Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments Oral History Project Interview of Jack Healy by Mark Goodman; Wednesday, March 08, 1995

Page 1

Advisory Committee on Human Radiatlorr Exprrimsrrts Comment on the contents of this accession: Here are my notes on the Healy interview: Healy describes career -- Chemist - OuPont -- offered job on radiation safety in bomb project. Healy worked on blowing glass for sensitive radiation monitoring equipment. Worked on environmental site surveys at Hanford. developed technique for isolating and measuring trace quantities of radioiodine, had technique perfected by 1947. Doesn't know who made decision -- suspects AEC, GE, Pentagon. Healy prepared plans, worked with Background, 1949. Air sampling equipment on Rattlesnake Mountain. Found samples with positive results. From decay curve noted and dated first Russian test. Air Force "descended that night." By following evening data and samples had disappeared. [NAME CLASSIFIED] was chief scientist of Air C-47 job at Green Run was to measure (he believes) mostly noble gases. Herb Parker told them to do Tried new monitoring technique - run gas through olive oil until saturated. Did Parker oppose Green Run? Healy: "As far as I know, no." Iodine was not considered a serious threat. Thyroid cancer was treatable. Didn't know milk pathway; attributes to Windscale accident in 1957, which led to British (ICRP) standards. Healy at first thought these standards too low, until he saw the data. Healy thinks Parker would have raised objections if he had known of the Milk pathway. Green Run would not have taken place. Goal was to use 20-day fuel, but used 16-day fuel. This raised release from estimated 3000-4000 curie At time, biology group was running experimental farm using sheep. Parker was concerned about iodine doses to animals. Farm was at 1OOF (near reactors). Parker saw Hanford as test bed for safety of nuclear industry. Purpose of fish experiments was to understand effect of thermal effluent. Harming Columbia River salmon would have had great publicity. Healy established fish lab during WWII. Main radioactive element found in fish was P-32. Amount of effluent was roughly 100 times higher than estimated, because of films that formed on tubes (from impurities) which were more highly irradiated than when dissolved in water. This became a problem wit More on Green Run: U.Harlen and C-47 showed up a few months before Green Run. Set out plans, prepared crews and equipment, including monitoring of iodine in stack (which didn't work because iodine concentrated in condensate). Went with Green Run in response to "reasonable" weather forecast. Heal made decision. Wind direction (north) and inversion were as desired, but at 2 AM 1Z3 wind went calm and then (4 AM) reversed direction. Iodine was evolved at this later time, toward tri-cities.

Page 2

There was only one aircraft, but many weather balloons. Contaminationwas so great that people walking on the grass picked up contamination that set off alarms. Healy couldn't go back to office for two weeks. He was a very unpopular person. Healy was not pressuredto go ahead with Green Run, but fett couldn't delay too long or radioactivity would decay. Doesn't know about success re Air Force objectives; Air Force took data and left. Healy never saw Green Run reports. They were classified "red label" and taken away. Report says Parker said he would never do it again. Becauseof weather, contaminated area twice that of Windscale, with release of only 1 6 of iodine. Ruthenium release (date unknown). Had scrubber to remove ruthenium. Monitoringequipment worked on logarithmic scale. Scrubber dried up, sawtooth readings on instrument, released several hundred curies. Big problemoccurred a year later with radioactive particles: ammonium nitrate and ruthenium-106. Figured it was accumulation in stacks, fixed by washing stacks. 1962 and 1963 releases. "They should have talked to me. When we rescued Bob Farbem (sp?) from under the stack at the Green Run, "We could read with Geiger counter from here."

Page 3

ORAL HISTORY PROJECT (name of interview subject) Tbis is a transc*r of a tape recorded interview conducted with Jack H e d y by Hark Goodm of the Advisory Camnittee on Human Radiation Experimentation, as p r t of the Oral History Project. The interview was conducted on l%& 8 9 199LY White Rock, k u Mexico - Corrections and minor -editorial ckmges Iwe &en made, principdy to increase accuracy and c 1 ~ fmeaing. No atrenpt has been made to p r d c e a literary document, but rhera readable and accurate representation of a conycrsation. The reader should bezr in mind that he is reading a transcript of the spoken. ather than the written word. Jack Healy transcript and has ken given the opportunity to make additional correctms, if needed. has been sent a copy of &e corrected of the interview.

Page 5

Let's start with the question of how yoc came to work at %ford. Is that a reasonable place to start or do yc-l want to start before that? the tape that DOE k s . We can repeat it. . I graduated ' from Penn State a5 a chemical engineer on, I believe it was, May 9tk, 1942. The date was accelerated because the war hz5 just started. We were'senta out to contribute to the war effort. I we== to work for DuPont two days later at Buffalo, New Yszk, Pioneering Research -- this was a part of the Zayon Department. The job was, In l%:, about September o r October, I was asked to go down z= Wilmington to interview for a new project, which I =Id. And at that pcint I was told. that the DuPont Zsinpany was under contract for the. government to Frz6uce the material for an atomic

Page 7

science fi czi x reader. I was shockec’,, but - - 3 E.. GOODMAN: Did ye=: have an idea of what !E. GOODMAN: -- an atomic weapon would be 11 F-.HEALY: Sure, sure. An atomic bomb, 12 the amount ~2 energy involves- i n the nucleus is 3.3 tremecdous. And I knew that - . I - hew that i f it .15 Z was told the prccess of producing the 16 material, --.Sch involved t ke reactor and the 17 ’ se2arx ions zlants, which wese even then being 1 9 - 2 d the biggest prcblern seemed to k the 20 radiation ar5 the radioactive msrerials invclved on a 21 scale xever %fore thought of. Ac that time therc had 22 betn possiX-,- 1 0 0 grams of radium i n tfie world 23 sesarazed. And we were goins t o ’ produce fission

Page 8

products many, :any times that axcunt. Sc 1 was asked ina vc-y nice way. They said they had a -Jery capable crew Sown there but they were all eggtssds and they needed some practical people t o see -2at things were c mie d outright. I =aid this to Herb Parker some years later. He agrssd. ' Az my rate,I was offered the job of working i n radizzion protection, what was then called, as a security cz-m, health physics, atthe University of Chicago. T k word Itradiation" was absolutely taboo because thisc.ld give anyone aclue as t o what was going on. So YP, used many odd terms for materials -- At my rate,I ' agreed to take the job. And on Februaq- 1st I went down t o Oak Ridge, which was still under zonstruction. As a matter of fact,I moved into a k--.where the carpenters were working a t the other end ~5 the hall build iq it. E..WODMAN: Did you go t o Chicago o r did you go t o Oak ?.dge? K. No, no, no. The people a t Oak

Page 9

Ridge, Her? Sarker, Carl Morgzn, Carl Gainertsfelder. hac! been ar Chicago. And they had moved to Oak Riege to get sors sxperience with the small reactor that WBE built the==. I guess that's not classified anymore. small separations plant. I believe that this was started becausr DuPont felz that they should have a pilot plant befozz starting tL=t big plant at Eazford. That is now'0L.c At any rate, I worked there for severa: months. T k r e were 11 other people there, 12 of us, fatuously referred to in future years as the 12 disciples. You might expect that. Our training consisted of lectures. primarily from Karl Morgan, who was a cosmic rzlphysicist ikahad been at the University of Chicagc, and then w s z = out through the plant for the afternocrs getting acz-ial experience in radiation protection. We were supposed to move out to Hanfor: about June 25 1943, but, unfoEanately, nry wife picks2 that time := have a baby. So I applied for a delay iz moving o x . And I didn't get out there until abou-,

Page 10

establishee s5en as the Health Instrument Divisions !S. GOODMAN: And. Herb Parker was -- I understoc.5 it, the program was to be under the -Wilson who first discovered the charge . on ' the . 3tlt Herb had come from England and to Seattle to xcrk for Cyrus Caarril. Jkd I don't know whether he %=xed to get back out there- At any rate, he agreed =: take on the leadership of the job and left Oak Rrigz, as I say, a b a t June or July ' 4 3 to 1 think it was an excelle=t choice. Many of the prccr%res that Parker put into place f o r the operations zz the time the plant started are still

Page 11

usee 12 many plants tkrzush t k s country and ci-;ilgh MR. HEALY: Such as t h e special work perzL=, things of that nature. MR. GOODMAN: Sgecial work psrmlz f o r MR. HEALY: For people going 2~ a radiazion area. They were required t o have a ,cecial work ;errnit which detailed what they were t o dc, what the kazards were, and was signed off on k2-the radiarion protection individual in charge. MR. GOODMAN: So it's kind of likez zteed toksw with classified information? You had tr Lave their entry, yes, t o make sure that people wsrzn ' t roarzzg i n and out. MR. GOODMAX: So I started to ask: What were =he' main problems thac you faced i n the 3 5 1 t h Instrxtent Division, the main issues that ycz were

Page 12

to state =kat at the time w e wezz to w a r , there wert2 3 three staztaxds for radiation protection. These we=% 4 from the bcernational group ar,d the National X-Ra-,- Committee, now the NCRP. These standards consisted of a standard ci one-tenth cf a roentgen per day external exposurs. Now, the international groq had recornrnen2s5 two-tenths of an r per day,. roentgen per day. Do yc=: know what =he roentgen is, by the way? :set the stmdard at a tenth of a roentgen per day fcrI :he United States. This was a tolerance level. So Ir 16 There was 13 fiddling around w i t h the linear theory cz . 17 anything else. This dose was tolerable. There wers some recczadations that they hsve extended vacatic-= and so or-, jut, now, that was tke primary standarc. A secondary standard was a body burden ftr radium ir r3rkers of a tenth of a microgram.

Page 13

prizazily with the radium dial painters. h d .the tk=irZ one was a limit f o r racon in the w0rI-c ==oms. MR. GOODMAN: Do you know where -kat came rex..rtber what the number was- I never MR. GOODMAN: Do YOU know there somewhere. But this was from the with radiologists and others worki-?,gwith And it was believed that this 5ose wa,s Now, youtll notice .that thert were no standards f o r any t*e of radlrzion but rerzlved this, actually at O a k Ridge, when ha iyvented tkr rep, which was equivalent to the arzunt of iczization in air of one roer,Zgen originally. Xe then re-.=ssd this to'make it the m o u n t of energy *sorbed in -,issue, 93 ergs per gram That's sofz tissue.

Page 14

ionization i r r air of one roentzt-l-? MR. HEALY: Well, 5 e ionization in air was 83 ergs per gram, which is a o u t one roentgel of X- or gamma radiation. It varias with the energy a bit. The 93 ergs per gram cars when it was realized that it's'the absorption of e n c y in the tissue that MR. HEALY: All rig==. Now, that was one of the problems: standards. I2 you don't have good - KR. HEALY: The second problem was standards were extremely cru&.- They consisted of Geiger counters. And, for exaqle, at Oak Ridse our primary instrirnent was a Laurits-rz electroscope, which consisted of fiber on a U-frszt. You charged the fiber up, acd itcharge, it would would repel f z x the U-frame. as the ioni=z=ion discharged the $25 you would time thedrift back.

Page 15

arifz of chis with a scz-,ratch. MR. GCODMX;: I sea. That's a pretty MR.' HEALY: It was an excellent charge it simply. It w s not convenient to use. 11 MR. HEALY: 3, yes. Yes, very good. As 12 a matter -of fact, we WE== talking of RaLa earlier. 13 For the first batch cf RaLa from Oak Ridge the . 14 chemists could not get a good number on it. So Carl 15 Gamertsfelder asked the= ';o take a known sample a d 16 set it up. I don't know iikat distance he was f r o m it, 17 20, 30, 40 feet. And ks took a reading on one of 18 these Laczitsen electrcsr3pes and told then hcw much 19 was in it, And that, I lslieve, was the number t5at 20 was certified at L o s ALZZ~S. 21 It * s an exctlltnt icstrument , believe me, 22 but it's not convenient. And it has a limited rage. 23 For example, the first - N e y I went out on --

Page 16

MR. GOODMAN: So it's something like a pre cus or of an ionizaticr chamber?11 The only .t&g is that it leaks the charge off, -- excellent resistor to set z i e post in. Okay?16 There was work soing on on direct reaag instrnents at Oak Ridge =Ld elsewhere at the time. One I remember was callec =he paint pail for a ve--y good reason. The ionizatlzr chamber was a paict paFI. buckez with a lid.

Page 17

hall in Oak Ridge 0x2 = h e , and the paint paFl fell off from the cover =o which the instrument was to the doors and looks2 out. But, at %y rate, the Lauritsen was our -Erimary instrument ax Oak Ridge. At Hanfcrd the Beckman Comp ny had IxXt a direct reading instrument, which was a very good htrument except for one thing. It weighed e o u t 25 Fc-z-ds with the batteries. So by the time somebody c e i e d that to the top of the down several times duzkg a day, they were pretty well pooped. But it was a =ice acting instrument. MR. HEAL'.': Oh, no, no. We had several They were used throughoutkundred of t5em at Haz2:rd. …