Generations After The First Nuclear Test, Those Sickened Fight For Compensation : Consider This from NPR - NPR
Generations After The First Nuclear Test, Those Sickened Fight For Compensation : Consider This from NPR : NPR
Generations After The First Nuclear Test, Those Sickened Fight For Compensation
Tina Cordova poses in front of the entrance of White Sands Missile Range where Trinity test site is located. Cordova who is one of five generations in her family diagnosed with cancer since 1945, and runs the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium. Cordova has been fighting for decades to secure compensation for those affected by the radiation from the Trinity test. VALERIE MACON/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Tina Cordova poses in front of the entrance of White Sands Missile Range where Trinity test site is located. Cordova who is one of five generations in her family diagnosed with cancer since 1945, and runs the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium. Cordova has been fighting for decades to secure compensation for those affected by the radiation from the Trinity test. VALERIE MACON/AFP via Getty Images
On August 6, 1945, a stone-faced President Harry Truman appeared on television and told Americans about the atomic bomb being dropped on Hiroshima.
The attack on Hiroshima marked the first time nuclear power was used in war, but the atomic bomb was actually tested a month earlier in the Jornada del Muerto desert of New Mexico.
At least hundreds of New Mexicans were harmed by the test's fallout. Radiation creeped into the grass their cows grazed, on the food they ate, and the water they drank.
A program compensating victims of government-caused nuclear contamination has been in place since 1990, but it never included downwinders in New Mexico, the site of the very first nuclear test.
This week, the Senate will vote on whether or not to broaden the bi-partisan legislation that could compensate New Mexicans.
Generations after the Trinity Nuclear Test, will people in New Mexico finally get compensation?
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This episode was produced by Jonaki Mehta. It was edited by Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.
Related Knowledge Center: ENERGY BASICS: nuclear
Nuclear energy provides almost 20 percent of the U.S. electricity supply. Advocates have called for an expanded role for nuclear as an emissions-free fuel source. But the economics of building new reactors are daunting. In addition, lingering safety concerns are an institutionalized part of the calculation of nuclear regulation, and highly radioactive nuclear waste remains a can that public officials have been inclined to kick down the road. The Energy Information Administration projects a sharp decline in nuclear power generation over the next decade, as new nuclear plants — two are planned — are more than offset by anticipated retirements of several operating reactors.