PLUTONIUM CONTAMINATION AT THULE
On January 21, 1968, a B-52 carrying 4 nuclear weapons crashed and burned on
the ice near Thule, Greenland.
and 6 survived.
The 7 crew members bailed out before the crash
At the time of the crash, the plane was carrying about
225,000 pounds of JP-4 jet fuel.
The resultant fire produced a blackened area
on the ice of about 500 feet wide by 2100 feet long.
The ice was cracked for
about 100 yards in all directions from the point of the impact.
At the time of the crash, the temperature was -24°F and a 7 knot wind reduced
this to an equivalent -53°F reading.
It would be about 3 weeks yet until ‘the
sun made its first appearance after the long Artic night.
weeks, several storms swept the area.
During the next few
The combination of darkness, storms,
severe cold, and the remote location would make recovery operations extremely
difficult.
Within a few days, members of the U.S. Air Force, scientific experts from LASL
and Livermore, and Danish scientists were assembled at Thule to assess the
accident situation.
It quickly became clear that there was plutonium
contamination around the crash site, but there was no evidenace of any nuclear
yield.
Also, it was determined that the ice at the crash site was 2 to 4 feet
thick and sufficient to support vehicles and structures as long as adequate
spacing was maintained.