This happened at a Nevada test site. Radiation and fallout drifted into St. George, UT.
"The folks in St. George were repeatedly hit by uninvited fallout. . . . In 1953, one test, codenamed "Harry" actually deposited quite a lot of fallout on St. George, to the point where residents were forced to stay inside for many hours, and prohibited from washing their cars until they became less radioactive."
Cars get and subsequently become less radioactive? I did not know that. The 50s seem so quaint. But that atomic bomb stuff is grisly.
i took a class on the culture of the atomic bomb during my last semester of college (probably one of the best classes i took at BYU) and i couldn't believe some of the footage i saw and first-hand accounts i read. this makes me shudder.
ReplyDeleteIt's called half life for a reason, girlie...
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-life
And if that freaks you out - you should see the "Sniffer" boxes at Dugway. They're placed at multiple distances from a test location. People would sit in these incredible boxes, smell the test material, and report how long it took until they couldn't smell it anymore.
I question the validity of this test since the nose is eventually overwhelmed and pretty much stops working on some scents...
Oh the things we've done for science improvements.