Part 1. OVERVIEW: How a San Francisco Navy Lab Became a Hub for Human Radiation Experiments + List of Studies
Podcast Episode 1: A Community of Color Contends With the Navy’s Toxic Legacy
Podcast Episode 2: Why the Navy Conducted Radiation Experiments on Humans
12/2 Part 2. THE DECISION-MAKERS: After Atomic Test Blunder, Government Authorized Study of Radiation in Humans
12/4 Part 3. THE STUDIES: Human Radiation Studies Included Mock Combat, Skin Tests and a Plan to Inject 49ers
12/6 Part 4. ETHICS: Cold War Scientists Pushed Ethical Boundaries With Radiation Experiments
12/9 Part 5. FADING HISTORIES: Destroyed Records, Dying Witnesses Consign San Francisco Radiation Lab to Obscurity
12/11 Part 6. PERPETUAL EXPERIMENT: Shuttered Radiation Lab Poses Ongoing Health Risks for Growing Neighborhood
About the series: The San Francisco Public Press sifted through thousands of pages of obscure records, interviewed experts and tracked down elderly veterans who were subjected to ethically questionable radiation exposure by the U.S. Navy in San Francisco during the Cold War. What we found reveals a troubling history with effects still felt today.
Reporting: Chris Roberts and Rebecca Bowe | Editing: Michael Stoll and Liz Enochs | Research Editing: Ambika Kandasamy | Web Design: John Angelico | Copy Editing: Kurt Aguilar, Michele Anderson and Richard Knee | Archival Research and Illustration: Stacey Carter | Audio Editing: Liana Wilcox, Mel Baker and Megan Maurer | Sound Gathering: Justin Benttinen | Photography: Sharon Wickham, Yesica Prado and Guillermo Hernandez | Graphic Design: Reid Brown | Fact Checking: Dani Solakian and Ali Hanks | Proofreading: Lila LaHood, Noah Arroyo, Zhe Wu and Sylvie Sturm | Special thanks to Alastair Gee and Danielle Renwick at The Guardian and Ben Trefny at KALW Public Radio, and to Amy Pyle
Image above: Hundreds of blue-collar shipyard workers were exposed to potentially dangerous amounts of radiation while attempting to “decontaminate” the USS Gasconade and other vessels hit by a 1946 atomic bomb test in the Pacific and brought to San Francisco for study. Source: National Archives and Records Administration. Color illustration by Reid Brown.
Funding for “Exposed” comes from the California Endowment, the Fund for Environmental Journalism, the Local Independent Online News Publishers Association and members of the San Francisco Public Press. Learn more at sfpublicpress.org/donate.
