Radioactive Autopsy - The Cecil Kelley Criticality Accident

Kyle Hill2021-02-12

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💫 Short Summary

The video discusses the true story of the 'body snatchers of Los Alamos,' in which workers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory were unknowingly exposed to plutonium during semi-secret experiments. The accidental criticality involving a chemical operator named Cecil Kelly resulted in him being bathed in gamma rays, leading to severe and radioactive burns, but he surprisingly survived the incident. The video discusses the story of Cecil Kelley, a worker at Los Alamos National Laboratory who was accidentally exposed to a high dose of plutonium in 1958, leading to his death. It also delves into the unethical human plutonium injection experiments conducted by Manhattan Project doctors and the subsequent autopsy performed on Kelley's radioactive body, which yielded unexpected findings about plutonium biokinetics in humans. The video discusses the case of Cecil Kelley, a Los Alamos employee who was unknowingly injected with plutonium as part of human radiation experiments. Investigative journalist Eileen Welsom exposed the experiments, leading to a government committee and a class-action lawsuit against Los Alamos. Ultimately, affected families were awarded a $9.5 million settlement, but the pathologist involved never admitted wrongdoing. The video highlights the lack of ethics and accountability in these human radiation experiments.

✨ Highlights

📊 Transcript

✦

Introduction to the True Story of the Body Snatchers of Los Alamos

00:00

Dr. Clarence Lushbaugh began an autopsy on Cecil Kelly, a 38-year-old chemical operator at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Workers at the facility were tasked with recovering plutonium from experiments.

An unexpected amount of plutonium-rich solids in a vessel caused a critical situation, resulting in a burst of high-energy radiation that severely affected Cecil Kelly.

✦

Control and Impact of Criticality in Nuclear Materials

02:06

Nuclear weapons and power seek to control criticality to produce energy or explosions.

Criticality by accident can be deadly, with high-energy radiation causing immediate harm.

Changes in the mass and shape of radioactive material can make it go critical, leading to a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.

✦

Accidental Criticality Incident at Los Alamos

03:57

Cecil Kelly was exposed to a criticality incident at the Los Alamos facility due to an unexpected amount of plutonium in the chemical solution.

The unplanned configuration in the vessel led to a brief but intense critical situation with 150,000 trillion unique fission reactions.

Cecil Kelly experienced the direct impact of the energy release, causing burns and high-energy gamma rays to pass through his body.

✦

Immediate Effects on Cecil Kelly After Exposure

05:42

Cecil Kelly exhibited disorientation, confusion, and physical symptoms like twitching and uncoordinated muscles.

He was found burning up in the snow, which was a dermatological reaction to the high-energy gamma rays.

Cecil's skin appeared pink, he was in shock and unconscious, and his bodily fluids were found to be radioactive.

Despite the severity of the exposure, Cecil Kelly's condition improved slightly after one hour and 40 minutes.

✦

Aftermath of Cecil Kelly's Exposure

07:12

Cecil Kelly was coherent but in tremendous pain in his chest and abdomen.

His blood was found to be radioactive, with light metals like sodium transformed by radiation.

Kelly reported seeing a heavenly blue glow and hearing rumbling in the room.

He was eventually moved to a private room for further observation.

✦

Cecil Kelley received a high dose of radiation during an accident, leading to his imminent death.

00:07

Cecil Kelley received an estimated 49 grays of radiation, much higher than the 5 grays fatality rate.

His white blood cells were completely gone six hours after the accident.

Doctors considered a bone marrow transplant, but it was clear that it wouldn't help due to the size of the radiation dose.

✦

Scientists at Los Alamos conducted plutonium injection experiments to understand the effects of radioactive elements on the human body.

00:10

From 1945 to 1947, 18 people were unknowingly injected with plutonium during medical procedures.

Results showed that plutonium preferred to stay in the skeleton and also accumulated in the liver, kidneys, and spleen.

The biokinetics of plutonium in the body were not well understood, leading to the need for human tissue samples.

✦

Cecil Kelley's death and autopsy led to new revelations about how plutonium moves in the human body.

00:13

Cecil Kelley died 10 hours after his bone marrow was sampled.

His body was still radioactive after death.

Dr. Clarence Lushbaugh performed an autopsy on Cecil's radioactive corpse without permission, removing samples for study.

Results showed less deposition of plutonium in the skeleton, more in the liver, lungs, and lymph nodes, and it stayed in the body longer than expected.

This data from Kelley's incidental plutonium exposure could shape industry safety measures.

The Los Alamos Human Tissue Analysis Program was established to collect samples from staff and the general public.

✦

Cecil Kelly, a worker at Los Alamos, became a scapegoat for a nuclear accident

00:16

In 1974, the U.S Atomic Energy Commission attributed an accident to the errors of the deceased operator, Cecil Kelly.

The laboratory director at Los Alamos, Norris Bradbury, disagreed and said no single cause was identifiable.

Cecil Kelly received documents 20 years later detailing what happened to him, including the fact that tissue samples were taken without permission.

✦

Investigations revealed a human tissue analysis program and plutonium injection experiments at Los Alamos

00:17

Clarence Lushbaugh made it standard practice to take tissue samples from everyone he performed an autopsy on, without their permission.

Tissue samples from 1520 people, including non-Los Alamos workers, were sampled for plutonium.

Documents revealed experiments on radioactive animal carcasses at Los Alamos.

Journalist Eileen Wilson's reports led to pressure on Los Alamos and the establishment of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments.

✦

Legal and public pressure led to the revelation and settlement of the human experiments at Los Alamos

00:19

The government committee and Los Alamos released over 1600 documents to the public.

Families affected by the experiments initiated a class-action lawsuit, resulting in a 9.5 million dollar settlement in 2001.

Pathologist Clarence Lushbaugh, who took and distributed Cecil Kelly's tissue, never admitted wrongdoing.

The book 'The Plutonium Files' by Eileen Wilson provides more in-depth information about the human plutonium injection experiments.

00:00 they did not tell the families the true

00:03 purpose for the examinations what did

00:05 they tell them

00:06 that they had been given some

00:08 radioisotope or some

00:10 chemical and they wanted to see what it

00:12 had done

00:13 in the bodies of their loved ones but

00:15 they did not use the word plutonium

00:17 at 6 am on new year's day 1959 dr

00:20 clarence lushbaugh began an autopsy

00:23 more than just dissecting a body what he

00:25 was about to do would kick off a series

00:26 of semi-secret experiments

00:28 draw comparisons in the media to the

00:30 sci-fi trope of body snatchers

00:32 and result in a multi-million dollar

00:34 class action lawsuit

00:35 37 years later dr lushbaugh was about to

00:38 open up one

00:39 cecil kelly and remove eight pounds of

00:42 his organs

00:43 muscles tissues and bone he put these

00:46 tissues

00:47 including kelly's brain and a few

00:49 hastily gathered mayonnaise jars

00:50 and took them back to his lab for

00:52 analysis this

00:54 is the true story of the body snatchers

00:56 of los alamos

01:04 when you work with plutonium things can

01:06 get dirty

01:07 and workers at the facilities of the los

01:09 alamos national laboratory the

01:11 birthplace of the atomic bomb

01:12 were getting dirty in the radioactive

01:14 sense of the word

01:15 while some of the smartest scientists to

01:17 ever live were studying their recently

01:19 discovered element and attempting to

01:21 shape it

01:21 into the heart of the first nuclear

01:23 weapons facility staff were tasked with

01:25 recovering the plutonium from these

01:27 experiments

01:28 at the los alamos plutonium processing

01:30 facility workers chemically

01:32 separated the element by dissolving and

01:34 mixing unusable slag

01:36 crucibles and other combined residues in

01:38 large tanks

01:40 this process would purify and

01:42 concentrate plutonium

01:43 for further experimentation it was in

01:46 one of these very tanks where cecil

01:47 kelly

01:48 a 38 year old chemical operator at the

01:50 facility would see the same bewildering

01:53 blue flash that lewis slaughten and

01:55 harry dogly and junior saw

01:57 before the demon core claim their lives

02:00 criticality is at the core of what

02:03 nuclear weapons and nuclear power seek

02:05 to control

02:06 radioactive material naturally decays

02:08 and when it does high-energy particles

02:10 release themselves from the nuclei

02:12 in random directions over time these

02:15 particles can also hit other atoms in

02:17 the same material like billiard balls

02:19 cracking together to force

02:20 more of these reactions to occur but

02:23 small

02:23 natural masses of radioactive material

02:25 are almost always

02:26 subcritical there aren't enough atoms

02:29 around to act like a

02:30 large nuclear pool table and constantly

02:32 knock each other around

02:34 if you change the mass and the shape of

02:36 the material however

02:38 the density of atoms can be such that it

02:40 can make a mass go

02:41 critical starting a self-sustaining

02:44 nuclear chain reaction

02:46 and when criticality is created on

02:48 purpose in something like a nuclear bomb

02:50 the resulting cascade of energy and

02:52 radiation can be directed towards

02:54 catastrophically destructive ends

02:57 criticality by accident is sinister in

03:00 another way

03:02 within literally two ten thousands of a

03:04 second you can be dead

03:06 and not even know it yet in a vessel

03:09 meant for dissolving plutonium naturally

03:11 you never want too much plutonium in the

03:13 chemical solution

03:15 on the last work day before new year's

03:17 break in 1958 however

03:18 and for reasons that were later

03:20 determined to be no single person's

03:21 fault

03:22 an unexpected amount of plutonium-rich

03:24 solids were in the vessel cecil kelly

03:26 was about to switch on

03:28 the solution in kelly's vessel was

03:29 supposed to contain maybe just a tenth

03:32 of a gram of plutonium per liter

03:34 the day before 1959 at los alamos

03:36 however it actually contained over 200

03:39 times that amount

03:41 the upper layer of organic solvents in

03:43 the vessel accidentally washed in from

03:45 two other vessels at the facility that

03:47 should have been handled separately

03:49 now contained over seven pounds of

03:51 plutonium

03:52 half the mass of the demon core and it

03:54 was already close to going critical

03:57 ironically at the same time cecil kelly

03:59 showed up for work that day

04:00 los alamos was reviewing safety

04:02 protocols for the very vessel

04:04 that was about to kill him based on

04:07 experimental reconstructions of what

04:08 happened next

04:09 within one second of cecil kelly

04:11 flipping the same switch he had flipped

04:13 many many times before

04:14 the stir in the vessel revved up to full

04:17 speed

04:18 this instantly flung out the lower

04:20 aqueous layers of solution in the tank

04:22 while simultaneously forming

04:24 a vortex for the plutonium saturated

04:26 upper layers

04:27 to cascade down into this new

04:30 configuration

04:31 instantly created a critical situation

04:33 in the tank

04:34 and for the next two ten thousands of a

04:36 second the plutonium atoms inside raged

04:39 with a calculated

04:41 150 000 trillion unique fission

04:44 reactions

04:44 before the vessel had been mixed enough

04:47 to return to subcritical

04:49 cecil kelly though who is standing on a

04:51 footstool in front of this vessel and

04:53 looking in at it

04:54 through a viewport received this nova of

04:57 energy directly

04:58 in his head and in his chest

05:01 in the next moment kelly found himself

05:03 on his back on the cold

05:05 hard floor of the facility he was

05:07 disoriented

05:09 confused he turned off the mixer then

05:12 turned it back on then ran out of the

05:14 building

05:15 two other operators on duty that day

05:17 reported seeing a blue flash of light

05:20 and then hearing a thud they turned off

05:22 kelly's mixer again

05:24 and followed him outside they found

05:26 kelly

05:27 twitching with uncoordinated muscles in

05:29 the snowfall

05:30 of new year's eve that blanketed los

05:32 alamos

05:33 all cecil could say was quote i'm

05:36 burning up

05:38 i'm burning up

05:42 after finding him in the snow the two

05:44 lab technicians that were with kelly

05:46 took him to a chemical shower mistakenly

05:48 assuming that he had been covered by

05:49 some substance that they couldn't see

05:52 but the burns appearing on kelly weren't

05:53 from any chemical

05:55 they were a dermatological reaction to

05:57 the high-energy gamma rays

05:58 that had just ripped through his body

06:01 the technicians laid him on the floor

06:03 and waited for an ambulance a laboratory

06:06 nurse on staff observed that kelly was

06:08 in shock

06:08 unconscious and had quote a nice pink

06:12 skin

06:12[Music]

06:13 just a few minutes later cecil kelly was

06:15 in the los alamos medical center

06:17 and he was almost dead lips blew and

06:20 eyes red like he had stared too long at

06:22 the sun

06:23 reports indicate that upon his arrival

06:25 kelly was thrashing

06:27 wildly enough to need physical restraint

06:29 at the same time

06:30 a number of los alamos scientists

06:32 arrived and started taking samples

06:34 kelly's urine was collected it was

06:36 radioactive

06:38 a chemist on hand don peterson used a

06:40 tongue depressor in the room to collect

06:42 kelly's vomit off of the floor and

06:44 scrape his explosive diarrhea off of the

06:46 walls

06:47 those two were radioactive as was

06:49 kelly's whole body

06:51 the scientists took everything that they

06:53 could as peterson recalled during a

06:55 legal deposition in 1997

06:57 quote we weren't going to lose anything

06:59 but the groans

07:01 end quote one hour and 40 minutes after

07:05 a mixture of plutonium accidentally

07:07 bathed cecil kelly in gamma rays

07:09 his condition was improving it wasn't

07:11 much but

07:12 it was something cecil was coherent

07:15 again and

07:15 able to keep down water though he

07:17 complained of tremendous pain in his

07:19 chest and abdomen

07:20 he only occasionally vomited kelly was

07:24 soon moved from the emergency room at

07:25 los alamos medical center

07:27 to a private room he told those watching

07:29 over him about the

07:30 heavenly blue glow that filled the room

07:32 about the rumbling he heard inside of

07:34 the vessel before he found himself

07:36 twitching in the snow finally calmed

07:39 down

07:39 his blood was taken around this time and

07:42 it was also radioactive

07:44 the light metals in his blood like

07:46 sodium had been activated

07:48 or transformed by radiation into

07:50 radioactive material

07:51 themselves it was with his blood that

07:54 the first whole body dose estimate

07:56 during the accident was made

07:58 for context the average dose that leads

08:01 to a one hundred percent

08:02 fatality rate is five graves

08:06 a unit of absorbed radiation kelly had

08:09 endured

08:09 much more than five kelly was hit with

08:12 an estimated

08:13 49 greys according to his wife

08:17 doris kelly who was present in his room

08:18 at this time cecil knew that he was

08:20 dying

08:21 and his doctors did too six hours after

08:24 the accident

08:26 all of the white blood cells in cecil's

08:27 body were gone

08:30 doris kelly and cecil's brother waited

08:32 at his bedside for hours

08:34 cecil spoke with them quietly asking

08:36 doris to take care of their two children

08:38 a seven-year-old daughter and an 18

08:40 month old baby boy

08:42 he dozed off he slept he vomited

08:45 nurses pumped him full of iv fluid

08:48 the next day at 5 pm the doctors wanted

08:51 to take a sample of bone marrow from

08:52 cecil sternum to see if he might be a

08:55 candidate for a bone marrow transplant

08:57 a new and exciting operation in the

08:58 1950s

09:00 the operation did not go well after

09:03 operating equipment was wheeled to his

09:04 bedside and his chest was cleaned with

09:06 alcohol

09:07 a surgeon made an incision in cecil's

09:08 chest and removed quote

09:10 a good deal of material end quote but

09:13 the material didn't look like a bone

09:15 marrow biopsy

09:17 that was because the surgeon had missed

09:19 cecil sternum entirely so the surgeon

09:22 tried again

09:24 and what he removed this time made

09:25 doris's stomach churn

09:28 she recalled later quote what they

09:30 pulled out

09:32 was slop they pushed a syringe in his

09:35 chest and pulled it out

09:36 it was it was just mush

09:40 end quote cecil's bone marrow where red

09:44 blood cells in the body are made

09:46 was watery acellular

09:49 transformed mush

09:52 it wasn't bleeding like it should be

09:55 obviously a bone marrow transplant then

09:57 was not going to help cecil's chances

09:59 but his doctors

10:01 already knew that according to legal

10:04 documents obtained by doris and her

10:06 daughter katie during the discovery

10:07 stage of the lawsuit that was to come

10:09 decades later

10:10 the attending los alamos doctors had no

10:12 actual intention of trying to save cecil

10:14 with a transplant

10:16 one doctor thomas shipman wrote later

10:18 quote

10:19 because of the size of the dose it

10:21 seemed obvious that he would die a

10:23 central nervous system death so

10:25 we never seriously considered bone

10:27 marrow transfusions

10:29 end quote this was the first of many

10:32 half-truths that would be told by the

10:34 doctors and scientists

10:35 at los alamos

10:39 as the manhattan project continued into

10:41 the mid-1940s

10:43 it was obvious to leading scientists

10:44 that radioactive elements like plutonium

10:47 were

10:47 uniquely dangerous research materials

10:50 they knew from the use of radionuclides

10:52 in medical diagnostics for example

10:54 that material left in the body could

10:56 provide a long-term source

10:58 of harmful radiation but what they did

11:00 not know

11:01 was how the body dealt with these metals

11:04 how long would they remain in the body

11:06 where would they be excreted in the

11:08 urine or deposited in the bones

11:11 from these questions spraying the

11:13 impetus to begin the human plutonium

11:15 injection experiments

11:17 from 1945 to 1947 18 people were

11:21 unknowingly injected with plutonium by

11:24 manhattan project doctors

11:25 during unrelated medical procedures

11:28 none of these people knew that they were

11:30 being injected with plutonium

11:32 but the doctors knew exactly what they

11:34 were looking for

11:35 results indicated that plutonium in the

11:37 bloodstream preferred to stay in the

11:39 skeleton

11:40 and for a long time the element also

11:43 accumulated in the liver

11:44 the kidneys and spleen animal models of

11:47 the same experiments

11:48 showed mostly the same thing but the

11:50 results of these experiments came from

11:52 plutonium injected

11:53 into the bloodstream the exposure that

11:56 workers at los alamos would encounter

11:58 would be from inhalation of airborne

12:01 particles

12:02 and it was these workers that these

12:03 experiments were ostensibly supposed to

12:05 protect

12:06 and so at best the known biokinetics of

12:09 plutonium was

12:10 indirect the most direct way to validate

12:13 early models the best way to find out

12:15 how plutonium

12:16 entered and exited the body would be to

12:19 get

12:19 actual tissue samples from actual humans

12:24 as a quick aside if you want to know

12:26 more about the obviously controversial

12:28 plutonium injection experiments

12:30 i recommend the plutonium files by

12:32 pulitzer prize-winning investigative

12:33 journalist

12:34 eileen wilson where much of the

12:36 information in this video is covered in

12:38 detail and who will enter our story a

12:40 bit later

12:43 cecil kelly would only live another 10

12:45 hours after his bone marrow was sampled

12:47 the pain in his chest became

12:49 unmanageable even with medication

12:51 and he again thrashed against the

12:52 restraints of his hospital bed

12:55 soon cecil was breathing in a way that

12:56 doctors described as

12:58 froglike breathing slowed to nothing

13:01 after 15 minutes of this

13:02 and cecil kelly was pronounced dead at 3

13:05 15 am

13:06 on new year's day 1959

13:10 those who were in route to visit cecil

13:11 were notified and told to return home

13:14 one of those who were notified lewis

13:16 hempelman was the man who oversaw the

13:18 medical care of both harry doglion

13:20 and louis slaughten the two physicists

13:22 who also lost their lives after

13:24 criticality accidents with the so-called

13:26 demon core

13:27 some 14 years before kelly had died

13:30 exactly 34 hours and 45 minutes

13:33 after a plutonium vortex and an

13:34 improperly loaded vessel went critical

13:37 but his job wasn't done scientists had

13:40 cecil's body dragged by

13:41 sled from the los alamos medical center

13:44 through the snow

13:45 back to the lab and into a steel-lined

13:47 room

13:48 his body was still exceedingly

13:50 radioactive

13:52 two hours and 45 minutes after cecil

13:54 kelly died the resident pathologist at

13:56 los alamos

13:57 dr clarence lushbaugh began the autopsy

14:00 that would both start a brand new

14:01 program

14:02 at los alamos and cost the medical

14:04 center

14:05 and the university of california

14:07 millions of dollars

14:09 doris kelly cecil's widow who worked

14:11 with her husband at los alamos

14:13 would eventually be compensated with

14:15 sixteen and a half thousand dollars for

14:16 the accident

14:18 and given two hundred fifty dollars to

14:20 plan a funeral

14:21 ever the scientist clarence lushbaugh

14:24 reportedly saw cecil's tragic death as

14:26 an experiment of opportunity he had the

14:29 unique chance here to perform an autopsy

14:31 on a radioactive corpse

14:33 and an opportunity to confirm or deny

14:35 the results of the plutonium injection

14:37 studies

14:38 tissue samples from cecil would be

14:40 direct and would therefore directly

14:42 confirm the bloodstream models or not

14:45 lush ball did not ask anyone for

14:47 permission or notify the family

14:50 before removing eight pounds of muscle

14:52 bone

14:53 soft tissue brain and spinal cord

14:56 from the body he placed the samples in

15:00 several wide mouth mayonnaise jars

15:01 and transported them back to his lab the

15:04 jars would eventually be sent to labs

15:06 across the country for study

15:08 to the satisfaction of the scientists

15:10 when the results came in they did in

15:11 fact differ from what they thought they

15:13 knew about how plutonium moved around

15:15 the human body

15:16 for example there was much less

15:18 deposition in kelly's skeleton

15:19 and more in the liver and there was much

15:22 much more plutonium in his lungs and

15:24 lymph nodes

15:25 and it stayed there for much longer than

15:26 anticipated

15:28 these data based on kelly's 11 and a

15:30 half years of incidental plutonium

15:32 exposure in the lab

15:34 could be used to shape industry safety

15:36 going forward

15:37 wright langham a radio biologist at los

15:40 alamos who created the protocols for the

15:42 human injection experiments

15:43 called the findings undoubtedly

15:45 fortuitous

15:46 they were so unexpected in fact it was

15:49 decided to collect tissue samples

15:51 from other facility staff like kelly and

15:53 from the general public as a control

15:55 the los alamos human tissue analysis

15:57 program was born

16:01[Music]

16:03 katy kelly moreau had been trying to

16:05 find out what actually happened to her

16:06 father

16:07 since 1974. the u.s atomic energy

16:10 commission had released a statement

16:11 after the accident that quote the

16:13 accident was directly attributable

16:15 to the errors on the part of the

16:17 deceased operator end quote

16:19 the laboratory director at los alamos at

16:21 the time norris bradbury

16:23 disagreed saying no single cause was

16:25 identifiable

16:26 nonetheless cecil kelly had become

16:28 something of a scapegoat

16:31 it wasn't until 20 years later in 1994

16:33 that miss kelly would receive a stack of

16:35 documents from los alamos

16:37 detailing what actually happened to her

16:38 father or

16:40 rather what happened to eight pounds of

16:42 him

16:43 around the same time more details were

16:45 coming out about the human tissue

16:46 analysis program

16:48 immediately after kelly's death it

16:50 turned out clarence lushbaugh made it

16:52 standard practice to take tissue samples

16:54 from everyone he performed an autopsy on

16:56 regardless of whether or not they worked

16:58 at los alamos

16:59 tissues from some 1520 people

17:02 were sampled for plutonium in this way

17:04 in operations performed

17:06 all the way up until 1980

17:09 the lab would claim that all organ

17:11 donations and samples were obtained with

17:13 permission

17:14 from next of kin it would later admit

17:16 that quote

17:18 people did not know the samples were

17:20 being sent to los alamos

17:24 in the spring of 1987 investigative

17:26 journalist eileen wilson was working her

17:28 way through some documents at kirkland

17:30 air force base

17:31 a few papers detailing experiments on

17:33 radioactive animal carcasses had got her

17:35 attention

17:36 years of further investigation would

17:38 eventually lead her to los alamos

17:40 and in november of 1993 wilson would

17:43 publish the first in a series of reports

17:45 in the albuquerque

17:46 tribune entitled the plutonium

17:48 experiment

17:49 outlining the fate of cecil kelly the

17:51 tissue analysis program

17:52 and the plutonium injection experiments

17:56 wilsom would win a pulitzer prize for

17:58 her series and los alamos scientists

18:00 would immediately feel the pressure from

18:02 it

18:03 as the director of los alamos national

18:05 laboratory siegfried s

18:06 hecker said in 1995 quote our

18:09 credibility

18:10 and integrity were put in question by

18:12 the widespread publicity regarding the

18:14 plutonium injection experiments

18:16 and other human radiation experiments

18:18 end quote

18:19 and that questioning came from the

18:21 highest office in the land

18:23 the advisory committee on human

18:24 radiation experiments was established in

18:26 1994

18:28 by president bill clinton for an

18:29 executive order

18:31 the los alamos team working with the

18:33 government's committee would end up

18:34 releasing over

18:35 1600 documents to the public

18:38 make no mistake without a loan

18:41 journalist investigation

18:42 a government committee and the

18:44 cooperation from los alamos

18:46 we might not know a thing about cecil

18:48 kelly

18:49 the tissue program or the injection of

18:52 unknowing human patients

18:53 with plutonium and katie kelly wouldn't

18:56 have known

18:57 that somewhere her father's brain

19:00 was in a mayonnaise jar

19:04 just two years later in 1996 katy kelly

19:07 and other families who were affected by

19:09 what the media had dubbed

19:10 the body snatchers of los alamos

19:12 initiated a class-action lawsuit against

19:14 the los alamos medical center

19:16 and the university of california five

19:18 years later in 2001

19:20 the plaintiffs were awarded a 9.5

19:22 million dollar settlement

19:24 and that was that however clarence

19:27 lushbaugh the pathologist who cut open

19:29 cecil kelly

19:30 never settled he died in 2000

19:34 without once admitting that he had done

19:36 a single thing

19:37 wrong it was a feeling that many

19:39 scientists and doctors at los alamos

19:41 shared at least in part

19:43 focusing more on the results than the

19:45 optics of their experiments

19:47 leshba did have something to say about

19:49 his actions however

19:50 why he did what he did before he died

19:54 lashbaugh was asked during a legal

19:56 deposition who had given him the

19:58 permission

19:59 to remove and distribute eight pounds of

20:01 cecil kelly

20:02 around the country he responded god gave

20:06 me permission

20:08 until next time

20:14 thank you so much to the verde nerdy

20:15 staff at the facility for the direct

20:17 and substantial support and the creation

20:19 of this here video today especially i

20:20 want to recognize research assistant sf

20:23 edwards and visiting scholar

20:24 cody kilibrew kind of fitting if you

20:26 want to join the facility drape on a

20:28 silky white lab coat

20:29 join me on discord see episodes early

20:32 see members only live streams not like

20:34 that

20:34 you can go to patreon.com kyle hill

20:36 right now and sign up for the facility

20:38 today and hey if you support us just

20:39 enough

20:40 get your name on aria here each and

20:41 every week and as you can see there's

20:43 literally hundreds and hundreds of you

20:44 so i have no idea how i'm going to pass

20:46 the

20:46 if you want to dive more into this topic

20:48 if you want to know more about the human

20:50 plutonium injection experiments

20:52 and everything i do recommend eileen

20:54 wilson's book the plutonium files

20:56 i just ordered it myself it is a little

20:59 hard to find but i think you will find

21:01 quite elucidating illuminating and

21:03 perhaps even

21:05 radiant irradiating if you will

21:16 thanks for watching

💫 FAQs about This YouTube Video

1. What were the circumstances of the plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory?

The plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory occurred when a chemical operator, Cecil Kelly, was exposed to a critical amount of plutonium during an unexpected chemical reaction, resulting in a dangerous level of radioactive exposure.

2. How did the accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory affect Cecil Kelly?

The accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory caused Cecil Kelly to suffer from a dangerous level of radioactive exposure, leading to severe physical effects such as burns, radiation sickness, and the contamination of his body with radioactive materials.

3. What were the consequences of the plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory?

The consequences of the plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory included the severe health effects on Cecil Kelly, the contamination of his body with radioactive materials, and the need for extensive medical attention to treat the radiation sickness and injuries resulting from the exposure.

4. How did the accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory demonstrate the dangers of working with plutonium?

The accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory served as a stark demonstration of the dangers of working with plutonium, highlighting the potential for severe health effects, radiation sickness, and the contamination of the body with radioactive materials in the event of a critical exposure to plutonium.

5. What measures were taken to treat Cecil Kelly after the plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory?

After the plutonium accident at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Cecil Kelly received extensive medical attention to treat the radiation sickness and injuries resulting from the exposure. Measures were taken to address the severe health effects and to decontaminate his body from the radioactive materials.

6. What were the effects of the radiation exposure on Cecil Kelley during the criticality accident?

Cecil Kelley experienced a fatal dose of radiation during a criticality accident, leading to his death within 10 hours. The video discusses the details of his suffering and the medical procedures that followed.

7. How did the medical professionals at Los Alamos handle the aftermath of Cecil Kelley's radiation exposure?

The medical professionals at Los Alamos grappled with the challenges of treating Cecil Kelley after his radiation exposure during the criticality accident. The video provides insights into the medical care and the decision-making process during this tragic event.

8. What did the autopsy of Cecil Kelley reveal about the effects of plutonium on the human body?

The autopsy of Cecil Kelley provided valuable insights into the effects of plutonium on the human body, challenging existing knowledge. It led to the creation of the Los Alamos Human Tissue Analysis Program and influenced industry safety protocols.

9. How did Cecil Kelley's radiation exposure contribute to the understanding of plutonium's effects on the human body?

Cecil Kelley's radiation exposure and the subsequent autopsy significantly contributed to the understanding of plutonium's effects on the human body. The findings led to the development of industry safety protocols and the establishment of the Los Alamos Human Tissue Analysis Program.

10. What were the findings of the investigation into the death of Cecil Kelley at Los Alamos?

The investigation revealed the truth about the fate of Cecil Kelley, the tissue analysis program, and the plutonium injection experiments conducted on unknowing human patients at Los Alamos.

11. How did Eileen Wilson's investigative journalism contribute to the uncovering of the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos?

Eileen Wilson's investigative journalism led to the uncovering of the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos, bringing the truth about the plutonium injection experiments and the tissue analysis program to light.

12. What was the outcome of the class-action lawsuit initiated by the families affected by the 'body snatchers of Los Alamos'?

The families affected by the 'body snatchers of Los Alamos' initiated a class-action lawsuit and were awarded a $9.5 million settlement from the Los Alamos Medical Center and the University of California.

13. How did the investigation into the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos affect the credibility and integrity of the laboratory?

The investigation into the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos put the laboratory's credibility and integrity into question, leading to the establishment of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments by President Bill Clinton.

14. Who was responsible for the uncovering of the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos?

Eileen Wilson's investigative journalism and the collaboration of the government's committee and Los Alamos scientists were responsible for uncovering the human radiation experiments at Los Alamos.

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