My parents bought a house, from a physicist that worked at A.I., in early 1959. The physicist had bought the house new, and oddly sold it to my folks after living in it for only a few months. It was located on the border of Chatsworth and Northridge. We spent a lot of time playing at Chatsworth Park, and frequently rode our bikes through box canyon, right through the Santa Susana test site. (security was non existent) I remember the rocket tests that shook our house, and filled the evening sky with an orange glow. The tests were usually conducted right after sunset. The westerly winds would have brought the exhaust right over our house. Everyone on our block ended up with cancer. Kids and parents alike. My oldest sister died of lymphoma, and my youngest sister got thyroid cancer but survived after a successful surgery. I ended up with cancer as well. We never knew that we had been irradiated by a cloud of nuclear radiation until decades later. The cover-up was complete and successful.☠💀
@@THEWRENCH343 It had the lawsuits conducted in “Northern California”. There were six parks for kids to play climbing all over the boulders surrounding SSFL..We sat on top of the train tunnel above. tge most polluted part of SSFL.. I have a golf ball sized “meningioma” which is “only caused by ionizing radiation”. Survivors of Nagasaki and Hiroshima had meningioma”.. They are very slow growing..Checking them. With contrast material causes your feet to go numb and feel like wearing socks making your feet feel prickly.. I would like for all the scientists that “ vented the experimental reactors to the community for three weeks to”suffer the effects to the body “ they inflicted to residents around the lab.
@@THEWRENCH343 We played in Chatsworth park also and climbed around the train tunnel behind Orcutt Park ..We climbed all over The hill behind the train tunnel and walked through that tunnel… as kids.. and sat on top of the concrete tunnel entrance and dangled our legs… while the train rumbled through.
Back when the Superfund sites were being created my father noticed something odd about them. They were all former private industrial locations, or municipal waste disposal sites. No joint corporate/federal locations or federal controlled areas like military bases were listed. He'd been career navy and knew every base had places you didn't want to spend time at. It had been common practice to get rid of extra "stuff" by either tossing it in a burn pit or burning it in an oil drum. As long as it wasn't too noxious or no one immediately got sick, no one cared. If on a ship it was common to just toss it overboard. Not on your boat, not your problem.
Is there a separate program to the Superfund program for these sites? Obviously there is still gonna be some nasty stuff in the water table where military burn pits have had a multi-decade run. Wasn’t the fact that everything was disposed of by burning one of the theories behind gulf war syndrome?
@@extragoogleaccount6061there is a program called FUSRAP for "formerly used defense site remediation and preservation" that began predominantly because of the multitude of Manhattan Project sites where waste disposal was appalling. Still, a lot of sites fall between the cracks and can't receive FUSRAP or Superfund status because they don't exactly meet either program's requirements, despite still leaving many people sick or living with contaminated land or water with no real promises of remediation
@@extragoogleaccount6061 That, along with all the toxic crap in the air from burning Kuwaiti oil wells set ablaze by retreating Iraqis, plus organophosphate pesticide exposure, and a medication given preventatively to protect against possible exposure to nerve gases, apparently.
@@extragoogleaccount6061 gulf War syndrome was caused by low dose of chemical weapons both sides suffered from it and yes we sold it to them well usa the French and germans
One thing to keep in mind about TSCA (Superfund) is that when it was first enacted, many previously allowed practices that were allowed now came under the regulations. There is a section in TSCA called a Part B closure. This was part of the law and regulations that allowed corporations to stop and close these sites without penalties or prosecution under the law. I was involved in many Part B closures. If the facility was to remain in service, the Part B interim closure had to cover how the emissions would be stopped, and how proper disposal techniques were to be implemented. Then how the problems were to be addressed for final closure when the facility shut down. The other thing that TSCA did was to address the abandoned sites which were the first ones to show up on the list. As I mentioned above, more environmental damage has been done under the umbrella of national security than any other reason. hth
I was 4 months old and my family lived 1/2 mile from the site when the disaster happened, and because we were never notified we continued to live there for another 10 years. My grandmother died of stomach cancer a few years after the accident, I have no doubt it resulted from drinking the well water! She was truly an awesome person and I still feel the loss. We received nothing from the responsible parties, not even a warning when it happened or an apology since then!
You have "no doubt" it was the well water, yet the maximum credible offsite radiation dose from this incident was less than one tenth of one single millirem - ie. less than one day's worth of natural background radiation exposure, and meanwhile everyone and their brother was sucking down a pack of cigarettes a day at the time and 45% of the general population gets cancer at some point in their life anyway. Your comment typifies the kind of ultra certain attitude in the face of almost zero evidence supporting the underlying conviction that so many people have. The fact of the matter is you simply have absolutely no idea what actually caused your grandmother's cancer and no one else does either.
We had to “duck roll and cover” so often at Enadia Way 18:23 Elementary school.. The siren at the school went off and we were told get under our desk.and cover our heads.. so frequently.. The big black cloud burn’t from where the rumbling was rattling my bedroom window.Our back of our brand new track home faced the low hills behind our house where the black billowing cloud was was steeply angled as it rose at a narrowly angled traveling across the shallow “Woodland Hills” of our neighborhood.There were no trees obstructing our view..off the rear of the top of our hill.our house occupied. We used to slide down the grassy knoll across the street..on cardboard boxes. through the tall thick grasses.We were made to play outside practically all day… My Mom put a above group pool we spent hours in.. We moved in third grade to a radius still inside the radius affected by the publicized map of exposure..closer to Parthenia..lab were the lab fire took place where the graphite rods were scrubbed .
A family friend of ours lived downhill from this place. He died young of the same rare cancer his dad died of. The catch is that he wasn't even related to his father because he was adopted.
@@CollinFisher That is a strong implication of being environmentally induced. I've had melonoma, and I have an ideopathic disabling illness. Don't trust corporations or governments. I have 4 college degrees, and I often wonder what I could have achieved without illness!
As a 30+ year environmental professional, I say well done. I have seen the results of "dump it and it goes away" in the far north (DEW Line site), and the casual handling of vast quantities of what's now hazardous material and waste is amazing.
i grew up in Burbank. In about 1960 at age 11 I developed a goiter and thyroid cancer. The doctors at UCLA could not understand how a young boy born in 1949 could develope a large thyroid goiter. A few year ago I was diagnosed with the beginnings of Leukemia. DNA tests conducted by Kaiser show that I have DNA that has been damaged. Today I am trying to survive but the outlook is grim. I remember friends of mine dying of cancer in the early 1960's. I blame all of this on thatt site. James Heath
@@donaldharlan3981 says a dude who think millions are lying about Santa Susana in a very coordinated conspiracy to ....what exactly? What is the purpose everyone is lying?
I was born and raised in Simi Valley (1978). I clearly remember rocket tests constantly engaging, clear from my elementary school playground all through my childhood.
this was something new to me until a little while ago when I saw it being referred to; as soon as I saw it, I knew I wanted to put an episode together for it.
Born and raised in the SF valley. Lived about 6 miles as the crow flies from there. I always heard stories about this accident while growing up. The Spawn Ranch where the Charlie Mansion family hung out was just down the hill from there. Used to love to hear and experience the earth shaking rocket engine tests. Rocketdynes factory was about two miles from where we lived. Great Video!
@@donalddepew9605 There was another laboratory off of Parthenia where graphite fuel rods scrubbed fissionable material off the fuel rods..where several fires occurred..
@@donalddepew9605 Menninginoma can go undetected for years and get picked up on CT Scans..They discovered person from Nagasaki and Hiroshima had them if they did not die from the nuclear bombing…They are caused from ionizing radiation…I grew up in West SF valley and also watched those test…the dark plume of billowing smoke we could see from the back of our slope on Calvert Street .. between Shoup and Topanga Blvd.. Went to Enadia Way,Nobel ,Cleveland living West Valley until I was 21.. Menninginoma is very slow growing Mine is golf ball size behind my right eye ..My mobility is just about gone…
I grew up in Simi Valley, just down the mountains from there. I am 55 YOA, and many of my school mates and friends have passed away from all kinds of illnesses. Many of my younger sisters friends, have a lot of mental disorders and several have had their children taken from them. People in Simi continue to get sick and die. It is a sad state of affairs.
My family moved to Thousand Oaks in 1967, and I have been living in this town ever since. We frequently heard them testing rocket engines at the Santa Susanna site. Those engines must have been incredibly loud, because our location had to be at least 7 miles away by bird. Around 1978, I met a guy who claimed that his dad had worked at the molten sodium reactor up there, and that was the first time I had ever heard anyone say that there was a nuclear reactor in those hills, but he said nothing about a nuclear accident. I had never heard of the nuclear accident until around 2015 when I read about it on the internet. Living here all these years, as well as some family that had been living just off Kuehner Drive (near the nuclear site) since before we arrived; well, it just seems odd that they could keep a secret like that away from the locals for so long.
Huh.... Everyone I know in Simi is generally aware of this incident. I know many people who have lived their most of their lives, too.... but they are also skewed much younger compared to the year you mentioned.
I lived in thousand oaks in that time too and you can go behind the shop I worked in up on the hill and see the rocket plumes from those tests I believe it was a space shuttle engine they we're working on
Born and raised near here. I have multiple friends that had thyroid cancer with no other family history. We grew up waiting to see if a sudden rumble was an earthquake or a Rocketdyne test. The area has developed massively with new housing over the last 30 years and no one is informed of this. We didn't know until the clean up demands started in the early 2000s.
@@BrandyStaples-d8l My Thyroid quit when I was young.. around age 40.. My meningioma discovered during an ER visit.. It is caused by “ionizing radiation”.. survivors of Hiroshima have them… We lived on Calvert street in Woodland Hills.My Mom had bladder cancer.. We all watched the Rocketdyne tests when the rumbling began rattling our windows in our house… by sitting on our back slope on our lot facing the rocket tests..
To David and the entire Cold War crew, can you please make a video on the history of Thailand during the Cold War. That way, all your viewers and subscribers will learn about Phibun's return to power (Phibun previously governed Thailand during WW2), Thailand's back-and-forth transition between civilian and military governments during the Cold War, as well as the country's lese-majeste laws (laws which basically criminalise negative public attitudes towards the country's royalty and royal institution) which became more strictly enforced during the Cold War. Thank you very much.
My great grandmother was an electrician and worked on the Apollo rockets here. She passed from cancer on Dec. 8, 1980, the same day John Lennon was shot. We still have the same soldering irons she used on that job, and they still work.
Disturbing to know that all of those thousands who were and have been in the know over accidents like this kept their mouths shut and potentially allowed harm to come to others. So many times it seems the general public only finds out by accident, while those who could have spoken out can go to bed every night and rest in peace while keeping us in ignorance. Something quite disturbing to think many of them live among us.
I actually live around 6-7 miles from this site. When the Woolsey Fire came in 2018, there was some serious concern over what could happen if that site was consumed by the fire.
I worked there in the mid 90s at the internal fire department. Many of the older employees died of various cancers. Rocket Testing was winding down and environmental cleanup was ongoing. The building that housed the SRE was being demolished with a robot. Interesting place to work at. Lots more went on at the place that was never mentioned and is probably still classified.
@@gregorybirchfield4952 There was a lab recycling the graphite rods reclaiming the uranium.. that caught fire that was about four blocks on Parthenia.. Were you present at the fires that occurred?
@@gregorybirchfield4952 We lived a below Parthenia near Tampa and ate from the local citrus that was sold along with local farmers beef obtained from a local butchers market called “Red Blacks Market… as did most in the area where we lived…
@@gregorybirchfield4952 My mother had bladder cancer… I lived on a street where the family was losing children to cancer then the mother died from Cancer.
As I recall, as late as 1975 Rocketdyne employees shot barrels of unstable chemicals with rifles causing them to explode thus disposing them. After work hours of course.
Uh, not exactly. They shot the barrels behind a barrier for a reason. They ignited them so they would burn. On top of everything else they did up there, they had burn pits.That was how they ignited them. They just let the smoke waft over Semi Valley and the always beautiful Canoga Park on certain days. They buried thousands of barrels of chemicals for cleaning rocket parts. There are caves with ancient Indian artwork inside them up there also. You can no longer get to them because it's no longer safe to do so. The place was (is) a cesspool of cancerous materials. They went ahead and built tract homes right behind the S.S.F.L. There was a staggering amount of cancers, premature babies, and illnesses, all directly related to that site. Semi Valley is not a place to go raise a family. As for me? My father worked up there for a short period of time. He was dead at 49 riddled with cancer. We lived in the San Fernando Valley. My mother died of breast cancer. I have myself checked regularly. I've had skin cancer removed already. The sodium reactor meltdown was just one of many disasters up there. Now, they are building one in Washington state. Who's behind it? Bill Gates. Yep. The one at the SSFL was a baby reactor. They want to build a huge one now. Brilliant.
@@rodgerrodger183940% of humans get cancer and 20% of human mortality is from cancer. That's regardless of living in an industrial or pre industrial society.
The rocket tests shook the whole western SFValley we were in granada hills just outside the nuke reactor danger zone my dad had thyroid cancer in 65 makes me wonder !!
@TheColdWarTV I'm guessing but my folks read it in the news paper in the early 60's I'm thinking so far as a specific time that's as close as I can get 'thanks great shows btw !
Living near Chatsworth Nature Preserve, located in the northwest corner of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles, California, the Santa Susana test site entrance is just a few miles up the road. PS - there are several contaminated sites throughout the San Fernando Valley at aerospace facilities where cleaning solvents and oil waste was routinely dumped in pits. Same thing happened in a smaller scale at dry cleaners that used these solvents PS2 - lowering contamination to level that would allow agriculture is a ridiculous standard. Just tritium contamination in subsurface water flowing toward Simi Valley is problematic. Removal of contaminated rock and soil in the recent past has lowered the risk somewhat. Doubt area will ever be used beyond open space
Simi Valley native, raised and currently living on the east side of the city, about 3 miles from the SSFL. My older family members would tell stories about the houses shaking when they were young during the rocket firings and that it was louder than the trains and planes coming into town. Several older relatives and friends have died to cancer related illnesses. Hard to say if the nuclear testing at SSFL played a significant role compared to their lifestyles choices. I was born in 1994 so unfortunately I didn't get to experience the rocket testing and hopefully dodge the worst of the airborne fallout from the tests conducted. The valley is forever our home base.
@@facedominion our windows rattled on our home during rocket engine testing and the thick black smoke at an a 20 degree angle billowed across the horizon when we as kids ran outside on our back slope to watch the rocket testing… while the cloud dispersed across the west end of the San Fernando Valley cities groves valley. grew all across the l
@@facedominion My mother had bladder cancer that was caught in time.. but her Uterus and the bladder tumor were removed.. Menninginoma was prolific in Hiroshima and Nagasaki..survivors. Menninginoma safe slow growing and caused “by ionizing radiation..Mine is golf ball sized. The Physicians for Social Responsibility went to court with a specific “ information” regarding exposure to ionizing radiation tumors.. Their clinical expertise helped win the case ..
My earliest memory of living in Simi was, the Sylmar quake. I was 2 years old, but I remember the testing very well. It was always: Earthquake? Nah, testing. At least some of the time.
My job takes me there several times a year as a vendor for the last 25 years to present. Knowing the history of that place while working there is surreal.
We lived there and went to Enadia Way Elementary School..We were putting in lawns and digging in the dirt,swimming in a pool,and playing in the day parks near the railroad tracks and tunnels..hiking on the rocks at these parks for extended periods of time on Saturdays…Meninginomas have a cause of ionizing radiation…I have one ..We lived in Woodland Hills in one of the new homes built out there..
Well said, well spoken, well presented! Yes, remember the early 1960's well with regards to this site..... my dad was an engineer in the aerospace programs.... we lived in West LA and Thousand Oaks at the time..... there was much to be said about this incident, at least one cause of one of the accidents....which wasn't....... an accident but a feud between 2 employees.....
I grew up in Burbank about 1/4 mile from Lockheed. I remember hearing the testing of crazy sounding engines in the middle of the night. Both my parents died of cancer. I’m always hoping for the best. I’m amazed how many locations have had dangerous chemical history in the past. I now live in Pasadena, and I recently found out that a top secret WW2 chemical warfare laboratory was located within 4 blocks of where I live. It is now a self-storage facility.
I once knew three sisters; One died of Lymphatic cancer, one has had a double mastectomy and the surviving sister has to have Cancer screenings every six months. They lived on Chatsworth street and spent a lot of time in the surrounding hills.
Still the biggest secret of LA/Ventura Counties. I lived there from 1971 to 2011, never heard it mentioned. I worked for an environmental cleanup company in the late '90s and went out there with my boss to look at a site to bid on the cleanup. We got the creeps without knowledge of the meltdown and left. I worked in that area for 30 years in the construction industry and never heard a word about it.
I'm from Southern California (San Diego, albeit) and I had never heard of this disaster until now. Reading the comments, the fact that people living much closer to the site have also never heard of it until fairly recently is both mind boggling, and infuriating.
Almost nobody in the city, or Ventura county (where Its located knows anything about it) all information about it was hidden from the public until 2014. Considering making a video interviewing people in the city, to prove how hidden this event really was.
Return To Witch Mountain is a Disney movie that depicted a nuclear accident at this place. I didn't realize this was loosely based upon REALITY until many years later. 😱
I lived through all this from my home in Canoga Park. What I have failed to hear about from anyone were the multiple night sightings of UFO's around the reactor site disaster. Many of my friends did too. They're real! I saw them with my own eye's as did all my friends! The sightings that I witnessed lasted around 4 days., mainly at nightfall. They would dart around for awhile, then group up and streak off towards Simi Valley's direction, at an impossible rate of speed.
Saw the same thing myself. I remember it being so obvious that anyone looking would have been as alarmed. It was like the UFOs were trying to tell the engineers to knock it off. Like mankind was going to far. That's cool you saw it and that's a great point people are leaving out.
I never heard anything about this. I do recall in the 90's there were hundreds of metal barrels of nuclear waste uncovered due to rust and leakage into the groundwater table in California. There were also concerns in the 70's and 80's of leaking atomic waste into the Columbia River in Oregon from several hazard waste storage silos in Arlington Oregon..There was a cleanup for decades in Arlington Oregon scheduled. Never heard much after that.
I don't know if you'll ever get another chance to name chemicals on your channel, but in case you do: you just say the numbers for the positions on the skeleton, and you don't mention the decimals/commas. For example, 1,4-dioxane is not "one point four dioxane", it's just "one four dioxane", 1,1,1-trichloroethane is "one one one trichloroethane".
My Dad worked at Rocketdyne for 30 years and wore a radiation monitor at work. He died of throat cancer, but I don't blame it on Radiation exposure. He smoked a couple packs of cigarettes a day like most of his generation. I still live near the site and have had no sign of developing cancer.
My parents moved our family to Simi in 64 when I was 6. We lived maybe 3 to 4 miles, as the crow flies, from the test site. Lived in Simi until 84. I remember watching the rocket tests from the valley floor. Had no idea of the dangers we were being exposed to until years after leaving the area. My younger brother was 3 years old when we moved there. He died at 44. My youngest sister had just been born before moving there. She died at 46. To this day, I wonder if their exposure contributed to their deaths.
This does surprise me. I was in Nuc school in 75 and 76. We were told about Chalk River, SL1, Windscale and a couple of odd incidents. A very serious incident occurred when an Xray machine was dumped in Mexico. A guy brought it back to his home in the back of a pickup truck. Some children started to take it apart. They found the Colbalt. I think some of them died. Subsequently, the truck ended up in a steel manufacturing facility, and the Colbalt ended up in the steel. The steel ended up in all sorts of places in the US. Evidently, one day a truck with the contaminated steel tried to go into Sandia Labs through the exit, not through the entrance. Sandia monitors all vehicles leaving the site. I think this was about six months after the unit was disposed of from an American medical facility. There was another incident when a researched wanted to get a closer look at fuel in a spent fuel tank. He put some glass at the end of a pipe, pushed it down close to the fuel cells and looked through it. I think his glasses went up to 7 REM. Sorry, I have never figured out the Seinfeld measuring system. Now someone mentioned in the comments that Hanford Site had been closed, I can see the steam from the B&W reactor that is still operating there just fine. don't even think of driving on the site. And a few months ago somebody went ballistic on me for saying 'contamination'. Evidently it is no longer called contamination.
Your last sentence confirms just how stupid politically correct speech is. Change the name of something and it neutralises it's properties. The same happens in sociology and politics, Orwell warned us about this way of thought control.
I feel like theres more to SSFL than we know... those cold war towers run all the way to Sylmar & noticable from pretty much any point. At the height of the Boeing discourse about cleaning it. I've seen EPA testing rain run off at corners in some streets.
Thank you for all your hard work. It is appreciated. It is informative and entertaining, a wonderful way to present an important part of the human story.
A neighbor dropped in. Have you missed me. I just moved to ventura county . I ask where. He said Bell canyon. I said how close to thr rocket dyne fence. He said 5 houses didn't the real estate agent or the title insurance people warn you. Of what he said. That there was a nuclear accident in 1959. His eyes almost popped out of his head. He turned and ran full speed down all 88 steps . I never saw him again. I wonder what happened. If he had not run off I was going to offer to come by with my PUG7 with its lollipop and check his home and yard. A few years later I ask a dirt contractor why he would take job at the end of Sherman way. Likely in a warm zone. I needed the money he said.
One little mentioned site was near Cleveland ; described in the " novelized " book " We almost Lost Detroit " . A breeder reactor that blew and lifted the roof several inches for a few seconds the first time it was started up .
Definitely being cleaned up as we speak. Albeit I don’t know exactly what area/structure of the massive site they originate from, they are trucking massive chunks of steel every week out of the site and down Woolsey Canyon. Likely rocket test stand pieces, but the nuclear section had a lot of massive and heavy steel structures also.
I was born in the “Valley” in 1960 and lived in Woodland Hills until the ‘90s. My father was a rocket scientist for Rocketdyne from the mid ‘50s until he retired in the’80s. He often worked at the SSFL in the ‘60s. He died at nearly 91 from injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident. My mother however died from multiple myeloma. I wonder…….
I live In Simi Valley The Test Site overlooks the Valley the original "China syndrome" Meltdown was before My time having moved here in 79' But the Space Shuttle engine tests were Spectacular they really shook the town up. The Knolls was most affected because water table was contaminated seemed to be well known. Most residents of that area Used bottled water. Oh Just for illumination this is just a couple miles from Spawn Movie ranch where Charlie Mansons group hung out.
When the government delegates research, it can wash its hands of any liability. An accident happens, a company just declares bankruptcy and gives its board a nice payout. It's easier to hide from responsibility, something much more difficult for the government to do.
From 1970 to 1990 I lived 5-6 miles away, and I wonder if my autoimmune disease that started in 2010 has something to do with it. As a kid we spent a lot of time outside riding bikes. Everyone should be aware of how terrible the pollution was there also with the valley holding in the smog which is why we have the EPA (because of LA smog), so that maybe also caused a lot of disease.
I live less than five miles from the SSFL. The State of California has washed its hands of the problem. The U.S. Department of Energy has let NASA and Boeing off the hook. Still, we wait for meaningful cleanup of this ongoing disaster.
I'm beginning to think the Fallout video games series are a reflection of real life events. Specifically Robco, REPCONN Aerospace, and the many other industries that lacked oversight and environmental safety standards.
There was a short article in _The Los Angeles Times_ a few days after the initial release of radioactive gas from the SRE in 1959. Apparently, few paid attention. There must have been a news blackout after that. The wind was easterly at the time of the initial release and would have mostly affected the immediate area and the Simi Valley. There were media rumors about the "accident" around 1970-71. That's when I first learned about it. From January 1956 to early 1962 my dad worked at the Santa Susana Field Test Laboratory (SSFTL), which was the original name of the facility. The shop out of which his crew worked was in Area III about 1/4 mi. from the SRE along the border with Area IV. They knew something had happened in Area IV but no particulars. Presumably they didn't have access to their shop during the time of the releases.
I grew up in Canoga Park , born in 1940. We used to tour that area before it became this test site. We would take Jeep rides over in Box Canyon as we knew ti then. I left the area in 1963 when I joined the Navy.
Can you talk about the defense of Florida during the Cold War, and how Florida was to be defended in case of a Soviet invasion of the Florida peninsula via Cuba? Just asking, as you previously did a video on the defense of Alaska? Thanks!!
When I was a kid looking for pollywogs in the water coming down it, it is was a very hot and humid day so I drank that water going down it, never saw any pollywogs, wonder way. Many years later, found out someone got cancer. It was still very active and running .C. Park side.
For chemicals with commas in their names (e.g. 1,2-dichlorobenzene), you don't pronounce the commas (e.g. "one-two-dichlorobenzene"). (and no, these commas are not points)
My grandfather who served in US Army Corps of Engineers worked there for decades after having been in Pearl Harbor during the attack. He was on deck peeling potatoes when it happened in Hawaii.
I grew up about 2 (?) miles from the Santa Susana field. Almost every kids father, in almost every home in my neighborhood ,passed away from cancer, not to mention the other family members. Unknowingly,as kids in the sixties and seventies ( before being informed)) ....we would dam up the creek beds below rocketdyne in Woolsey canyon.....and swim in the water in the summer. I'm now fighting Cancer myself most likely due to the exposure of krypton -85 and or another isotope. The health of the people in that area I moved from will be affected for 300 years. I sure hope it was worth it. I believe a much more remote testing facility would have been prudent. Many families have suffered,and are suffering. The profits ,and technological gains were made at the expense of the physical project,and also the health of the surrounding community.
I had exposure to the radiation from Chernobyl when the US wanted to make a show of force in Germany. We were out marching in the rain consisting of the fallout from Chernobyl on May 1st 1986. The result is that I have a nodule on my thyroid as well as lesions on my head, neck and shoulders. The biopsy revealed that it is consistent with exposure to radiation. This happened in Regan’s peacetime Army. I’m being treated for it now. There are probably more people suffering from this same exposure. I was literally singing, “I’m a Radioactive” at the time. ☢️
I do remember the rocket testing going on it used to shake the ground Like An Earthquake and rattle the windows of the home. A huge plume of steam I would rise above the mountain there's Saturn V rocket engine tests where insane. (15 miles away)
I lived in the east end of Simi Valley for 12 years. This is some scary shit! I had to sign documents that "informed" me of the situation when I bought my first house. But I didn't know all this!! Forunately, I'm OK, health wise.
I'm no Boeing apologist (especially these days), but I'm not sure I can agree with blaming them for trying to get out of the expense of remediation, when we consider that they merged their way into liability for some top secret accident that happened decades ago that had been covered up for ages. Frankly, I think the Feds, AEA, etc should foot the bill.
According to the law, if you owned the problem at anytime you're responsible. In other words, if you buy property and it has a LUST (Leaking Underground Storage Tank) on it you can be held responsible for the costs of the clean up. This is why companies such as Boeing have people do a property history on any property that they are thinking of buying. So Boeing knew about the sites problems when they acquired it.
@@rebeccaorman1823 you make good points; that said, if the information of past history was withheld from them, then surely they've got an "out," so to speak? Just my thinking.
@@randyrohe not legally. Additionally, they certainly knew that the site had been used for industrial purposes and the type of activities that went on there. Furthermore, just because information was not available to the general public doesn't mean that industry insiders with their connections didn't know about it. Don't kid yourself, Boeing probably knew exactly what happened at the site and at worst had an extremely good idea.
@@rebeccaorman1823 I don't think anyone making comments on a UA-cam video has the insight to know what is and isn't "legal" with regard to contracts that were signed. As I've said, I'm no Boeing apologist, but your argument reads more like an indictment of "big evil ugly corporations" ("don't kid yourself, they PROBABLY knew...") than a factual defense of either side. I'd love to be on a jury and have access to the facts! That would be fun for us both.
Back in the day, everything was vented to the environment.... everything. Progress today is acknowledging this fact and trying to clean such places up in the future....
I wanna know more about Rancho Seco. While 3 mile Island had ONE problem that never happened again, Rancho Seco was a real American Chernobyl waiting to happen, clearly all the incidents and multiple reactor emergency shut-downs they had have been swept under the rug by SMUD. I can't find much about it and I just want to know what went on there out of pure curiosity.
I've lived in the West San Fernando Valley California since 1960, 9 months after the explosion! Lots of cancer in the area! I still live in a stone's throw of the disaster location and drive by it now and then! Fortunately, no cancer in my family! It's an eri site!
It is important that people understand the existence and the meaning/function of The Nuclear Industries Indemnities Act of 1953. If you are not familiar, look it up.
I feel like most people in Simi are aware of it thou, at least every person I knew and spoke to about it when I lived there was aware... (many of them don't see any risk with it- look at the Real Bros of Simi Valley, it is 100% realistic of how it is today.)
Some of the lack of care is enraging. I remember reading fairly recently that people guarding the closed Hanover reactor site in the north-west USA would deal with drums of radioactive waste that bobbed to surface in the Columbia river by SHOOTING HOLES IN THE BARRELS UNTIL THEY SUNK BACK OUT OF SIGHT! Freak!
Research "Humboldt Nuclear Accident" by Scott Rainsford. There is a 39min video and a 66min radio interview ( laborvideo). The accident was 450yrds UPWIND of South Bay Elementary School.
In the 1990s I worked for Bechtel who was contracted to clean up various naval bases. The EPA sued the Navy in federal court which ruled in favor of the EPA for the clean up. (Yeah, one branch of the US government sued another! Go figure.) Anyway, the bases were cleaned up to the extent they could be. There was so much redundant paperwork and ridiculous government red tape it’s amazing anything got done.
Indeed... my dad is a nuclear chemist and I learned about 'modern' (60s onward) tech and ALL the failsafes and such- later learning about earlier nuclear tech scared the heck outta me.
@@nathanspreitzer6738 They tried to say there were only 379 kids living out near the labs.There were more than that ..The baby boomers were being born ..The largest graduating class in Los Angeles graduated in 1970 from Cleveland High School 990 for each 1/2 year…
As some who lived in the Santa Susana pass I’m glad you’re bringing this to light even among people who live there it’s not nearly talked about enough
My parents bought a house, from a physicist that worked at A.I., in early 1959. The physicist had bought the house new, and oddly sold it to my folks after living in it for only a few months. It was located on the border of Chatsworth and Northridge. We spent a lot of time playing at Chatsworth Park, and frequently rode our bikes through box canyon, right through the Santa Susana test site. (security was non existent) I remember the rocket tests that shook our house, and filled the evening sky with an orange glow. The tests were usually conducted right after sunset. The westerly winds would have brought the exhaust right over our house. Everyone on our block ended up with cancer. Kids and parents alike. My oldest sister died of lymphoma, and my youngest sister got thyroid cancer but survived after a successful surgery. I ended up with cancer as well. We never knew that we had been irradiated by a cloud of nuclear radiation until decades later. The cover-up was complete and successful.☠💀
@@THEWRENCH343 It had the lawsuits conducted in “Northern California”. There were six parks for kids to play climbing all over the boulders surrounding SSFL..We sat on top of the train tunnel above. tge most polluted part of SSFL.. I have a golf ball sized “meningioma” which is “only caused by ionizing radiation”. Survivors of Nagasaki and Hiroshima had meningioma”.. They are very slow growing..Checking them. With contrast material causes your feet to go numb and feel like wearing socks making your feet feel prickly..
I would like for all the scientists that “ vented the experimental reactors to the community for three weeks to”suffer the effects to the body “ they inflicted to residents around the lab.
@@THEWRENCH343 We played in Chatsworth park also and climbed around the train tunnel behind Orcutt Park ..We climbed all over The hill behind the train tunnel and walked through that tunnel… as kids.. and sat on top of the concrete tunnel entrance and dangled our legs… while the train rumbled through.
@@THEWRENCH343 The lawsuit went through Kamala Harris’ offices and took place in Northern California.
Back when the Superfund sites were being created my father noticed something odd about them. They were all former private industrial locations, or municipal waste disposal sites. No joint corporate/federal locations or federal controlled areas like military bases were listed. He'd been career navy and knew every base had places you didn't want to spend time at. It had been common practice to get rid of extra "stuff" by either tossing it in a burn pit or burning it in an oil drum. As long as it wasn't too noxious or no one immediately got sick, no one cared. If on a ship it was common to just toss it overboard. Not on your boat, not your problem.
Is there a separate program to the Superfund program for these sites? Obviously there is still gonna be some nasty stuff in the water table where military burn pits have had a multi-decade run.
Wasn’t the fact that everything was disposed of by burning one of the theories behind gulf war syndrome?
@@extragoogleaccount6061there is a program called FUSRAP for "formerly used defense site remediation and preservation" that began predominantly because of the multitude of Manhattan Project sites where waste disposal was appalling. Still, a lot of sites fall between the cracks and can't receive FUSRAP or Superfund status because they don't exactly meet either program's requirements, despite still leaving many people sick or living with contaminated land or water with no real promises of remediation
@@extragoogleaccount6061 That, along with all the toxic crap in the air from burning Kuwaiti oil wells set ablaze by retreating Iraqis, plus organophosphate pesticide exposure, and a medication given preventatively to protect against possible exposure to nerve gases, apparently.
@@extragoogleaccount6061 gulf War syndrome was caused by low dose of chemical weapons both sides suffered from it and yes we sold it to them well usa the French and germans
One thing to keep in mind about TSCA (Superfund) is that when it was first enacted, many previously allowed practices that were allowed now came under the regulations. There is a section in TSCA called a Part B closure. This was part of the law and regulations that allowed corporations to stop and close these sites without penalties or prosecution under the law. I was involved in many Part B closures. If the facility was to remain in service, the Part B interim closure had to cover how the emissions would be stopped, and how proper disposal techniques were to be implemented. Then how the problems were to be addressed for final closure when the facility shut down.
The other thing that TSCA did was to address the abandoned sites which were the first ones to show up on the list.
As I mentioned above, more environmental damage has been done under the umbrella of national security than any other reason.
hth
I was 4 months old and my family lived 1/2 mile from the site when the disaster happened, and because we were never notified we continued to live there for another 10 years. My grandmother died of stomach cancer a few years after the accident, I have no doubt it resulted from drinking the well water! She was truly an awesome person and I still feel the loss. We received nothing from the responsible parties, not even a warning when it happened or an apology since then!
You have "no doubt" it was the well water, yet the maximum credible offsite radiation dose from this incident was less than one tenth of one single millirem - ie. less than one day's worth of natural background radiation exposure, and meanwhile everyone and their brother was sucking down a pack of cigarettes a day at the time and 45% of the general population gets cancer at some point in their life anyway.
Your comment typifies the kind of ultra certain attitude in the face of almost zero evidence supporting the underlying conviction that so many people have. The fact of the matter is you simply have absolutely no idea what actually caused your grandmother's cancer and no one else does either.
Add another, my cousin in San Fernando from a rare stomach cancer.
We had to “duck roll and cover” so often at Enadia Way 18:23 Elementary school.. The siren at the school went off and we were told get under our desk.and cover our heads.. so frequently..
The big black cloud burn’t from where the rumbling was rattling my bedroom window.Our back of our brand new track home faced the low hills behind our house where the black billowing cloud was was steeply angled as it rose at a narrowly angled traveling across the shallow “Woodland Hills” of our neighborhood.There were no trees obstructing our view..off the rear of the top of our hill.our house occupied. We used to slide down the grassy knoll across the street..on cardboard boxes. through the tall thick grasses.We were made to play outside practically all day… My Mom put a above group pool we spent hours in..
We moved in third grade to a radius still inside the radius affected by the publicized map of exposure..closer to Parthenia..lab were the lab fire took place where the graphite rods were scrubbed .
A family friend of ours lived downhill from this place. He died young of the same rare cancer his dad died of. The catch is that he wasn't even related to his father because he was adopted.
@@CollinFisher That is a strong implication of being environmentally induced. I've had melonoma, and I have an ideopathic disabling illness. Don't trust corporations or governments. I have 4 college degrees, and I often wonder what I could have achieved without illness!
As a 30+ year environmental professional, I say well done. I have seen the results of "dump it and it goes away" in the far north (DEW Line site), and the casual handling of vast quantities of what's now hazardous material and waste is amazing.
Have you seen what went on at the Hanford Site? What a mess!
i grew up in Burbank. In about 1960 at age 11 I developed a goiter and thyroid cancer. The doctors at UCLA could not understand how a young boy born in 1949 could develope a large thyroid goiter. A few year ago I was diagnosed with the beginnings of Leukemia. DNA tests conducted by Kaiser show that I have DNA that has been damaged. Today I am trying to survive but the outlook is grim. I remember friends of mine dying of cancer in the early 1960's. I blame all of this on thatt site. James Heath
I have friends that lived in Glendale that have suffered from cancer. No history of cancers in other family members that did not live in Glendale.
Iodine131 is strongly linked to thyroid cancer.
Your reasoning is defective. 🍄🟫
@@donaldharlan3981 says a dude who think millions are lying about Santa Susana in a very coordinated conspiracy to ....what exactly? What is the purpose everyone is lying?
@@donaldharlan3981 your brain is
I was born and raised in Simi Valley (1978). I clearly remember rocket tests constantly engaging, clear from my elementary school playground all through my childhood.
Fascinating. I never heard of this before. Thanks David.
this was something new to me until a little while ago when I saw it being referred to; as soon as I saw it, I knew I wanted to put an episode together for it.
Born and raised in the SF valley. Lived about 6 miles as the crow flies from there. I always heard stories about this accident while growing up. The Spawn Ranch where the Charlie Mansion family hung out was just down the hill from there. Used to love to hear and experience the earth shaking rocket engine tests. Rocketdynes factory was about two miles from where we lived. Great Video!
Typo should be "Spahn ranch".
@@donalddepew9605 There was another laboratory off of Parthenia where graphite fuel rods scrubbed fissionable material off the fuel rods..where several fires occurred..
@@Comm0ut Rim of the World sign was at the intersection where the “Box Canyon “ road entered another road..
@@donalddepew9605 The lawsuits were conducted in Northern California and back room deals were done bypassing the courtroom.
@@donalddepew9605 Menninginoma can go undetected for years and get picked up on CT Scans..They discovered person from Nagasaki and Hiroshima had them if they did not die from the nuclear bombing…They are caused from ionizing radiation…I grew up in West SF valley and also watched those test…the dark plume of billowing smoke we could see from the back of our slope on Calvert Street .. between Shoup and Topanga Blvd.. Went to Enadia Way,Nobel ,Cleveland living West Valley until I was 21..
Menninginoma is very slow growing Mine is golf ball size behind my right eye ..My mobility is just about gone…
I grew up in Simi Valley, just down the mountains from there. I am 55 YOA, and many of my school mates and friends have passed away from all kinds of illnesses. Many of my younger sisters friends, have a lot of mental disorders and several have had their children taken from them. People in Simi continue to get sick and die. It is a sad state of affairs.
My family moved to Thousand Oaks in 1967, and I have been living in this town ever since. We frequently heard them testing rocket engines at the Santa Susanna site. Those engines must have been incredibly loud, because our location had to be at least 7 miles away by bird.
Around 1978, I met a guy who claimed that his dad had worked at the molten sodium reactor up there, and that was the first time I had ever heard anyone say that there was a nuclear reactor in those hills, but he said nothing about a nuclear accident.
I had never heard of the nuclear accident until around 2015 when I read about it on the internet.
Living here all these years, as well as some family that had been living just off Kuehner Drive (near the nuclear site) since before we arrived; well, it just seems odd that they could keep a secret like that away from the locals for so long.
Huh.... Everyone I know in Simi is generally aware of this incident. I know many people who have lived their most of their lives, too.... but they are also skewed much younger compared to the year you mentioned.
they keep it a secret because they dont want to have to pay to clean it up
Hey, think of what else they keep secret…
I lived in thousand oaks in that time too and you can go behind the shop I worked in up on the hill and see the rocket plumes from those tests I believe it was a space shuttle engine they we're working on
Graduated s.v.high 1973
Born and raised near here. I have multiple friends that had thyroid cancer with no other family history.
We grew up waiting to see if a sudden rumble was an earthquake or a Rocketdyne test.
The area has developed massively with new housing over the last 30 years and no one is informed of this. We didn't know until the clean up demands started in the early 2000s.
@@BrandyStaples-d8l My Thyroid quit when I was young.. around age 40.. My meningioma discovered during an ER visit.. It is caused by “ionizing radiation”.. survivors of Hiroshima have them… We lived on Calvert street in Woodland Hills.My Mom had bladder cancer.. We all watched the Rocketdyne tests when the rumbling began rattling our windows in our house… by sitting on our back slope on our lot facing the rocket tests..
Great no wonder my teeth glow in the dark and my tomatoes are the size of pumpkins
do they have tentacles? That would be a bonus.
@@jlvfrhis teeth or the giant tomatoes?
It's tomacco season.
@@chrishanneman1298 tomatoes :D
@@jlvfr I think I've seen that video
I' m glad you share stories like this on THE COLD WAR CHANNEL .
Good nuance to the era.
Thanks David!
To David and the entire Cold War crew, can you please make a video on the history of Thailand during the Cold War. That way, all your viewers and subscribers will learn about Phibun's return to power (Phibun previously governed Thailand during WW2), Thailand's back-and-forth transition between civilian and military governments during the Cold War, as well as the country's lese-majeste laws (laws which basically criminalise negative public attitudes towards the country's royalty and royal institution) which became more strictly enforced during the Cold War. Thank you very much.
@@ekmalsukarno2302 An interesting history of “ power” governing speech.
My great grandmother was an electrician and worked on the Apollo rockets here. She passed from cancer on Dec. 8, 1980, the same day John Lennon was shot. We still have the same soldering irons she used on that job, and they still work.
Great Jobs guys, I had no idea about this event. Thanks for bringing this to light
Disturbing to know that all of those thousands who were and have been in the know over accidents like this kept their mouths shut and potentially allowed harm to come to others. So many times it seems the general public only finds out by accident, while those who could have spoken out can go to bed every night and rest in peace while keeping us in ignorance. Something quite disturbing to think many of them live among us.
I actually live around 6-7 miles from this site. When the Woolsey Fire came in 2018, there was some serious concern over what could happen if that site was consumed by the fire.
I worked there in the mid 90s at the internal fire department. Many of the older employees died of various cancers. Rocket Testing was winding down and environmental cleanup was ongoing. The building that housed the SRE was being demolished with a robot. Interesting place to work at. Lots more went on at the place that was never mentioned and is probably still classified.
@@gregorybirchfield4952 There was a lab recycling the graphite rods reclaiming the uranium.. that caught fire that was about four blocks on Parthenia.. Were you present at the fires that occurred?
@@Nursense2024 no I wasn’t, but we had multiple sodium metal fires and hypergolic fuel leaks at labs.
@@gregorybirchfield4952 We lived a below Parthenia near Tampa and ate from the local citrus that was sold along with local farmers beef obtained from a local butchers market called “Red Blacks Market… as did most in the area where we lived…
@@gregorybirchfield4952 My mother had bladder cancer… I lived on a street where the family was losing children to cancer then the mother died from Cancer.
As I recall, as late as 1975 Rocketdyne employees shot barrels of unstable chemicals with rifles causing them to explode thus disposing them.
After work hours of course.
Well that's good they weren't on the clock
@@stardust86x 🤷🏻
Uh, not exactly. They shot the barrels behind a barrier for a reason. They ignited them so they would burn. On top of everything else they did up there, they had burn pits.That was how they ignited them. They just let the smoke waft over Semi Valley and the always beautiful Canoga Park on certain days. They buried thousands of barrels of chemicals for cleaning rocket parts. There are caves with ancient Indian artwork inside them up there also. You can no longer get to them because it's no longer safe to do so. The place was (is) a cesspool of cancerous materials.
They went ahead and built tract homes right behind the S.S.F.L. There was a staggering amount of cancers, premature babies, and illnesses, all directly related to that site. Semi Valley is not a place to go raise a family. As for me? My father worked up there for a short period of time. He was dead at 49 riddled with cancer. We lived in the San Fernando Valley. My mother died of breast cancer. I have myself checked regularly. I've had skin cancer removed already. The sodium reactor meltdown was just one of many disasters up there. Now, they are building one in Washington state. Who's behind it? Bill Gates. Yep. The one at the SSFL was a baby reactor. They want to build a huge one now. Brilliant.
@@rodgerrodger1839 was the time frame- early 70s- about right? I think I heard about it around ‘75
@@rodgerrodger183940% of humans get cancer and 20% of human mortality is from cancer. That's regardless of living in an industrial or pre industrial society.
The rocket tests shook the whole western SFValley we were in granada hills just outside the nuke reactor danger zone my dad had thyroid cancer in 65 makes me wonder !!
i'm sorry to hear that about your father. Do you remember when you first learned about the '59 incident?
@TheColdWarTV I'm guessing but my folks read it in the news paper in the early 60's I'm thinking so far as a specific time that's as close as I can get 'thanks great shows btw !
Living near Chatsworth Nature Preserve, located in the northwest corner of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles, California, the Santa Susana test site entrance is just a few miles up the road.
PS - there are several contaminated sites throughout the San Fernando Valley at aerospace facilities where cleaning solvents and oil waste was routinely dumped in pits. Same thing happened in a smaller scale at dry cleaners that used these solvents
PS2 - lowering contamination to level that would allow agriculture is a ridiculous standard. Just tritium contamination in subsurface water flowing toward Simi Valley is problematic. Removal of contaminated rock and soil in the recent past has lowered the risk somewhat. Doubt area will ever be used beyond open space
...now I regret eating so much fruit from neighbors when I was in Simi....
Simi Valley native, raised and currently living on the east side of the city, about 3 miles from the SSFL. My older family members would tell stories about the houses shaking when they were young during the rocket firings and that it was louder than the trains and planes coming into town. Several older relatives and friends have died to cancer related illnesses. Hard to say if the nuclear testing at SSFL played a significant role compared to their lifestyles choices. I was born in 1994 so unfortunately I didn't get to experience the rocket testing and hopefully dodge the worst of the airborne fallout from the tests conducted. The valley is forever our home base.
@@facedominion our windows rattled on our home during rocket engine testing and the thick black smoke at an a 20 degree angle billowed across the horizon when we as kids ran outside on our back slope to watch the rocket testing… while the cloud dispersed across the west end of the San Fernando Valley cities groves valley. grew all across the l
@@facedominion My mother had bladder cancer that was caught in time.. but her Uterus and the bladder tumor were removed..
Menninginoma was prolific in Hiroshima and Nagasaki..survivors. Menninginoma safe slow growing and caused “by ionizing radiation..Mine is golf ball sized.
The Physicians for Social Responsibility went to court with a specific “ information” regarding exposure to ionizing radiation tumors.. Their clinical expertise helped win the case ..
My earliest memory of living in Simi was, the Sylmar quake. I was 2 years old, but I remember the testing very well. It was always: Earthquake? Nah, testing. At least some of the time.
@@facedominion The fallout continued for three weeks.
My job takes me there several times a year as a vendor for the last 25 years to present. Knowing the history of that place while working there is surreal.
We lived there and went to Enadia Way Elementary School..We were putting in lawns and digging in the dirt,swimming in a pool,and playing in the day parks near the railroad tracks and tunnels..hiking on the rocks at these parks for extended periods of time on Saturdays…Meninginomas have a cause of ionizing radiation…I have one ..We lived in Woodland Hills in one of the new homes built out there..
Well said, well spoken, well presented! Yes, remember the early 1960's well with regards to this site..... my dad was an engineer in the aerospace programs.... we lived in West LA and Thousand Oaks at the time..... there was much to be said about this incident, at least one cause of one of the accidents....which wasn't....... an accident but a feud between 2 employees.....
I grew up in Burbank about 1/4 mile from Lockheed. I remember hearing the testing of crazy sounding engines in the middle of the night. Both my parents died of cancer. I’m always hoping for the best.
I’m amazed how many locations have had dangerous chemical history in the past.
I now live in Pasadena, and I recently found out that a top secret WW2 chemical warfare laboratory was located within 4 blocks of where I live. It is now a self-storage facility.
I once knew three sisters; One died of Lymphatic cancer, one has had a double mastectomy and the surviving sister has to have Cancer screenings every six months. They lived on Chatsworth street and spent a lot of time in the surrounding hills.
Still the biggest secret of LA/Ventura Counties. I lived there from 1971 to 2011, never heard it mentioned. I worked for an environmental cleanup company in the late '90s and went out there with my boss to look at a site to bid on the cleanup. We got the creeps without knowledge of the meltdown and left. I worked in that area for 30 years in the construction industry and never heard a word about it.
Yes!!! I love finding channels like this with so much content and hasnt blown up yet
I'm from Southern California (San Diego, albeit) and I had never heard of this disaster until now. Reading the comments, the fact that people living much closer to the site have also never heard of it until fairly recently is both mind boggling, and infuriating.
Almost nobody in the city, or Ventura county (where Its located knows anything about it) all information about it was hidden from the public until 2014. Considering making a video interviewing people in the city, to prove how hidden this event really was.
Totally brand new to me. Thank you for sharing
Excellent reporting. Thanks. I lived in 1000 Oaks for 30 years. heard the engine tests but had no idea of the history and contamination. Yikes.
Return To Witch Mountain is a Disney movie that depicted a nuclear accident at this place. I didn't realize this was loosely based upon REALITY until many years later. 😱
"Pressure excursion" ... from now on, that's what I'll call my farts.
As long as you don't keep liquid sodium in your guts you're fine.
My father worked for Rocketdyne from early 50’s until 1965. He died of cancer in February 1972
I lived through all this from my home in Canoga Park. What I have failed to hear about from anyone were the multiple night sightings of UFO's around the reactor site disaster. Many of my friends did too. They're real! I saw them with my own eye's as did all my friends! The sightings that I witnessed lasted around 4 days., mainly at nightfall. They would dart around for awhile, then group up and streak off towards Simi Valley's direction, at an impossible rate of speed.
Saw the same thing myself. I remember it being so obvious that anyone looking would have been as alarmed. It was like the UFOs were trying to tell the engineers to knock it off. Like mankind was going to far. That's cool you saw it and that's a great point people are leaving out.
My last career, was developing the study for the Yuuca Mtn nuclear waste storage project. There is no plan to safely store leaking nuclear waste.
IIRC the Plainly Difficult channel covered this incident about 4 years ago.
I never heard anything about this. I do recall in the 90's there were hundreds of metal barrels of nuclear waste uncovered
due to rust and leakage into the groundwater table in California. There were also concerns in the 70's and 80's of leaking atomic waste into the Columbia River in Oregon from several hazard waste storage silos in Arlington Oregon..There was
a cleanup for decades in Arlington Oregon scheduled. Never heard much after that.
I don't know if you'll ever get another chance to name chemicals on your channel, but in case you do: you just say the numbers for the positions on the skeleton, and you don't mention the decimals/commas. For example, 1,4-dioxane is not "one point four dioxane", it's just "one four dioxane", 1,1,1-trichloroethane is "one one one trichloroethane".
My Dad worked at Rocketdyne for 30 years and wore a radiation monitor at work. He died of throat cancer, but I don't blame it on Radiation exposure. He smoked a couple packs of cigarettes a day like most of his generation. I still live near the site and have had no sign of developing cancer.
My parents moved our family to Simi in 64 when I was 6. We lived maybe 3 to 4 miles, as the crow flies, from the test site. Lived in Simi until 84. I remember watching the rocket tests from the valley floor. Had no idea of the dangers we were being exposed to until years after leaving the area. My younger brother was 3 years old when we moved there. He died at 44. My youngest sister had just been born before moving there. She died at 46. To this day, I wonder if their exposure contributed to their deaths.
This does surprise me. I was in Nuc school in 75 and 76. We were told about Chalk River, SL1, Windscale and a couple of odd incidents. A very serious incident occurred when an Xray machine was dumped in Mexico. A guy brought it back to his home in the back of a pickup truck. Some children started to take it apart. They found the Colbalt. I think some of them died.
Subsequently, the truck ended up in a steel manufacturing facility, and the Colbalt ended up in the steel. The steel ended up in all sorts of places in the US.
Evidently, one day a truck with the contaminated steel tried to go into Sandia Labs through the exit, not through the entrance. Sandia monitors all vehicles leaving the site. I think this was about six months after the unit was disposed of from an American medical facility.
There was another incident when a researched wanted to get a closer look at fuel in a spent fuel tank. He put some glass at the end of a pipe, pushed it down close to the fuel cells and looked through it. I think his glasses went up to 7 REM. Sorry, I have never figured out the Seinfeld measuring system.
Now someone mentioned in the comments that Hanford Site had been closed, I can see the steam from the B&W reactor that is still operating there just fine. don't even think of driving on the site. And a few months ago somebody went ballistic on me for saying 'contamination'. Evidently it is no longer called contamination.
Your last sentence confirms just how stupid politically correct speech is. Change the name of something and it neutralises it's properties. The same happens in sociology and politics, Orwell warned us about this way of thought control.
I lived in Bell Canyon from the early 90's to the early 2000's. I remember the rocket engine tests at night.
I feel like theres more to SSFL than we know... those cold war towers run all the way to Sylmar & noticable from pretty much any point. At the height of the Boeing discourse about cleaning it. I've seen EPA testing rain run off at corners in some streets.
Thanks as always for a well researched and presented subject.
I grew up here, as a kid I used to hike in this area
Hiking is fine, just don't drink the water or eat the plants😅 also zomg Sage Ranch Park is my favvvv
Thank you for all your hard work. It is appreciated. It is informative and entertaining, a wonderful way to present an important part of the human story.
I live in simi and i give this 3 thumbs up ❤
My family lived on fletcher st. And Waco st. Many years ago.
😂😂
Very cool. I grew up in Simi hearing about this so its great to get a video on the topic.
A neighbor dropped in. Have you missed me. I just moved to ventura county . I ask where. He said
Bell canyon. I said how close to thr rocket dyne fence. He said 5 houses didn't the real estate agent or the title insurance people warn you. Of what he said. That there was a nuclear accident in 1959. His eyes almost popped out of his head. He turned and ran full speed down all 88 steps . I never saw him again. I wonder what happened. If he had not run off I was going to offer to come by with my PUG7 with its lollipop and check his home and yard. A few years later I ask a dirt contractor why he would take job at the end of Sherman way. Likely in a warm zone. I needed the money he said.
I'd me much more worried about dirt north of Sherman Way and closer to Santa Susana pass....
One little mentioned site was near Cleveland ; described in the " novelized " book " We almost Lost Detroit " . A breeder reactor that blew and lifted the roof several inches for a few seconds the first time it was started up .
Definitely being cleaned up as we speak. Albeit I don’t know exactly what area/structure of the massive site they originate from, they are trucking massive chunks of steel every week out of the site and down Woolsey Canyon. Likely rocket test stand pieces, but the nuclear section had a lot of massive and heavy steel structures also.
I was born in the “Valley” in 1960 and lived in Woodland Hills until the ‘90s. My father was a rocket scientist for Rocketdyne from the mid ‘50s until he retired in the’80s. He often worked at the SSFL in the ‘60s. He died at nearly 91 from injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident. My mother however died from multiple myeloma. I wonder…….
You Can See The Radiation On The Images Of The Sight. How Creepy...
I live In Simi Valley The Test Site overlooks the Valley the original "China syndrome" Meltdown was before My time having moved here in 79' But the Space Shuttle engine tests were Spectacular they really shook the town up. The Knolls was most affected because water table was contaminated seemed to be well known. Most residents of that area Used bottled water.
Oh Just for illumination this is just a couple miles from Spawn Movie ranch where Charlie Mansons group hung out.
Radio active decay contamination has never had the respect it requires. oops we miss placed our Strontium 90.
When the government delegates research, it can wash its hands of any liability. An accident happens, a company just declares bankruptcy and gives its board a nice payout. It's easier to hide from responsibility, something much more difficult for the government to do.
Rocketdyne admitted to taking disposal products out in drums, partially submerging them in water and shooting them until they exploded, DOOM like...
From 1970 to 1990 I lived 5-6 miles away, and I wonder if my autoimmune disease that started in 2010 has something to do with it. As a kid we spent a lot of time outside riding bikes. Everyone should be aware of how terrible the pollution was there also with the valley holding in the smog which is why we have the EPA (because of LA smog), so that maybe also caused a lot of disease.
I live less than five miles from the SSFL. The State of California has washed its hands of the problem. The U.S. Department of Energy has let NASA and Boeing off the hook. Still, we wait for meaningful cleanup of this ongoing disaster.
I'm beginning to think the Fallout video games series are a reflection of real life events. Specifically Robco, REPCONN Aerospace, and the many other industries that lacked oversight and environmental safety standards.
Indeed the game franchise has that social cultural commentary.
4 years of college and 2 years nuclear science. Job description - Nuclear Rod Jiggler.
College is expensive. Scientist gotta make a living somehow.
There was a short article in _The Los Angeles Times_ a few days after the initial release of radioactive gas from the SRE in 1959. Apparently, few paid attention. There must have been a news blackout after that. The wind was easterly at the time of the initial release and would have mostly affected the immediate area and the Simi Valley. There were media rumors about the "accident" around 1970-71. That's when I first learned about it. From January 1956 to early 1962 my dad worked at the Santa Susana Field Test Laboratory (SSFTL), which was the original name of the facility. The shop out of which his crew worked was in Area III about 1/4 mi. from the SRE along the border with Area IV. They knew something had happened in Area IV but no particulars. Presumably they didn't have access to their shop during the time of the releases.
I grew up in Canoga Park , born in 1940. We used to tour that area before it became this test site. We would take Jeep rides over in Box Canyon as we knew ti then. I left the area in 1963 when I joined the Navy.
Can you talk about the defense of Florida during the Cold War, and how Florida was to be defended in case of a Soviet invasion of the Florida peninsula via Cuba? Just asking, as you previously did a video on the defense of Alaska? Thanks!!
I grew up in the area. There are a lot of rare cancers in children that popped up in the area.
....not even just kids... all the people I know who have had cancer whilst I knew them, 100% lived in Simi for decades.
When I was a kid looking for pollywogs in the water coming down it, it is was a very hot and humid day so I drank that water going down it, never saw any pollywogs, wonder way. Many years later, found out someone got cancer. It was still very active and running .C. Park side.
For chemicals with commas in their names (e.g. 1,2-dichlorobenzene), you don't pronounce the commas (e.g. "one-two-dichlorobenzene"). (and no, these commas are not points)
Most people aren't familiar with organic chemical notation. Thank you for the reminder.
My grandfather who served in US Army Corps of Engineers worked there for decades after having been in Pearl Harbor during the attack. He was on deck peeling potatoes when it happened in Hawaii.
I grew up about 2 (?) miles from the Santa Susana field. Almost every kids father, in almost every home in my neighborhood ,passed away from cancer, not to mention the other family members. Unknowingly,as kids in the sixties and seventies ( before being informed)) ....we would dam up the creek beds below rocketdyne in Woolsey canyon.....and swim in the water in the summer.
I'm now fighting Cancer myself most likely due to the exposure of krypton -85
and or another isotope. The health of the people in that area I moved from will be affected for 300 years. I sure hope it was worth it. I believe a much more remote testing facility would have been prudent.
Many families have suffered,and are suffering. The profits ,and technological gains were made at the expense of the physical project,and also the health of the surrounding community.
I had exposure to the radiation from Chernobyl when the US wanted to make a show of force in Germany. We were out marching in the rain consisting of the fallout from Chernobyl on May 1st 1986. The result is that I have a nodule on my thyroid as well as lesions on my head, neck and shoulders. The biopsy revealed that it is consistent with exposure to radiation. This happened in Regan’s peacetime Army. I’m being treated for it now. There are probably more people suffering from this same exposure. I was literally singing, “I’m a Radioactive” at the time. ☢️
I do remember the rocket testing going on it used to shake the ground Like An Earthquake and rattle the windows of the home.
A huge plume of steam I would rise above the mountain there's Saturn V rocket engine tests where insane.
(15 miles away)
Every time I drive down highway 58 I see Rockedyne. We used to take load slings to their facility for testing.
It’s a Super Fun site!
7:55 this sounds like Mr Burns' power plant; just clean the residue from FUEL RODS, jiggle them to dislodge buildup!
13:10 How does that compare to Windscale or Chalk River?
Thanks!
I lived in the east end of Simi Valley for 12 years. This is some scary shit! I had to sign documents that "informed" me of the situation when I bought my first house. But I didn't know all this!! Forunately, I'm OK, health wise.
Thank you for sharing reality 🙏 about the gray of history ....some one seen gallfly inside others' eyes 👀 but don't see a tree branch inside his eyes.
Shared.
I'd love to see Radioactive Drew visit this place.
I live right down the freeway from this.
I worked at Rocketdyne for 20 years. Everyone I know who worked there is still doing fine. 1985 through 2005.
@@squidnerful How many that worked there from the meltdown died from cancers..
I'm no Boeing apologist (especially these days), but I'm not sure I can agree with blaming them for trying to get out of the expense of remediation, when we consider that they merged their way into liability for some top secret accident that happened decades ago that had been covered up for ages.
Frankly, I think the Feds, AEA, etc should foot the bill.
According to the law, if you owned the problem at anytime you're responsible. In other words, if you buy property and it has a LUST (Leaking Underground Storage Tank) on it you can be held responsible for the costs of the clean up. This is why companies such as Boeing have people do a property history on any property that they are thinking of buying. So Boeing knew about the sites problems when they acquired it.
@@rebeccaorman1823 you make good points; that said, if the information of past history was withheld from them, then surely they've got an "out," so to speak?
Just my thinking.
@@randyrohe not legally. Additionally, they certainly knew that the site had been used for industrial purposes and the type of activities that went on there. Furthermore, just because information was not available to the general public doesn't mean that industry insiders with their connections didn't know about it. Don't kid yourself, Boeing probably knew exactly what happened at the site and at worst had an extremely good idea.
They merged for the profits, they should also bear the cost. They would be entitled to sue the people that they bought the company from.
@@rebeccaorman1823 I don't think anyone making comments on a UA-cam video has the insight to know what is and isn't "legal" with regard to contracts that were signed.
As I've said, I'm no Boeing apologist, but your argument reads more like an indictment of "big evil ugly corporations" ("don't kid yourself, they PROBABLY knew...") than a factual defense of either side.
I'd love to be on a jury and have access to the facts! That would be fun for us both.
Back in the day, everything was vented to the environment.... everything.
Progress today is acknowledging this fact and trying to clean such places up in the future....
I wanna know more about Rancho Seco. While 3 mile Island had ONE problem that never happened again, Rancho Seco was a real American Chernobyl waiting to happen, clearly all the incidents and multiple reactor emergency shut-downs they had have been swept under the rug by SMUD. I can't find much about it and I just want to know what went on there out of pure curiosity.
I've lived in the West San Fernando Valley California since 1960, 9 months after the explosion! Lots of cancer in the area! I still live in a stone's throw of the disaster location and drive by it now and then! Fortunately, no cancer in my family! It's an eri site!
For decades the population has been growing in the area.
It is important that people understand the existence and the meaning/function of The Nuclear Industries Indemnities Act of 1953. If you are not familiar, look it up.
As a native southern Californian, I never knew about this.
I feel like most people in Simi are aware of it thou, at least every person I knew and spoke to about it when I lived there was aware... (many of them don't see any risk with it- look at the Real Bros of Simi Valley, it is 100% realistic of how it is today.)
Some of the lack of care is enraging.
I remember reading fairly recently that people guarding the closed Hanover reactor site in the north-west USA would deal with drums of radioactive waste that bobbed to surface in the Columbia river by SHOOTING HOLES IN THE BARRELS UNTIL THEY SUNK BACK OUT OF SIGHT!
Freak!
True no one should be so careless with firearms.
Research "Humboldt Nuclear Accident" by Scott Rainsford. There is a 39min video and a 66min radio interview ( laborvideo). The accident was 450yrds UPWIND of South Bay Elementary School.
In the 1990s I worked for Bechtel who was contracted to clean up various naval bases. The EPA sued the Navy in federal court which ruled in favor of the EPA for the clean up. (Yeah, one branch of the US government sued another! Go figure.) Anyway, the bases were cleaned up to the extent they could be. There was so much redundant paperwork and ridiculous government red tape it’s amazing anything got done.
Nice reading.
We are still fighting to get it cleaned up. And yet, it has not.
When the solution to a problem is reportedly "jiggling the flange" ...
It would sound normal in a popsicle stick factory!
Damn early nuclear power was scary
Indeed... my dad is a nuclear chemist and I learned about 'modern' (60s onward) tech and ALL the failsafes and such- later learning about earlier nuclear tech scared the heck outta me.
@@nathanspreitzer6738 They tried to say there were only 379 kids living out near the labs.There were more than that ..The baby boomers were being born ..The largest graduating class in Los Angeles graduated in 1970 from Cleveland High School 990 for each 1/2 year…