And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----Con't from part 1---- ====================================================== MAGICAL METAL TURNS DEADLY Discovered in France in 1798, beryllium wasn't produced commercially in America until the 1930s. When it was, it was extracted from beryl and bertrandite ores and processed through a series of chemical steps. Among the first uses of beryllium: fluorescent lights. Workers coated the insides with beryllium-containing phosphors to help make the glass tubes glow. At the time, beryllium dust was considered harmless. No one wore respirators, and no one appeared to be getting sick. Then came World War II. Suddenly, the U.S. government needed tons of beryllium for the top secret Manhattan Project, the $2 billion effort to build the world's first atomic bomb. <Picture>Graphic: A bigger bang Beryllium plants signed government contracts and began shipping orders to Manhattan Project sites. To maintain the secrecy of the project, shipments were in unmarked packages, identified only by code names, such as Product 38. "The word 'beryllium' should never be used," one government document warned. In 1943, federal officials ran into a problem that threatened supplies: Beryllium workers, many in the Cleveland area, began developing a mysterious illness. They were coughing, losing weight, and becoming breathless. Many recovered, but some grew sicker and died. A Cleveland Clinic doctor concluded in 1943 that beryllium dust was toxic. But the U.S. Public Health Service, in a report that same year, thought some other agent was to blame. As the controversy brewed, the government stepped up its beryllium orders. When the factories couldn't keep up, the government spent millions to expand them. By the mid-1940s, dozens of people had become sick, both at Manhattan Project sites and in the fluorescent light industry. And the mysterious disease was exhibiting a new twist. Researchers studying the fluorescent light industry concluded in 1946 that workers were getting sick months - even years - after their last exposure to beryllium. No one was recovering from this form of the illness, which would become known as chronic beryllium disease. By now, most scientists and industry leaders agreed that beryllium dust was toxic. The government recommended safety improvements and supplied respirators for some workers. But it was also deeply concerned about its image. A 1947 secret report by the newly formed Atomic Energy Commission, or AEC, warned that the disease "might be headlined, particularly in non-friendly papers, for weeks and months - each new case bringing an opportunity for a rehash of the story. This might seriously embarrass the AEC and reduce public confidence in the organization." Despite mounting sickness, the AEC remained "acutely interested in maintaining and expanding production of beryllium," according to the report, which was recently declassified. The agency's mission - building nuclear weapons - depended on it. "The AEC appears to be stuck with beryllium," the report said, "and hence stuck with the public relations problem." DISEASE STRIKES LORAIN RESIDENTS Just weeks after the government outlined its public relations fears in 1947, a tragedy began to unfold: People living near a beryllium plant in Lorain, O., started coming down with the disease. One 28-year-old woman dropped to 85 pounds. Another became so weak she had to remain in bed. Government officials were stunned. Never before had people been known to contract metal poisoning by living near a factory. Fear in Lorain spread quickly. Citizens stormed a city council meeting, and Councilman Leo Svete had to pound the gavel for 15 minutes to restore order. The AEC took air samples around the plant, and the Ohio Health Department announced it would conduct a rare and massive project: It would X-ray as many Lorain residents as possible. X-ray stations were set up at schools, JC Penney, and Abraham Motor Sales. In all, 10,500 people were X-rayed - a fifth of the entire city. And when the inquiry was over, 11 citizens who had never set foot in the plant were found to have the disease. The wife of one worker got it by handling her husband's dusty work clothes. But the other victims, the AEC found, got it strictly from beryllium air pollution. Among them: 7-year-old Gloria Gorka, a chubby girl with curly hair. <Picture>Photo: Gloria Gorka "We noticed she kept panting and had a hard time breathing when she exerted herself in the least little way," recalls her father, Joseph, an 81-year-old now living in Florida. "We just thought she was having a hard time getting over the measles." When her schoolteacher called and said Gloria was having difficulty walking up one flight of stairs at school, her parents took her to a doctor. But there was nothing anyone could do. "It was so sad," recalls her 79-year-old aunt, Angela Barraco. "By the time she died she was nothing but skin and bones." AEC officials concluded that the victims had been exposed to surprisingly minute levels of beryllium. They recommended that citizens should no longer be exposed to more than .01 micrograms per cubic meter of air - an amount invisible to the naked eye. The limit was the first air pollution standard in American history. As for the limit inside beryllium plants, officials weren't sure what to do. They discussed the matter for weeks, and then an AEC health official and a medical consultant to the fluorescent light industry settled on 2 micrograms while riding in a taxi. This limit, based largely on guesswork, was dubbed "the taxicab standard." Officials knew workers might become ill at lower levels, a 1958 AEC report states, but "because of the relatively small numbers of people involved," it was seen as "an acceptable risk." COSTS MADE A PRIORITY OVER WORKER SAFETY Publicly, the government was cracking down. While the AEC was setting limits on pollution, the U.S. Public Health Service was convincing fluorescent light companies to stop using beryllium. Government officials issued warnings about the lights already in use: Children shouldn't use them as lances, and burned-out tubes should be broken under water. But unbeknownst to the public, the government was embracing beryllium, ordering more for weapons. In fact, in 1949 the AEC adopted a policy that weapons production and economics would come before worker safety when the United States was choosing some beryllium suppliers. One top official who was upset about this, records show, was Wilbur Kelley, manager of the AEC's New York office. In the summer of 1949, he and his staff were concerned that the government was planning to buy beryllium hydroxide - the vital feed material for all beryllium products - from a plant outside Reading, Pa., operated by the Beryllium Corporation. Mr. Kelley had reason to be concerned: Dust in the plant was hazardously high, and several workers had died. In a series of letters, Mr. Kelley pleaded with his AEC colleagues not to buy beryllium from the firm. "The AEC cannot avoid knowing that every time it enters into a contract for the production of beryllium in what it knows to be a medically unsafe plant the lives of an unknown number of people may be placed in jeopardy," he wrote. The government, he wrote, "cannot shirk its moral responsibility in this matter." But at a meeting of top AEC officials in Washington, Mr. Kelley was informed that, except in certain contracts, the government would no longer bear "the responsibility for health conditions associated with the procurement and production of beryllium materials," minutes of the meeting state. It was decided that "further consideration of medical reasons would be dropped and that all consideration of the proposed arrangement with the Beryllium Corporation would be based strictly on economics." <Picture>Document: The government's choice It is unclear whether the AEC went ahead and bought beryllium from the Beryllium Corporation. But the government continued its association with the firm. The AEC owned a small building on plant grounds that cast beryllium metal. The Beryllium Corporation ran the casting operation under a government contract. For the next 20 months, from the summer of 1949 to the spring of 1951, workers in that building were exposed to dust up to 100 times the safety limit, records show. Conditions in Beryllium Corporation's main plant were worse: Some workers were exposed to dust 500 times the limit. And many people went on to get beryllium disease. In fact, in the 10 years following Mr. Kelley's repeated warnings about the Beryllium Corporation, at least 37 people either working at the plant site or living nearby developed the illness, studies show. Among them: a woman who paid weekly visits to a relative's grave in the cemetery across the street from the plant. ======================================================== ----------Con't to part 3--------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ We have a new web site! http://www.onelist.com Onelist: The leading provider of free email community services ------------------------------------------------------------------------ DOEWatch List --- Subscribe online: http://www.onelist.com/subscribe.cgi/doewatch"We have discovered the most terrible bomb in the history of the world. It may be the fire destruction prophesized in the Euphrates Valley Era, after Noah and his fabulous Ark. Anyway we think we have found the way to cause the disintegration of the atom." -Quote from Truman's diary July 25, 45 after Pottsdam and the "baby was born"""The Doctor of the future will give No Medicine, but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet, and in the cause and prevention of disease."."-Attributed to Thomas Alva Edisonn"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act"t"-George Orwell &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&& Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit) Unenh onhwa' Awayaton http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/ &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
