When he switched on the stirrer, the liquid formed a vortex and the plutonium layer was released in a pulse that lasted only 200 microseconds. He had an excruciating death after being exposed to a lethal dose of neutrons and gamma rays from a mixing tank. Text: An industrial accident at the Los Alamos, N.M., plutonium-processing plant took the life of experienced chemical operator Cecil Kelley in 1958. After a latent phase, victims experience hair loss and bone marrow failure and, if they do not recover, die within weeks to months. Polonium's effect, known as "acute radiation syndrome," first causes nausea, vomiting, anorexia and diarrhea. But taken internally, the poison can be fatal within one month. As a result, external contamination does not cause radiation sickness, according to a 2007 report in the Journal of Radiologic Protection. It is only a hazard if it is ingested, because of the low range of alpha particles in biological tissues. Polonium-210 (P-210) is a high-energy alpha emitter with a radioactive half-life of 138 days. In 1927, American geneticist Hermann Joseph Muller published research showing genetic effects of radiation, and in 1946 he was awarded the Nobel prize. In 1896, Serbian-American inventor Nikola Tesla intentionally subjected his fingers to X-rays and published findings that burns developed. Radiation was not discovered until the late 19th century and its dangers were not immediately known. Swiss scientists announced they had found 18 times the normal levels of polonium in Yasser Arafat's rib, pelvis and in soil stained with his decaying organs, concluding that he was poisoned. 7, 2013— - intro: This week, former Palestinian leader Yassar Arafat's death was in the news in a case of suspected radiation poisoning. Hughes testified that all five women had ingested so much radium that their breath was toxic.Nov. Their attorney, Raymond Berry, hired 30-year-old physicist Elizabeth Hughes who used an electroscope to measure radioactivity in the breath of the five dial painters. Newspaper headlines dubbed them the Living Dead and the Radium Girls. It took Fryer two years to find an attorney to take the case, but once she did, four other women - Edna Hussman, Katherine Schaub, and sisters Quinta McDonald and Albina Larice - joined. "Studies by officials in New Jersey proved that the women were suffering from radiation poisoning, and that it had come from the radium they were exposed to in their workplace."īy the late 1920s, five women sued USRC in Orange, New Jersey, starting with Grace Fryer. "When one of USRC's senior chemists died of aplastic anemia in 1925, it became obvious that there was a connection," Stemm says. submitted a falsified version of the report to New Jersey officials and suppressed its findings, continuing to refute the idea that its radium dial paint was making anyone sick. "Radium poisoning caused the victims' jaws to disintegrate over time, eventually killing them."īy the time the first dial painter died in 1923, the medical community had begun to suspect that radium exposure was the cause. "This extremely painful and disfiguring condition was the most common of the diseases suffered by the ," Stemm says. The women's employers at Radium Corporation assured them the paint was harmless, but many of the women soon fell ill, some severely with necrosis of the jaw. "To ensure a sufficiently sharp point, the women were told to use their lips and tongue to shape the brush." They had to do this repeatedly throughout the day to keep that fine point, which meant the women ingested radioactive paint constantly. "Once the paint was mixed, the extremely fine detail painting required very sharply pointed paint brushes," says Stemm. Some of the women even used radium paint on their teeth to brighten their smiles. They were soon known as " ghost girls," because the radium dust made their skin, hair and clothes glow. The women would mix their own paint from radium dust and other ingredients. "Estimates of the total number of women employed in the industry between 19 vary, but a number approaching 10,000 is not unreasonable." "At the height of the industry in the early 1920s, about 2,000 women were employed," says Stemm. Their small hands were suited to the detailed work, and the jobs paid well. USRC hired young women to paint these instruments with radium paint.
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