Karen Silkwood Had To Die
In a nasty car accident that happened on November 13, 1974, one woman had died. The name of this poor woman was Karen Silkwood. After that, a press and TV stations literally started to talk about that person. It was one of the mysteries that obsessed people around the world. Nothing has changed for the. This car crash is a still unsolved mystery. But who was Karen Silkwood?
Problems With Safety
She was one of the leading chemical technicians at the Kerr- McGee’s plutonium fuels plant in a city of Crescent in Oklahoma. She was also a member of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers’ Union. But, the more important thing is that she was one of the persons who do not had a great opinion about the safety of the plant where she worked. She stated in several different occasions that she suspect on the some abuses in the safety procedures and about the some plutonium exposures that were not reported to the official institutions. It was just one week before she died in the mentioned car accident. This is a reason why a number of people that her death was not happened by accident. Maybe they are in the right.
It was very important that her body was transferred to the hospital for the further examination. This examination was a part of the program that was asked by the Atomic Energy Commission. Why it was important, some might as. It was crucial because her body was potentially an evidence of the unexpected plutonium exposure.
She Was Exposed
According to the documents that were published, we now know that Karen had certain doses of plutonium on her hands on November 5. She was working that day in the laboratory and she wore gloves during the polishing pellets of plutonium. After she finished with her work, she used a detector to check out the radiation level on her body. The result was positive, which means that she was contaminated. This is a reason why she decided to do further testing. She went to the Health Physic Office. The repeated test also showed she was exposed to the plutonium.
In the following day, the whole situation complicated because tests did not show any traces of the contamination but they occurred during the next testing. It was very confusing. However, it very interesting that company and plant officials did not make any moves regardless this. They all behaved as nothing strange was happening. They were hiding something. They were hiding about the obvious mistakes in the safety plans of the nuclear plant, despite that was very dangerous for the workers and environment.
Plant Finally Closed
After autopsy, it was discovered that almost all Karen’s internal organs was exposed to the plutonium radiation, which was not supposed to happen. It was obvious that someone wanted to cover up that workers was exposed to the radiation. This is a reason why Karen Silkwood had to be killed.
However, Karen did not died for nothing. After a long trial, the plant finally closed in 1975.
