CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

Vampire Planet: The Time the US Nuked Spain

The remediation of nuclear waste has long been a classified endeavor. Accidents, exposure to radiation, and worker injuries on the job rarely, if ever, make the newspapers where they would receive public scrutiny. This is, of course, intentional. The less oversight, the easier it is to mislead and cover up mistakes. Take the case of the military’s Palomares disaster.

On January 17, 1966, a collision occurred during a routine refueling operation of a B-52 bomber over Spain’s Mediterranean coast. The Associated Press reported first on the incident, writing that a KC-135 tanker with jet fuel had collided in mid-air with a B-52.

“At least five of the eleven crewmen aboard the two planes died in the crashes,” wrote the AP. “They collided miles above the earth. School children walking to their classes heard the rending of metal, then watched as smoke clouds erupted from the big planes as they spiraled down, scattered burning wreckage over a wide area.”

The startling reporting left out one important fact: when the KC-135 struck the B-52, four hydrogen bombs became dislodged and fell toward the unsuspecting countryside of Palomares. Had the weapons been armed, the result would have been unspeakably deadly. Nonetheless, each bomb was laced with plutonium. While the bombs themselves were not activated, other explosives on the aircraft detonated in the crash, causing the plutonium housed in the B-52’s warheads to scatter across Spanish homes and farmland below.

Had the AP news report of the accident included the tidbit about radioactive particles raining down on innocent Spaniards, there would have been an international uproar and a collective call for an abandonment of nuclear arms. But the initial communiqué from the Air Force was intentionally vague, if not overtly misleading:

A B-52 bomber from the 68th Bomb Wing at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, and a KC- 135 tanker from the 910th air refueling squadron at Bergstrom Air Force Base, Texas, crashed today southwest of Cartagena, Spain, during scheduled air operations. There are reports of some survivors from the crews of the aircraft. An Air Force accident investigation team has been dispatched to the scene. Additional details will be available as the investigation progresses.

A B-52 bomber from the 68th Bomb Wing at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, and a KC- 135 tanker from the 910th air refueling squadron at Bergstrom Air Force Base, Texas, crashed today southwest of Cartagena, Spain, during scheduled air operations. There are reports........

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