Atomic Doctors

Atomic Doctors
Author: James L. Nolan
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2020-08-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 0674248635

An unflinching examination of the moral and professional dilemmas faced by physicians who took part in the Manhattan Project. After his father died, James L. Nolan, Jr., took possession of a box of private family materials. To his surprise, the small secret archive contained a treasure trove of information about his grandfather’s role as a doctor in the Manhattan Project. Dr. Nolan, it turned out, had been a significant figure. A talented ob-gyn radiologist, he cared for the scientists on the project, organized safety and evacuation plans for the Trinity test at Alamogordo, escorted the “Little Boy” bomb from Los Alamos to the Pacific Islands, and was one of the first Americans to enter the irradiated ruins of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Participation on the project challenged Dr. Nolan’s instincts as a healer. He and his medical colleagues were often conflicted, torn between their duty and desire to win the war and their oaths to protect life. Atomic Doctors follows these physicians as they sought to maximize the health and safety of those exposed to nuclear radiation, all the while serving leaders determined to minimize delays and maintain secrecy. Called upon both to guard against the harmful effects of radiation and to downplay its hazards, doctors struggled with the ethics of ending the deadliest of all wars using the most lethal of all weapons. Their work became a very human drama of ideals, co-optation, and complicity. A vital and vivid account of a largely unknown chapter in atomic history, Atomic Doctors is a profound meditation on the moral dilemmas that ordinary people face in extraordinary times.

Restricted Data

Restricted Data
Author: Alex Wellerstein
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 558
Release: 2021-04-09
Genre: History
ISBN: 022602038X

"Nuclear weapons, since their conception, have been the subject of secrecy. In the months after the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the American scientific establishment, the American government, and the American public all wrestled with what was called the "problem of secrecy," wondering not only whether secrecy was appropriate and effective as a means of controlling this new technology but also whether it was compatible with the country's core values. Out of a messy context of propaganda, confusion, spy scares, and the grave counsel of competing groups of scientists, what historian Alex Wellerstein calls a "new regime of secrecy" was put into place. It was unlike any other previous or since. Nuclear secrets were given their own unique legal designation in American law ("restricted data"), one that operates differently than all other forms of national security classification and exists to this day. Drawing on massive amounts of declassified files, including records released by the government for the first time at the author's request, Restricted Data is a narrative account of nuclear secrecy and the tensions and uncertainty that built as the Cold War continued. In the US, both science and democracy are pitted against nuclear secrecy, and this makes its history uniquely compelling and timely"--

Assessment of the Scientific Information for the Radiation Exposure Screening and Education Program

Assessment of the Scientific Information for the Radiation Exposure Screening and Education Program
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 431
Release: 2005-10-01
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0309096103

The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) was set up by Congress in 1990 to compensate people who have been diagnosed with specified cancers and chronic diseases that could have resulted from exposure to nuclear-weapons tests at various U.S. test sites. Eligible claimants include civilian onsite participants, downwinders who lived in areas currently designated by RECA, and uranium workers and ore transporters who meet specified residence or exposure criteria. The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), which oversees the screening, education, and referral services program for RECA populations, asked the National Academies to review its program and assess whether new scientific information could be used to improve its program and determine if additional populations or geographic areas should be covered under RECA. The report recommends Congress should establish a new science-based process using a method called "probability of causation/assigned share" (PC/AS) to determine eligibility for compensation. Because fallout may have been higher for people outside RECA-designated areas, the new PC/AS process should apply to all residents of the continental US, Alaska, Hawaii, and overseas US territories who have been diagnosed with specific RECA-compensable diseases and who may have been exposed, even in utero, to radiation from U.S. nuclear-weapons testing fallout. However, because the risks of radiation-induced disease are generally low at the exposure levels of concern in RECA populations, in most cases it is unlikely that exposure to radioactive fallout was a substantial contributing cause of cancer.

United States Nuclear Tests

United States Nuclear Tests
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 202
Release: 2000
Genre: Nuclear weapons
ISBN:

This document lists chronologically and alphabetically by name all nuclear tests and simultaneous detonations conducted by the United States from July 1945 through September 1992. Two nuclear weapons that the United States exploded over Japan ending World War II are not listed. These detonations were not "tests" in the sense that they were conducted to prove that the weapon would work as designed (as was the first test near Alamogordo, New Mexico on July 16, 1945), or to advance nuclear weapon design, or to determine weapons effects, or to verify weapon safety as were the more than one thousand tests that have taken place since June 30,1946. The nuclear weapon (nicknamed "Little Boy") dropped August 6,1945 from a United States Army Air Force B-29 bomber (the Enola Gay) and detonated over Hiroshima, Japan had an energy yield equivalent to that of 15,000 tons of TNT. The nuclear weapon (virtually identical to "Fat Man") exploded in a similar fashion August 9, 1945 over Nagaski, Japan had a yield of 21,000 tons of TNT. Both detonations were intended to end World War II as quickly as possible. Data on United States tests were obtained from, and verified by, the U.S. Department of Energy's three weapons laboratories -- Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California; and Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico; and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. Additionally, data were obtained from public announcements issued by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and its successors, the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration, and the U.S. Department of Energy, respectively.

Adverse Reproductive Outcomes in Families of Atomic Veterans

Adverse Reproductive Outcomes in Families of Atomic Veterans
Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 107
Release: 1995-07-17
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0309176115

Over the past several decades, public concern over exposure to ionizing radiation has increased. This concern has manifested itself in different ways depending on the perception of risk to different individuals and different groups and the circumstances of their exposure. One such group are those U.S. servicemen (the "Atomic Veterans" who participated in the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons at the Nevada Test Site or in the Pacific Proving Grounds, who served with occupation forces in or near Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or who were prisoners of war in or near those cities at the time of, or shortly after, the atomic bombings. This book addresses the feasibility of conducting an epidemiologic study to determine if there is an increased risk of adverse reproductive outcomes in the spouses, children, and grandchildren of the Atomic Veterans.

A Good Day Has No Rain

A Good Day Has No Rain
Author: Bill Heller
Publisher: Atlasbooks Dist Serv
Total Pages: 183
Release: 2003
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780878755462

Despite the risk of exposing innocent Americans to cancer-causing radiation, the U.S. government decided that domestic atom bomb testing was "essential to the national defense." This testing, combined with an extremely violent storm, caused New York's Capital Region to receive excessive amounts of radioactive fallout in April 1953.