998
00:48:55.519 --> 00:49:00.159
<v Speaker 1>it on their tongues, thinking it's a bizarre, miraculous summer snowstorm.

999
00:49:00.079 --> 00:49:02.920
<v Speaker 2>Just awful, only to find out decades later that your

1000
00:49:03.000 --> 00:49:05.519
<v Speaker 2>own government, the state that is supposed to protect you,

1001
00:49:06.000 --> 00:49:10.039
<v Speaker 2>was raining highly radioactive nuclear fallout directly onto your community.

1002
00:49:10.199 --> 00:49:11.760
<v Speaker 2>It is absolutely heartbreaking.

1003
00:49:12.760 --> 00:49:16.519
<v Speaker 1>The medical statistics from the region, which were suppressed for decades,

1004
00:49:16.800 --> 00:49:20.239
<v Speaker 1>reflect the depth of that tragedy. The doctors in the

1005
00:49:20.280 --> 00:49:23.360
<v Speaker 1>region were not allowed to diagnose radiation sickness.

1006
00:49:23.519 --> 00:49:24.559
<v Speaker 2>Really, what are they call it?

1007
00:49:24.639 --> 00:49:27.000
<v Speaker 1>They had to code it as vegetative syndrome.

1008
00:49:27.440 --> 00:49:31.679
<v Speaker 2>When the Soviet Union collapsed, the truth came out. Skyrocketing

1009
00:49:31.760 --> 00:49:36.360
<v Speaker 2>rates of rare cancers, horrific spikes in severe birth defects

1010
00:49:36.559 --> 00:49:39.760
<v Speaker 2>that are still affecting third and fourth generations today, elevated

1011
00:49:39.800 --> 00:49:41.199
<v Speaker 2>mortality rates across the board.

1012
00:49:41.320 --> 00:49:44.400
<v Speaker 1>It is estimated that one point five million people were

1013
00:49:44.400 --> 00:49:47.559
<v Speaker 1>directly affected by the fallout from the Polygon, and the

1014
00:49:47.559 --> 00:49:50.920
<v Speaker 1>full scale of this medical atrocity was fiercely classified by

1015
00:49:50.920 --> 00:49:52.599
<v Speaker 1>the state until nineteen ninety one.

1016
00:49:52.880 --> 00:49:55.719
<v Speaker 2>When Kazakhstan gained its independence. One of their very first

1017
00:49:55.760 --> 00:49:58.320
<v Speaker 2>acts as a sovereign nation was to permanently shut the

1018
00:49:58.360 --> 00:50:00.880
<v Speaker 2>site down. Good for them, of course, the genetic and

1019
00:50:00.960 --> 00:50:03.360
<v Speaker 2>environmental damage was already written into the DNA of the

1020
00:50:03.360 --> 00:50:04.679
<v Speaker 2>people and the soil of the land.

1021
00:50:04.760 --> 00:50:05.639
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it's permanent.

1022
00:50:05.800 --> 00:50:09.480
<v Speaker 2>It perfectly ties our entire exploration together. Bringing us back

1023
00:50:09.519 --> 00:50:12.760
<v Speaker 2>to the most haunting concept from the historical analysis of

1024
00:50:12.760 --> 00:50:16.639
<v Speaker 2>these events. In the sources, there's a quote that's not

1025
00:50:16.719 --> 00:50:20.119
<v Speaker 2>a disaster that happened, that's a disaster that was chosen.

1026
00:50:19.840 --> 00:50:20.920
<v Speaker 1>A chosen disaster.

1027
00:50:21.159 --> 00:50:23.800
<v Speaker 2>Yes, when we look at the B fifty two over

1028
00:50:23.840 --> 00:50:28.880
<v Speaker 2>Goldborough or the collision over Palomares, we see mechanical systems failing.

1029
00:50:29.480 --> 00:50:32.920
<v Speaker 2>We see accidents exacerbated by a culture of secrecy.

1030
00:50:32.559 --> 00:50:33.639
<v Speaker 1>Right terrible mistakes.

1031
00:50:33.719 --> 00:50:36.199
<v Speaker 2>Well, when we look at the Marshall Islands, Lake Karace,

1032
00:50:36.480 --> 00:50:40.199
<v Speaker 2>and the Polygon and Kazakhstan, we see something much darker.

1033
00:50:40.800 --> 00:50:43.400
<v Speaker 2>We see how the intense paranoid pressure of the Cold

1034
00:50:43.480 --> 00:50:47.880
<v Speaker 2>War arms race fundamentally warped the morality of global superpowers.

1035
00:50:47.960 --> 00:50:49.159
<v Speaker 1>They lost their humanity.

1036
00:50:49.400 --> 00:50:53.039
<v Speaker 2>It led governments across the globe, regardless of their political ideology,

1037
00:50:53.119 --> 00:50:56.159
<v Speaker 2>to view their own citizens and the citizens of the world,

1038
00:50:56.280 --> 00:50:59.840
<v Speaker 2>not as people to be protected, but as expendable data points,

1039
00:51:00.360 --> 00:51:04.480
<v Speaker 2>as acceptable casualties on the massive spreadsheet of national security.

1040
00:51:04.280 --> 00:51:07.320
<v Speaker 1>A spreadsheet where the ultimate cost is measured in generations

1041
00:51:07.320 --> 00:51:11.159
<v Speaker 1>of bone cancer, poisoned rivers, and radioactive lakes. It's a

1042
00:51:11.199 --> 00:51:12.800
<v Speaker 1>staggering reality.

1043
00:51:12.360 --> 00:51:13.559
<v Speaker 2>To confront, it really is.

1044
00:51:13.920 --> 00:51:16.639
<v Speaker 1>So what does this all mean? As we pull back

1045
00:51:16.639 --> 00:51:19.719
<v Speaker 1>and look at the big picture synthesis of our exploration today,

1046
00:51:20.679 --> 00:51:25.079
<v Speaker 1>we have traced a deeply unsettling thread through history, from

1047
00:51:25.119 --> 00:51:30.800
<v Speaker 1>a single cheap, low voltage switch saving North Carolina from annihilation.

1048
00:51:30.639 --> 00:51:34.880
<v Speaker 2>To the British government deliberately diluting radioactive milk into the

1049
00:51:34.920 --> 00:51:38.920
<v Speaker 2>breakfast glasses of their citizens to avoid a pr nightmare, to.

1050
00:51:38.920 --> 00:51:42.239
<v Speaker 1>The intentional, decades long poisoning of the Kuzak step.

1051
00:51:42.559 --> 00:51:46.440
<v Speaker 2>The through line is incredibly clear, and it is a warning. Authority,

1052
00:51:46.599 --> 00:51:49.760
<v Speaker 2>when faced with the terrifying consequences of its own unchecked

1053
00:51:49.760 --> 00:51:53.840
<v Speaker 2>power and its own failures, will almost always default to silence.

1054
00:51:53.519 --> 00:51:55.800
<v Speaker 1>Because transparency requires accountability, and.

1055
00:51:55.760 --> 00:51:59.239
<v Speaker 2>Accountability is terrifying to a massive bureaucracy. Now we might

1056
00:51:59.280 --> 00:52:01.000
<v Speaker 2>sit here today think well, the Cold War is over.

1057
00:52:01.079 --> 00:52:03.880
<v Speaker 2>The atmosphere, kest bands are in place, the Berlin Wall fell.

1058
00:52:04.199 --> 00:52:06.360
<v Speaker 1>We've learned our lessons, and while the era of open

1059
00:52:06.400 --> 00:52:09.679
<v Speaker 1>air testing is thankfully behind us, the physical legacy of

1060
00:52:09.679 --> 00:52:11.320
<v Speaker 1>that era is very much in the present.

1061
00:52:11.480 --> 00:52:14.920
<v Speaker 2>Literally, we are still spending billions upon billions of dollars

1062
00:52:14.960 --> 00:52:18.400
<v Speaker 2>trying to vitrify the toxic sludge at Hanford. The concrete

1063
00:52:18.400 --> 00:52:20.800
<v Speaker 2>over lake Karace is degrading as we speak.

1064
00:52:21.039 --> 00:52:25.599
<v Speaker 1>And let's not forget the Mark fifteen thermonuclear bomb that

1065
00:52:25.760 --> 00:52:28.679
<v Speaker 1>is right now, at this very second, still sitting in

1066
00:52:28.679 --> 00:52:31.119
<v Speaker 1>the mud in the shallow waters off Tidy Island, Georgia.

1067
00:52:31.960 --> 00:52:36.239
<v Speaker 1>The physical remnants of this secrecy are quite literally buried

1068
00:52:36.239 --> 00:52:37.119
<v Speaker 1>in our backyards.

1069
00:52:37.679 --> 00:52:42.599
<v Speaker 2>Perhaps more importantly, the deeply ingrained institutional habit of government secrecy,

1070
00:52:43.039 --> 00:52:46.280
<v Speaker 2>the instinct to hide, the failure to redact the report,

1071
00:52:46.559 --> 00:52:49.639
<v Speaker 2>to blame the low level operator, to dilute the truth,

1072
00:52:49.719 --> 00:52:52.800
<v Speaker 2>to avoid panic. That instinct hasn't gone anywhere.

1073
00:52:52.880 --> 00:52:55.679
<v Speaker 1>The bureaucracies have just changed their focus exactly, which brings

1074
00:52:55.719 --> 00:52:58.039
<v Speaker 1>me to a final, really provocative thought that I want

1075
00:52:58.039 --> 00:53:00.639
<v Speaker 1>to leave you the listener with. Today. We have spent

1076
00:53:00.679 --> 00:53:04.199
<v Speaker 1>this entire deep dive dissecting the secrets of the nineteen fifties, sixties,

1077
00:53:04.199 --> 00:53:06.880
<v Speaker 1>and seventies the past. We are talking about the documents

1078
00:53:06.920 --> 00:53:10.599
<v Speaker 1>that eventually, after thirty forty or fifty years, finally got declassified.

1079
00:53:11.000 --> 00:53:13.679
<v Speaker 1>The truth clawed its way into the light. But consider

1080
00:53:13.760 --> 00:53:15.920
<v Speaker 1>this historical anomaly that remains.

1081
00:53:15.639 --> 00:53:17.480
<v Speaker 2>Unsolved today, the Valley incident.

1082
00:53:17.760 --> 00:53:21.679
<v Speaker 1>Yes, in September nineteen seventy nine, an American VLLA satellite,

1083
00:53:21.880 --> 00:53:26.000
<v Speaker 1>which was designed specifically to detect nuclear explosions, picked up

1084
00:53:26.039 --> 00:53:30.119
<v Speaker 1>a massive, unmistakable double flash of light over the remote

1085
00:53:30.159 --> 00:53:32.599
<v Speaker 1>Prince Edward Islands in the South Atlantic.

1086
00:53:32.159 --> 00:53:35.920
<v Speaker 2>Ocean, the classic signature of an atmospheric nuclear detonation.

1087
00:53:35.800 --> 00:53:39.159
<v Speaker 1>Exactly, but to this day, nearly fifty years later, no

1088
00:53:39.360 --> 00:53:42.880
<v Speaker 1>nation has ever claimed responsibility for it. The official US

1089
00:53:43.000 --> 00:53:45.679
<v Speaker 1>government panel at the time claimed it was likely a

1090
00:53:45.719 --> 00:53:48.480
<v Speaker 1>micrometeoroid hitting the satellite.

1091
00:53:48.079 --> 00:53:51.559
<v Speaker 2>A conclusion widely dismissed by independent scientists.

1092
00:53:51.119 --> 00:53:53.719
<v Speaker 1>Who believe it was a joint, highly classified nuclear test

1093
00:53:53.719 --> 00:53:57.719
<v Speaker 1>by Israel and South Africa. The raw data remains heavily classified.

1094
00:53:58.039 --> 00:54:00.360
<v Speaker 1>The truth of who detonated a nuclear way been over

1095
00:54:00.360 --> 00:54:02.679
<v Speaker 1>the ocean in nineteen seventy nine is still a locked

1096
00:54:02.679 --> 00:54:03.639
<v Speaker 1>away secret today.

1097
00:54:03.760 --> 00:54:06.440
<v Speaker 2>It proves that the era of massive nuclear secrets didn't

1098
00:54:06.519 --> 00:54:07.760
<v Speaker 2>end in the nineteen sixties.

1099
00:54:07.800 --> 00:54:10.559
<v Speaker 1>It makes you wonder, what are the fifty year secrets

1100
00:54:10.599 --> 00:54:14.199
<v Speaker 1>being created right now today? What are the tatastrophic near misses,

1101
00:54:14.519 --> 00:54:17.960
<v Speaker 1>the environmental cover ups, or the technological disasters happening right

1102
00:54:17.960 --> 00:54:21.639
<v Speaker 1>now that are being quietly stamped, classified, sealed in a

1103
00:54:21.679 --> 00:54:24.079
<v Speaker 1>vault that we won't find out about until we are

1104
00:54:24.119 --> 00:54:24.760
<v Speaker 1>old and gray.

1105
00:54:25.039 --> 00:54:28.559
<v Speaker 2>The technology changes, but the bureaucratic reflex to hide the

1106
00:54:28.679 --> 00:54:31.559
<v Speaker 2>mistakes remains a constant force of human nature.

1107
00:54:31.719 --> 00:54:34.000
<v Speaker 1>And that is where you come in. We want to

1108
00:54:34.039 --> 00:54:36.599
<v Speaker 1>hear from you. We've covered a lot of heavy shocking

1109
00:54:36.639 --> 00:54:40.159
<v Speaker 1>ground today. So which of these hidden disasters shocked you

1110
00:54:40.199 --> 00:54:40.599
<v Speaker 1>the most?

1111
00:54:40.960 --> 00:54:43.559
<v Speaker 2>Was it the single switch in North Carolina.

1112
00:54:42.920 --> 00:54:47.000
<v Speaker 1>The logistics of scraping up palamyras, or the kids playing

1113
00:54:47.000 --> 00:54:50.400
<v Speaker 1>in the fallout at the Polygon? And more importantly, taking

1114
00:54:50.400 --> 00:54:52.639
<v Speaker 1>a look at the world today, do you think governments

1115
00:54:52.639 --> 00:54:55.960
<v Speaker 1>have actually learned their lesson about transparency and public.

1116
00:54:55.639 --> 00:54:58.760
<v Speaker 2>Trust or are we just living in the dark about

1117
00:54:58.760 --> 00:55:01.039
<v Speaker 2>a whole new set of tear verifying secrets.

1118
00:55:01.199 --> 00:55:03.360
<v Speaker 1>We want to know where you stand on this drop

1119
00:55:03.400 --> 00:55:06.519
<v Speaker 1>your thoughts, your theories, and your answers in the comments below.

1120
00:55:06.719 --> 00:55:09.000
<v Speaker 1>We read them all, and we love seeing how you

1121
00:55:09.039 --> 00:55:10.000
<v Speaker 1>connect these threads.

1122
00:55:10.199 --> 00:55:13.119
<v Speaker 2>It's always fascinating to see the analytical perspectives you all

1123
00:55:13.159 --> 00:55:14.880
<v Speaker 2>bring to these complex histories.

1124
00:55:15.199 --> 00:55:17.400
<v Speaker 1>It really is. Thank you so much for joining us

1125
00:55:17.440 --> 00:55:19.559
<v Speaker 1>and exploring the shadows of the atomic age on this

1126
00:55:19.719 --> 00:55:22.480
<v Speaker 1>edition of Thrilling Threads. We promise to bring you more

1127
00:55:22.519 --> 00:55:27.519
<v Speaker 1>mind bending, carefully untangled explorations next time. Until then, keep

1128
00:55:27.519 --> 00:55:29.440
<v Speaker 1>asking questions and keep pulling the threads.