On Dec 1-2, the University of Chicago commemorates the 75th anniversary of the first sustained nuclear chain reaction, Chicago Pile 1, led by Enrico Fermi, an event that ushered in the nuclear era. Amidst the planned commemoration activities, including the pyrotechnics of a multicolored mushroom cloud, the tolling of bells, and faculty organized events and… Read More »
Radiation Exposure Essays
Tunnel Collapses at Hanford Nuclear Site
A twenty-foot-long portion of a tunnel containing highly radioactive train cars and other equipment has collapsed at the Hanford Nuclear Site. A state of emergency was declared by Department of Energy Hanford officials on May 9, 2017. The collapsed tunnel, referred to as “Tunnel #1,” was built in 1956 and contains train cars filled with… Read More »
TEPCO Officials Indicted in Fukushima Nuclear Disaster
In a victory for the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Plaintiffs Group, led by Ms. Ruiko Muto, on February 29, 2016, Court-appointed attorneys serving as prosecutors indicted three former executives of the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the owner and operator of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. The three TEPCO executives were charged with criminal negligence… Read More »
Rocky Flats Downwinder Health Issues
Guest Blog by Tiffany Hansen Two years ago, in the dark basement in our Denver home, suffering from myriad aliments, some more visible than others, I had the “AH HA” Google-search moment of my life. After plugging in every symptom I’ve suffered along with the magic word ‘causes’ I discovered that I grew up downwind… Read More »
Manhattan Project Park: Petition for Downwinders!
Please sign my Change.org petition! Recently, the US gov approved funding for a “Manhattan Project National Historical Park.” We urge them to include prominent exhibits about the Downwinders. “Downwinders” are innocent people who lived near bomb-building plants, test-sites or dumping grounds, and were thereby poisoned by radiation. Many have died, but many are still alive and suffering from… Read More »
News, Spring, 2015
On April 15, 2015, I presented a lecture at Whitman College, in Walla Walla Washington, titled “Narrating Hanford Downwinders: Particles on the Wall, an Exhibit with a Conscience. I was invited to lecture on the subject as a feature of the POTW exhibit on display in the university’s Maxey Museum. Fukushima Radiation: Will You Still Say… Read More »
Fukushima Radiation Victims Speak
I urge everyone to purchase the newly translated collection of 50 stories and statements from Fukushima residents, called Fukushima Radiation: Will You Still Say No Crime Was Committed? Here’s the blurb I contributed to the book: Will You Still Say No Crime Was Committed? resounds with the anguished voices of deeply aggrieved mothers and fathers confronting… Read More »
Watch “Blind,” a Provocative Short Film from Japan
A devastating Fukushima-related cautionary student film. What would happen if Fukushima were right outside Tokyo?
Al Jazeera America and Drinking in Richland
Al Jazeera America recently ran my article about the forgotten victims of the Manhattan Project. The experience was extraordinary…and I’m losing track of all the ironies. Congress voted in December 2014 to create a National Historical Park in my home town of Richland, Washington. Richland is the site of the plutonium-producing Hanford B-Reactor, one of the… Read More »
Hanford Downwinders: Latino Farmworkers
Thank you so much to Ricardo Garcia, who has graciously contributed this guest post. Ricardo is a farmworker advocate and activist for the Yakima Valley in southeastern Washington, and Chairperson of the Board of Directors of Radio KDNA, “the voice of the farmworker.” Hanford Downwinders: Latino Farmworkers by Ricardo García The agricultural industry expanded greatly during… Read More »