Idealist - White Sands Missile Range, Trinity, MOP tests

The White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), operated by the U.S. Army, covers an area of about 4,000 square miles in a semi-arid region of south-central New Mexico.

On July 16, 1945, the world's first nuclear weapon was tested at the Trinity Site, located at the northwest corner of the White Sands Missile Range. The atomic blast created a 40,000 foot-high radioactive cloud that deposited fallout over much of central New Mexico, and parts of Colorado and Oklahoma. The Trinity Site - and large areas to the northeast - is still contaminated by radionuclides from the atomic blast. The Trinity site is enclosed by a fence at a 1600-foot radius from ground zero.

Radioactive Steel?

There is such a thing as 'pre-World War II steel.' So, what is it? It is steel manufactured before the second World War (WWII) that doesn't contain any traces of radioactive fallout from nuclear testing.

Nearly all steel manufactured over a half-century ago involved the incorporation of massive amounts of outside air, either heated up or used for its chemical properties, to help burn out or alter the impurities of iron to create steel. Back in earlier steelmaking years, open hearth furnaces - large brick ovens - sucked in huge quantities of outside air for these purposes and chemicals in the air were incorporated into the steel product. Yet surface air across the Northern Hemisphere during the post-war era, especially after 1950, was regularly contaminated with fallout from U.S. and Russia nuclear tests, so post-war steel contained a higher concentration entrained in it than other consumer products. Over the past few decades, steel mills have increasingly relied on oxygen steelmaking processes, which use 99% pure oxygen to lower the carbon content of molten iron to make low-carbon steel.

All steel made before 1945 - the year of the first atomic blasts and attacks by the U.S. - is substantially lower in radioactivity than steel made after 1945, and even through the present! In 1945, the radioactivity from a single U.S. bomb test in New Mexico ('Trinity') and two A-bomb blasts in Japan was scattered so efficiently across the globe that it was deposited - and later detected - even in ice in the Arctic.

'Pre-World War II steel,' also called 'pre WWII steel', 'low background steel' or 'pre-1945 steel' (the most accurate moniker), has been sought after for decades for military, space and medical research experiments that have a high sensitivity radioactive detection component. In many such experiments, the 'housing' that physically holds the detector - that is measuring radiation levels - must be shielded from any background radiation. This shielding is usually made of lead and clad in steel but the steel can't trigger radiation readings. So, there has been an unending need in science applications for low- or zero-contaminated steel in radiation detection experiments. The most available source, for a while, of pre-WWII steel in the post-war period was pre-1945 sunken steel battleships!

Cobalt-60 and steel

Another source of radiation in steel in the post-war era has been Cobalt-60, a gamma-emitting radioactive element. In 1946, following the splitting of the atom and A-bombing of Japan, the Atomic Energy Commission began distributing radioactive isotopes for industrial use from a nuclear reactor at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Since that year, radioisotopes have been used for taking measurements and inspections in various metal-making applications like irradiating piston rings to gauge engine wear and taking high precision measurements using beta-gages.

Since 1946, Cobalt-60 has been the favorite radioisotope for use in the metal industry. Its X-ray like (gamma) radiation properties have been used to inspect casting and welds for defects or improperly positioned parts and incorporated into the lining of blast furnaces of steel mills to gauge firebrick wear.

In general, firebricks, also called 'refractories,' are used in furnaces of all types to protect the casing, sides, stonework, and outside areas from extreme heat. In some steel mills, these bricks are laced with Cobalt-60, which gives off an easily-detectable pulse of gamma radiation. The way steelworkers know if the bricks are deteriorating in their furnaces (at any time) is by measuring the amount of gamma radiation; if the bricks are worn, the radiation levels will drop to zero and an accident may be imminent. The Cobalt-60, however, ends up in the slag (the steel product) and keeps on giving off penetrating radiation for over 10 times its half life of 5.27 years. Gamma rays can travel dozens of meters in air and through walls until stopped by lead or until they disperse to undetectable levels. Cobalt-60 is still in use in steel mills worldwide and there is no shortage of stories of Cobalt contaminated steel that ended up causing severe health problems and was later recalled.

Mixing it up

Because most steel that is cast nowadays comes from the recycling of old beams and used steel products, virtually all pure steel has by now been mixed with contaminated steel - from Cobalt-60 and fallout. (Steel cast via non-modern steelmaking techniques through the mid-1990s had radioactive contamination in it from the fallout from French, U.K., U.S. Chinese, etc... nuclear tests.) Steel in Russia and now worldwide also has traces of strontium-90 from recycled terrestrial radioisotope thermal generators, or RTGs. (Strontium-90 can cause beta-burns on the skin.) RTGs generate electricity from the decay heat of radioisotopes and have been used (terrestrially) in remote areas of the U.S. and Russia to power lighthouses and communications stations and also in U.S. and Soviet exploration and low-earth orbit spacecraft (for their power or heat qualities); several spacecraft with onboard RTGs (and nuclear reactors too) have burnt up in our atmosphere. The main danger posed by all of our steel is the group of radioactive elements entrained in it that emit gamma rays. Such elements as Cesium-137, Cobalt-60, Iodine-129 and others are truly ingredients of the steel in buildings and guardrails and in products all over the world, emitting x-ray radiation for meters in all directions. Are these gamma rays dangerous?

Yes. Please read more here.

In the book Trinity's Children, authors Tad Bartimus and Scott McCartney break the silence of Trinity's deadly radioactive secret: that the Trinity bomb 'was not a terrifically efficient explosion - it didn't use up all of the plutonium in the core. So tiny bits of "unexploded" plutonium was spread over hundreds of miles.'

The authors explain further: 'A 1978 inquiry noted a lack of specific information on the plutonium fallout but said the area was "one of the significant plutonium contaminated areas in the United States, both in terms of quantity of plutonium deposited and area extended"... And a 1983 filed investigation noted: "Even after 38 years, there are large areas (near ground zero) whose vegetation is not growing." Many of the ranchers who lived in the area in the time of Trinity have died from cancer, but no scientific studies were initiated. The ranchers wonder why,' when Utah families, downwind of Nevada fallout, have received compensation and health studies.

The map you see here is an estimated Trinity fallout trajectory map that was originally published by non-governmental scientists in an article that appeared in the journal Health Physics. The map was then later incorporated into the official governmental 'story' of Trinity fallout (yeah right!) in the recently released draft LAHDRA Project report (pdf, 9.1 megabytes). The map shows isopleths of radiation exposure from gamma radiation in New Mexico and southern Colorado at 12 hours after the Trinity explosion. The exposure is measured in units of milliRems per hour; a milliRem is one one-thousandth of a Rem. Trinity's fallout - that settled on buildings and the ground - within the worst-hit area, denoted in reddish-orange, emitted more than 100 milliRems per hour just 12 hours after the Trinity test occurred. Since you get about 200-400 milliRems of radiation exposure from natural and human radiation sources per year, getting irradiated at 100 milliRems per hour for several hours on July 16, 1945 would have used up ones' yearly 'quota' in one fell swoop. Of course, that is just for gamma radiation. Alpha- and beta- particles in Trinity's fallout would have added to downwinders' radioactive exposure when these particles became inhaled or ingested.

We discuss more about 'Trinity downwinders' on our RECA (Radiation Exposure Compensation Act) page. There you can read about a set of companion bills, recently introduced in Congress, that call for expanding RECA to include more downwinders, including Trinity downwinders. If passed, the expanded RECA legislation would provide monetary compensation and medical assistance and screening to tens of thousands additional claimants.

In the mid-1970s, WSMR was chosen by the US Army and the Defense Nuclear Agency (DNA) - the predecessor to the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) - as the site for a number of large conventional explosive tests.

During an 18-year period ending in 1993, the Defense Nuclear Agency conducted eight large-scale, ammonium-nitrate fuel-oil (ANFO) explosions designed to simulate various effects of nuclear blasts at WSMR. The first test in the series, dubbed Dice Throw, "rattled windows in towns located 25-35 miles away and sent a large gray cloud over the nearby San Andreas Mountains." News headline: 'It Wasn't Atomic, But It Was Scary'

Astonishingly, the Defense Nuclear Agency chose to conduct several of its ANFO explosions in very close proximity to the Trinity Site. Dice Throw (1976) was detonated at a distance of 'less than three miles' and Minor Scale (1985) - the largest conventional explosive test in world history (known outside the USSR) - was set off two miles from the atomic blast site.

One of the dark secrets of testing at WSMR is that the ANFO tests conducted by the Defense Nuclear Agency (DNA) likely ejected radioactive soils ten thousand feet (or higher) into the atmosphere in New Mexico.

Those dark days are far from being over. The DNA's successor, the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) mentioned plans in its 2007 Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS) for the White Sands Missile Range for an unspecified number of 500-ton conventional explosive tests. An excellent analysis on these 500-ton tests, which are similar in scope and purpose to the cancelled Divine Strake experiment, was completed in July 2007 by John Witham of Nuclear Watch of New Mexico. Peruse the 3-page factsheet, titled 'Divine Strake By Another Name: Nuclear Weapons Effects Tests at White Sands,' on these tests at: http://www.nukewatch.org/facts/nwd/500ton_WSMR.pdf

Dark days still not over... now about...DTRA's MOP tests. On March 14, 2007, on the same day the defense department filed in the Federal Register its Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for proposed testing activities in New Mexico, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) conducted a 30,000 lb (15 ton) conventional weapons test - of the massive ordnance penetrator or MOP - at the White Sands Missile Range. The ground-zero for the MOP test is a tunnel complex that is believed to be less than 20 miles from the ground-zero of the world's first atomic - and atmospheric - nuclear test, Trinity.

DTRA's test could have resuspended long-lived radionuclides from Trinity's fallout into New Mexico's air. Future MOP tests at WSMR are planned by DTRA. In late July 2009, the publication 'Inside the Air Force' reported that DTRA 'has scheduled two more Massive Ordinance Penetrator test drops this year on a B-52 Stratofortress before the bunker-busting bomb program is handed over to the Air Force...DTRA conducted three flight tests of the 30,000-pound bomb in 2008 -- one captive-carry on a B-52, another where an inert weapon was dropped and one where a live bomb was released.'

In early August 2009, the Pentagon came out with an announcement that it was going to consider fast-tracking the development of the MOP bomb, as a thickly-veiled threat/message to Iran and North Korea. This is despite common sense physics that a 30,000-pound bomb cannot shake the ground enough or cause enough explosive blast damage to crush a deeply buried, hardened tunnel target in either country! That was the role of Divine Strake, remember?

Divine Strake was a nuclear simulation bunker buster study - it would have (before citizens got it canceled) studied the ground shock effects of a 0.7 kiloton nuclear bomb dropped on a hardened tunnel buried in a limestone formation. So, what would a measly 15-ton MOP bomb do to a deeply buried, hardened bunker when the Divine Strake test was intended to validate for the Pentagon their belief that a 700-ton explosion was the lowest nuclear calibration needed to create a 'ground shock environment' to destroy these enemy targets. Someone in the Pentagon doesn't know the simple math that if Jim needs a farm with more than 700 cows, then a farm with 15 cows ain't gonna work for Jim!!!

Since the Trinity test, munitions testing and experiments involving depleted uranium (DU) and thorium have occurred at military testing sites throughout the state of New Mexico. Since the early 1970s, DU munitions have been used in testing at WSMR although evidence of such use, limited to brief mention in environmental studies and impact statements, is not well publicized. While it falls short of admission, WSMR's Memorandum for All Newcomers states '...we have tested nearly every type of deployable ordinance that has been developed in America since 1945...' (The U.S. Department of Defense has used depleted uranium for a variety of military applications since the 1970s, however it wasn't until the 1991 Gulf War that the radioactive material was used extensively in combat.)

DU testing has also occurred at Kirkland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, the Energetic Metals Research Test Center (EMRTC) at the New Mexico Institute of Mining, and at LANL.

DU munitions are known to aerosolize upon impact into fine particles that act like a gas. The tiny particles, commonly referred to as DU dust, can be carried hundreds of miles by normal wind action, and even re-suspended or stirred up from the ground by wind or human movement.

Downwind from WSMR is the 720 square-mile Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation, home to about 4,000 tribal members. The Mescalero Apache Tribe is already suffering from the disturbing sonic booms that are generated during aircraft exercises on the range. The sonic booms have the potential to 'damage glass, plaster or other parts of structures...' The Tribe has been concerned that a recent proposed increase in stealth fighter activity at WSMR will have a detrimental effect on their natural resources and economy, which is heavily based on tourism. There is also concern that the chemical components of chaff fibers and flares - that would be released from the aircraft - could pose a hazard to visitors and workers at the White Sands National Monument. Wedged between the reservation and WSMR is the city of Alamogordo (population: 35,582).

WSMR, under the jurisdiction of the US Army, is overseen by NewTec, short for New Mexico Technology Group LLC, a consortium formed in 1997, owned by Lockheed Martin Corp., Northrop Grumman Mission Systems, the Computer Sciences Corporation (acquirer of Dyncorp) and TRAX International. In 2006, the consortium finished out a nine-year, $333.6 million contract as overseer and manager of WSMR and in fall 2006 won the subsequent 10-year contract valued at approximately $422 million. That contract also provides mission support services to a test track at Holloman Air Force Base, NM.

In 2000, NewTec won an eight-year, $376 million contract from the U.S. Army to support the service's electronic testing ranges in AZ, WA, and TX. NewTec’s main office is located in Lexington Park, MD; it has a satellite office in Las Cruces, NM.

It is radioactive. Depleted Uranium, or 'DU,' is actually a medley of Uranium 238 and very small amounts of Uranium-235 and Uranium-234. Radioactive substances like Uranium-238 and its 'daughters' were meant to be stored in the Earth and not used in munitions that would spray it all over Europe, the United States, and the Middle East. They weren't meant to be incorporated into food chains and bodies of babies and soldiers. There are claims that millions of pounds of depleted uranium were used in Iraq.

Scientists basically agree that there is no threshold at which radioactivity is safe. Mutations and chances of contracting cancers are proportional to the amount of radiation received as soon as the level of radiation is detectable. So, it is preposterous that the U.S. defence agencies claim that the DU in use in war conflicts doesn't harm human beings. THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY SHOULD OUTLAW DEPLETED URANIUM.

**It gets worse. Uranium-238 decays over time into other radioactive elements that can bring on cancers even if the dust on the desert floor is never resuspended! Two of the 'daughters' of U-238 include radon-222 (a radioactive gas) and radium-226 (that shoot out x-rays like gamma rays). Other 'daughters' include polonium-210 and radioactive lead-210, both dangerous poisons if administered internally. To learn more about the toxicity of Uranium-238 'daughters' and their presence, and danger, in everyday building materials, visit our phosphogypsum page. Learn more about alpha/beta/gamma decay here.

20 Radioactive Dangers We All Face
1. Nuclear reactors crashing on Earth from space and fallout from: 2. Pacific nuclear testing 3. the Nevada Test Site 4. High-altitude nuclear tests 5. Project Rulison 6. Mighty Oak nuclear test 7. North Korea's nuclear tests 8. Global nuclear testing 9. 'Project 57' (Area 13) 10. Trinity, WSMR & Steel	11. Hanford & INL & LANL 12. Nuclear Power 13. DTRA's Divine Strake's babies 14. Fallout resuspension: Milford Flat Fire 15. Australia's fallout and duststorms 16. Hiroshima & Nagasaki -and- 17. Low-level radiation impacted viruses 18. Radioactivity in drywall (dust) 19. Nuclear waste transport 20. Greenham Common