Nuclear troops given unnecessary x-rays in Britain's first atomic bomb test

Troops were given potentially harmful x-rays in a secret biological monitoring programme as part of Cold War weapons tests. Hundreds of Royal Engineers were ordered to submit to the medical examinations without any clinical reason or benefit.

The evidence has emerged from a medical officer’s journal, hidden for decades at the Atomic Weapons Establishment behind top secret security classifications. Thousands of servicemen were subject to similar orders as Britain developed its nuclear arsenal over the decade that followed.

Pam Hill, whose dad Jim Stephenson took part in Operation Hurricane in 1952, said: “He was sent to do his duty and he did it. Afterwards he had serious gut problems, and 40 years of a severe lung disease which eventually killed him. Seven months are missing from his medical records. It was always on his mind that the whole lung thing was caused by being out at Montebello. If he had chest x-rays at the time, it might have answered all our questions.”

Jim’s lung condition, bronchiectasis, can be caused by radiation. His children have also suffered unexplained illness, with miscarriages, coeliac disease, and spinal issues. His teenaged grandson has almost no adult teeth. While the cancer risk of an x-ray is small, it increases if done repeatedly. It can be justified only if there is a therapeutic benefit - and for healthy troops already examined and found to be A1-fit, there was none.

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The Mirror ’s three-year investigation of the Nuked Blood Scandal has already uncovered thousands of blood and urine tests given to troops, with the results withheld from their medical records. Now we can reveal there was a third and potentially-harmful form of monitoring, using x-rays. If men had damage as a result of inhaling radioactive particles, it could show up as dark shadows on their lungs.

What happened to healthy people living amid fallout was unknown, but since 1947 human experiments have needed informed consent, full communication of the risks involved, and the right to withdraw.

A consultant radiologist told the Mirror: “There was a clear understanding at the time that radiation caused tumours. From a military standpoint you’d probably get ethical approval because it’s an unknown and there were civil defence concerns. You would want to know what proportion later developed a problem, what the damage was, whether it rectified itself or led to longer term damage. There would always be a duty of care to the patients.

“To not keep those records long-term would be considered a massive breach of research protocol. There would be redress, and punitive fines. Perhaps more importantly for the veterans, someone would have looked at all these x-rays and made an assessment, written a report on the outcomes. Where is that now?”

READ MORE: Video emerges of Defence Secretary saying nuke veterans scandal "shames us as a country"

The medical journal covers the weeks shortly before Operation Hurricane in 1952, Britain’s first nuclear bomb test, which detonated in the hull of an old warship off the Montebello Islands in Australia.

Just over 200 Royal Engineers were ordered to join the fleet, to build jetties, camps and laboratories near Ground Zero. The journal states: “They came aboard only a few hours before we sailed, and I did not discover until after that it is not a routine in the army to have the chest x-rayed at yearly intervals. Accordingly I had them all done at Royal Naval Hospital Malta.”

The log was discovered on a top secret database at the Atomic Weapons Establishment, locked on the grounds of national security risks. Labour ministers have ordered the entire archive to be published, but have not commented on why it was a state secret, or why it is not one any more. The Ministry of Defence has spent decades denying it experimented on troops.

Few survive from that first operation, and government studies have found they have increased risks of bladder, skin, stomach and ‘unspecified’ cancers. They also have elevated rates of suicide.

Jim’s former comrade, Dixie Kidd, 92, said: “At one point after the bomb we were ordered on to shore to collect things the scientists had left behind, tins of food, raw vegetables. Others were picking up dead sea birds. After we left, I was in a contingent ordered to take readings from the things we had found, two hours on, two hours off. The numbers were to establish the radioactive half-life.

“On the way home, our pay books were taken off us and they put into each one we had been exposed to 5 rads of radiation. All of us the same. I wondered how that was possible, and why I never got ill when so many of my mates did.”

Documents seen by the Mirror state that anyone with a dose over 5 rads could no longer be employed on the operation. A higher recorded dose may also have led to war pensions.

Another ex-sapper, Eric Waterfield, from 71 Field Squadron, has seen his daughters suffer reproductive issues. He said: “Three years after Hurricane, a surgeon found a growth in my lung. He said it was better in the bucket than in my chest, so he had it out, and that was the last I heard of it. If there were chest x-rays, it might explain things.”

The bogus classification of information about the experiments is now the subject of a criminal complaint to the Met Police, which is considering further action. The missing medical records are being sought in a civil suit estimated to cost the MoD up to £5bn in aggravated damages.

Campaign group LABRATS has asked the Prime Minister for a meeting to find a cheaper, quicker route to truth and justice, but has received no reply. Founder Alan Owen said: “This biological monitoring was done to see what would happen to the British civilian population if attacked. Troops were the only people who could be ordered into fallout and told to stay there, under threat of a court martial.

“We have found veteran after veteran has medical records that are missing this vital data. Without it, medical diagnosis and treatment are harder and war pensions next to impossible.

“All we want is for the most mistreated veterans in British history to get a fair deal - to be heard, to get justice, and to get an apology.”

A spokesman for the MoD said: “The Minister for Veterans and People has commissioned officials to look into unresolved questions regarding medical records as a priority, and this is now underway. This work will enable us to better understand what information the department holds regarding medical testing of service personnel.”