Nuclear and Radiation Accidents - Radiation and Other Accidents

Radiation and Other Accidents

Serious radiation and other accidents include:

1950s

• February 13, 1950 : a Convair B-36B crashed in northern British Columbia after jettisoning a Mark IV atomic bomb. This was the first such nuclear weapon loss in history.
• December 12, 1952: AECL Chalk River Laboratories, Chalk River, Ontario, Canada. Partial meltdown, about 10,000 Curies released.
• September 1957: a plutonium fire occurred at the Rocky Flats Plant, which resulted in the contamination of Building 71 and the release of plutonium into the atmosphere, causing US $818,600 in damage.
• September 1957: Mayak nuclear waste storage tank explosion at Chelyabinsk. Two hundred plus fatalities, believed to be a conservative estimate; 270,000 people were exposed to dangerous radiation levels. Over thirty small communities had been removed from Soviet maps between 1958 and 1991. (INES level 6).
• October 1957: Windscale fire, UK. Fire ignites plutonium piles and contaminates surrounding dairy farms. An estimated 33 cancer deaths.
• March 1959: Santa Susana Field Laboratory, Los Angeles, California. Fire in a fuel processing facility.
• July 1959: Santa Susana Field Laboratory, Los Angeles, California. Partial meltdown.

1960s

• 24 January 1961: the 1961 Goldsboro B-52 crash occurred near Goldsboro, North Carolina. A B-52 Stratofortress carrying two Mark 39 nuclear bombs broke up in mid-air, dropping its nuclear payload in the process.
• July 1961: soviet submarine K-19 accident. Eight fatalities and more than 30 people were over-exposed to radiation.
• March, 21 -August 1962: radiation accident in Mexico City, four fatalities.
• 1964, 1969: Santa Susana Field Laboratory, Los Angeles, California. Partial meltdowns.
• 1965 Philippine Sea A-4 crash, where a Skyhawk attack aircraft with a nuclear weapon fell into the sea. The pilot, the aircraft, and the B43 nuclear bomb were never recovered. It was not until the 1980s that the Pentagon revealed the loss of the one-megaton bomb.
• January 17, 1966: the 1966 Palomares B-52 crash occurred when a B-52G bomber of the USAF collided with a KC-135 tanker during mid-air refuelling off the coast of Spain. The KC-135 was completely destroyed when its fuel load ignited, killing all four crew members. The B-52G broke apart, killing three of the seven crew members aboard. Of the four Mk28 type hydrogen bombs the B-52G carried, three were found on land near Almería, Spain. The non-nuclear explosives in two of the weapons detonated upon impact with the ground, resulting in the contamination of a 2-square-kilometer (490-acre) (0.78 square mile) area by radioactive plutonium. The fourth, which fell into the Mediterranean Sea, was recovered intact after a 2½-month-long search.
• January 21, 1968: the 1968 Thule Air Base B-52 crash involved a United States Air Force (USAF) B-52 bomber. The aircraft was carrying four hydrogen bombs when a cabin fire forced the crew to abandon the aircraft. Six crew members ejected safely, but one who did not have an ejection seat was killed while trying to bail out. The bomber crashed onto sea ice in Greenland, causing the nuclear payload to rupture and disperse, which resulted in widespread radioactive contamination.
• May 1968: soviet submarine K-27 reactor near meltdown. 9 people died, 83 people were injured.
• January 1969: Lucens reactor in Switzerland undergoes partial core meltdown leading to massive radioactive contamination of a cavern.

1970s

• July 1978: Anatoli Bugorski was working on U-70, the largest Soviet particle accelerator, when he accidentally exposed his head directly to the proton beam. He survived, despite suffering some long-term damage.
• July 1979: Church Rock Uranium Mill Spill in New Mexico, USA, when United Nuclear Corporation's uranium mill tailings disposal pond breached its dam. Over 1,000 tons of radioactive mill waste and millions of gallons of mine effluent flowed into the Puerco River, and contaminants traveled downstream.

1980s

• March 1984: radiation accident in Morocco, eight fatalities from overexposure to radiation from a lost iridium-192 source. 　
• August 1985: soviet submarine K-431 accident. Ten fatalities and 49 other people suffered radiation injuries.
• October 1986: soviet submarine K-219 reactor almost had a meltdown. Sergei Preminin died after he manually lowered the control rods, and stopped the explosion. The submarine sank three days later.
• September 1987: Goiania accident. Four fatalities, and following radiological screening of more than 100,000 people, it was ascertained that 249 people received serious radiation contamination from exposure to Cesium-137. In the cleanup operation, topsoil had to be removed from several sites, and several houses were demolished. All the objects from within those houses were removed and examined. Time magazine has identified the accident as one of the world's "worst nuclear disasters" and the International Atomic Energy Agency called it "one of the world's worst radiological incidents".
• 1989: San Salvador, El Salvador; one fatality due to violation of safety rules at Cobalt-60 irradiation facility.

1990s

• 1990: Soreq, Israel; one fatality due to violation of safety rules at Cobalt-60 irradiation facility.
• December 16bc - 1990: radiotherapy accident in Zaragoza. Eleven fatalities and 27 other patients were injured.
• 1991: Neswizh, Belarus; one fatality due to violation of safety rules at Cobalt-60 irradiation facility.
• 1992: Jilin, China; three fatalities at Cobalt-60 irradiation facility.
• 1992: USA; one fatality.
• April 1993: accident at the Tomsk-7 Reprocessing Complex, when a tank exploded while being cleaned with nitric acid. The explosion released a cloud of radioactive gas. (INES level 4).
• 1994: Tammiku, Estonia; one fatality from disposed Cesium-137 source.
• August — December 1996: radiotherapy accident in Costa Rica. Thirteen fatalities and 114 other patients received an overdose of radiation.
• June 1997: Sarov, Russia; one fatality due to violation of safety rules.
• September 1999: two fatalities at criticality accident at Tokai nuclear fuel plant (Japan)

2000s

• January–February 2000: Samut Prakan radiation accident: three deaths and ten injuries resulted in Samut Prakarn when a Cobalt-60 radiation-therapy unit was dismantled.
• May 2000: Meet Halfa, Egypt; two fatalities due to radiography accident.
• April 2010: Mayapuri radiological accident, India, one fatality after a Cobalt-60 research irradiator was sold to a scrap metal dealer and dismantled.

2010s

• March 2011: Fukushima I nuclear accidents, Japan and the radioactive discharge at the Fukushima Daiichi Power Station