Interview with Leo Bustard

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Much anectodal material Re/Sheep experiment at Hanford Re/Pig experiment at Hanford Reasons for using the pig Military trained at Rochester Early inhalation work Advisory Committee for Biology and Medicine 'Contributions to other fields

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Interviei, with Dr. Leo Busta d of Veterinary Medicine of which he is Dean a t Pullman Washinpton. Discussion takes place in Albuquerque atthe Inhalation Toxicology Research In st it ue. VANN ARD : Leo, would YOU like to start with specifics on this stuff I sent YOU or -_ BUSTAD: Perhaps reminisce. You might s tz rt off with some questions. I have gone through this on the part th st1 am familiar with or have some first - hand association, and I've made cmments. 1'11 j u s t leave those with you. places that when we finish up I ' l l go over any questions and point out something. STANNARD: I did get out the write-up here that gives the purpose, etc.I wasn't sure that you were totally aware of why I am doing this. There might be one or two a1 I ' m doing for you was fran the outline for this chapter. In 1948 I was reviewins the literature on radiation, and I was quite interest& I was contacted by Carl Herde fran Hanford Laboratory about possible arployrntnt I guess they were seeking somebody because they were considering extensive i n sheep: ' 1 was reviewiog alot of available literature, and very valuable to me was the Manhattan Series fran maw - Hill. w e of great help to me to see how far they had gotten. discovery of isotopes (Fd) and "then the early work of Lawrence and all tlose people, so I can see s-y goinq into this field - t h i s is very valuable to have these books. Then Iwent back t o the 'Ihen there was a handkok on atanic energy (I have now forqotten the author. ) [Samuel HETAD: Yes, Glasstone. it was very hmdy. Havinq ham that I join& Hafor2 on my wedding anniversary r i @ t after gaduation with my DMV degree, and I alreaciy had a masters not only nutrition - they were then doin0 afm pilot studies on sheep, an2 we were

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plm ing for the larqe study on the sheep. I had t o assemble everythng prettlv much We were building the buil&nq, anZ it w a s pretty well planned when I q t there. They started construction he nI was there. It was an interesting s mr get-ting ready for all of this. I also got t o Lam the other groups - like you mentioned D i c k Foster (I was closely associated with that), they were building the eco lw hi lag, and Pat Hackett wzs alreaey tkiere, and marg was already i n biochemistry. speculating on a l o t of things and getting orgmized. a t mnitoring because Carl Herde was very interested in environmental It was a mall group so we were just We were also locking mnitoring and the significance of the effluents on the environment. forget - I and others knew a b u t the conmrants that they utilized in Japan for 9;3mre of the fish in the Columbia River for mnitoring. W e thought maybe we aught to check those out - maybe they could cat& So I, with a few others, (there =e s a cornrant nests across the river - we had an farm across the w= kind of tarred them dam, and w e t r i e d them out in the river - we couldn't get than to fish well - maybe we didn't work with them long enough. btell him a but this). a trout just a but that fast. At saw risk I did get saw young conmrants (I got pretty well hexed up), and I took him into Dick's We put the cormorant in one of his p l s . Boy, it caught BUSTAD: Y e s , one of the smll ones. It w a s n ' t an experirental group. So we knew it muld catch fish, but they seem& reticent to do it in the river. I s u p s e w e could have worked w i t h them. I guess they gave that up. It was just an accessory thing for m. 7hi.s that you ,=re speaking of is goin9 to be in the f i r s t chapter on the work sround One of the thin5s I am shy on is anecd0tz.l material for Hanford and sane sore of the places I have visited Ihcw the anecdotal materia fairly well. It is my in-pression that that work wi+A '-;ne piie effluents with Foster and

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m s by far the first radioecology as we ncw knm it. g~scf9: Yes, it ms. They were into it euly, and of course the long interest of as a mjor fishery was a ve,T critical entity. there - and you knw they established the retention basins t o cool off the water for radio activity and perhaps a little bit on temperature because they w e concerned not only w i t h radioactivity but increasing the temperature of the river. As I recall a t 1cw water flow times maybe 43,000 cubic feet per $roup along with the work beins aone over a t ~ 5 eU n ivers it y of Wa+,inc,::n He was an e a r l y consultant; and, of course, the Colwlbis. Fiver hhat with d wing the effluent in second (that seems to c m to mind) (but it would go up very much higher). at lw times .(and i f you have enough reactors) you could raise the temperatme and thus you could have same effect on the fish in the river. a disease of fish that I think is tmperature sensitive. For example, -c almas is I f you have lcx water flaw in l a t e smrurer and higher temperatures and with t h i s impinging on it, is this going to be a serious problem? W e had to consider that. going to affect them migrating, i.e. caning up and establishing their nests. W e also had t o consider - is this What was the artent of the streaming of this material? B you release the effluent i n the middle of the river - is it enough a t the side - arYi then f o l l m the pattern dcnrn to see i f there are hot spots in the river as a result of these short-lived radioactive materials. So there was extensive work done on this.I 'M it was sanewhat underrated. There w a s a fantastic munt of work done on this - a very dedicated group - J P Z Davis mrked very hard on this. I haven't seen his nam, and he still continued a t lezst Wayne Hanson worked on this with the wildlife because we had this wildlife problem. He was a very gcd ecologist. And Qlumbia River was an hprtant area where Cmadian geese came t o nest. had the waste pnds,and "he migrating fowl would ccme in there, so it was very i m p r t a n t to know where these aninaIs went.

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flichtless fora sho--t t h - I think it is late July or early Aucgst - so, my of u5 would help them then run d m the Geese and p;t tacs on thm. ke coulc! then follm them and give instvctions t o the hunters to let us knm where we also did this for ducks - and also d i d a l o t of radioanalysis of b k also had a deer problem there. There were s- horses that m e running loose on the reservation. You see, the reservation was very large. Y o u could drive for 40 miles and still be inside highway - it was a hazard to the drivers. I headquartered,andI met a patrolman ; and I did a double take on the patrolman because The horses were a hazard because people would run over them - out on the But the deer were also a problem,and they sitting in the backseat was a deer.Actually sitting up and looking out,just like it was a member of the team. a wild animal - this deer had been tamed by some patrol ken,and it got to be a real misance as it grew up. It got t o be a very mischievous thing. So when it got pretty big,they hauled it o u t t o the other deer, way across the reservation,but it didn ' t realize it was adeer. one day it was running along,andit came onto some people working on the railroad What had happened - it shows the fallacy of try bg to tame It was a real problem. there,and it split off from the group and went over and joined the people .' I One day they decided they muld put it on an island in the river, so they hzded it ovex t o the island and dropped it off and scurried back,and it wasn ' t very long before the nearest patrol house for one of the reactors - here comes a dripping deer ! What ....its head into one of the secretary ' s offices,and1guess the secretary just screamed. Maybe it went through api ate glass window,Idon ' t know, b,ut I think from there.it .was taken a few hundred miles away out in the forest...It was kind of a i un ny.stary..

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STANNARD: Your remark that that work hzs been under-zpprecizted i s one reason I want to spend quite a little time on it in that chapter. I am no ecologist,as you know, butI can talk to people and listen,andI think it ought to be together with a lot of other things. BUSTAD: Yes. 1would certainly interview Jerry Davis on it. SI'ANNARD: I forgot abut that. I've seen Dick Foster. BuslXD: Have you seen him? Well, it wuld be well to get his views. Another one I m l d give is Wayne Hanson. STANNARD: I'm running out of time. I ' v e interviewed over a hundred people. H e is a very interesting guy. Because on that whole wildlife story,that's a big issue. Have you got anyelse or have them carenission m e to expand on it for another volume. BUSTAD: Yes, because that whole wildlife issue - and what went on there - and Vince What I would like to do would be t o do this,and then either have somebody schultz, you knuw he was a tHe e quarters for a while but is out our way now, and he has written sane. then he was up with the Annecubic Pass in Alaska - for a l l the cesium stuff on the fallThen scme people in Colorado. Eut Wayne Hanson had been in it, w d cxlt and the high levels. concentrations, you h m , of anybiy, of the people in northern climes. the people i n northern Sweden - up i n Alaska - and fish..... STANNARD: Oh,yes, because they ate reindeer that ate lichen.... They would haul u~ and count the ,people - they were the highest Fie wzs a t Colorado with that tthe literature. But then Hanson was also a t IDS W s . mou_D, and he spent alot of time at Word, .znd he is back a t Hanforci nm. Ee is a real STAN ? : Well, Iwill be qet&&S t o -or2 because that ' s where 1 Sess

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big bang out of him. So you mcht want to see Wayne Hanson. He is an unus ul fellcw - I ?et E You see,there is quite a population of wildlife out there, not only water fowl, but there were sage hens and other fonns that they were lookinq at. So thzt was an interesting era. mother thing anecdotal was - it was heavily patrolled because we were in remote area across the Columbia - one day a French national was looking athis rnap,and Men I first went there, 1 had t o go through five gates t o get t o the he thought this was a good road so he went down, and he came down across the river 'from all our industries, and his car broke down. He saw all this activity across the river - all secured. The Columbia river is very large - so I don ' t know i f he stripped . . down -' but he caught a log and he swam across the - river. saw him coming - they had spotted him before. was quite a long time explaining that. Well, needless tosay, they Being a French national I.imagine he O f course they were right there to meet him, and drove him off. ' Idon ' t know whatever happened t o him. Then, we should also tell you the alligator story while we are working on SIWWLRD: Bill B air has told me... call ? about how we were progressing. resistance, so-.they got these alligators. I don't know i f you rermber that. And how they got away - and we had t o report to corp rate headquarters psridiIt might be worth having your version. satrre people were very interested in looking a t alligators and their radiation AS I recall, -haps only one or t w o of them You can see that this would be a very unpopular- thing - e spec is ll y for the they prolxbly woulh ' t survive because it gets pretty cole.

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sure s o we had to have pec ple looking.Eventually - there w zsa hot spring wsy on down the Columbia across the way - and the last one was found in this hot spring.They came in and got it land then the person whose land it was on,I think,he put up a cornalligator, or sore thin^;, but then they went back (I think) and go+ s a mre alligators. STANNARD: They got more? BUSTAD: I think they did.I think there were two shipments. Anyway, they hadEn other big escape o? more of them,and that ' s when we really got into trouble. some higher administration got a hold of this - and then we said Oh, n o ! We hadto give a report as to our success - a weekly report,I think,on how we were making out You better check this with him - he complained that they were taking his finding these alligators. SDQWiRE: I rarember. That's the story Bill told ne - hm they had to account for tvery alligator, period, or else. established themselves in the Columbia River. * fission products to escape and be distributed around came from the measurements around …