#reca — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #reca, aggregated by home.social.
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@NVL311 One good thing to come out of the #BigUglyBill at least.
#RECA #Radiation #Missouri #Downwinders #RadiationExposureCompensationAct
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The International Uranium Film Festival - No more Hibakusha - announces 2025 dates. Events in #RiodeJanerio (May 2025) and #BerlinGermany (October 2025)! Among the films being considered for this year's festival are "Address Unknown: #Fukushima Now," "#Nukemailing," and "#Taiwaste".
FMI:
https://uraniumfilmfestival.org/Follow @uraniumfestival here on Mastodon!
#NoNukes #NoWar #NoNuclearWar #RECA #Downwinders #EnvironmentalRacism #MarshallIslands #NuclearFilmFestival
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#Billiman matriarch, niece remain strong in face of adverse health conditions caused by #RadiationExposure
By Donovan Quintero | Jan 9, 2025 |
WINDOW ROCK – "Since September, when she traveled to Washington, D.C., to tell House Speaker Mike Johnson to renew the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (#RECA), Maggie Billiman has had her gallbladder removed.
"Now she is awaiting more possibly devastating news about her liver. And if that wasn’t enough bad news, she said she was also told she has three cysts on her pancreas.
"'I just had surgery and I’m still in a lot of pain,' she said on Dec. 26, referring to her gallbladder removal surgery.
"A #downwinder victim, Billiman, and about 30 others from the #NavajoNation, #Laguna, and #AcomaPueblo tribes traveled to Washington, D.C., in September to advocate for the passage of Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley’s RECA legislation.
"For 17 years, from 1945 and 1962, the U.S. conducted nearly 200 atmospheric nuclear weapons development tests. Atmospheric nuclear tests are when nuclear bombs are exploded in the air, instead of underground or underwater.
"At the heart of the bombs involved #UraniumMining and [#UraniumProcessing], which was performed by tens of thousands of workers, like Maggie’s father.
"Maggie’s father, a member of the legendary Navajo Code Talkers Howard Billiman Sr., worked in the #UraniumMines.
"'My dad had died of stomach cancer, he was one of the #NavajoCodeTalkers, and he passed away,' she said.
"Her father worked at the #KennecottMine in Utah. He also worked at the #KingmanMine in Arizona in the 1950s through the 1960s, Maggie said.
"After the tests ended in 1962, many of the uranium miners and process workers initiated class action lawsuits claiming exposure to known radiation hazards."
Read more:
https://navajotimes.com/reznews/billiman-matriarch-niece-remain-strong-in-face-of-adverse-health-conditions-caused-by-radiation-exposure/
#NoNukes #NoWar #Downwinders #NukingTheNavajo #Dine #LagunaPueblo #Genocide #EnvironmentalRacism #NoUraniumMining #NoMiningWithoutConsent #HaulNo -
"‘Time is running out’: Navajo Nation urges Congress to act on RECA expansion bill"
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TY to @bojacobs for posting this!
Nuclear fallout victims entitled to free advice and cancer screenings but not compensation
St. George clinic prepping “#downwinders” for possible #RECA revival.
By Mark Eddington
Aug. 22, 2024, 8:00 a.m.St. George • "A federal program to compensate nuclear fallout victims may be expired, but a St. George clinic tasked with helping them and conducting cancer screenings remains open for business.
"The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, a program to compensate victims of radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons testing during the Cold War, expired June 7.
Efforts to revive the program are currently stuck in the U.S. House of Representatives due to concerns by House Speaker Mike Johnson and members of Utah’s congressional delegation over its $50 billion price tag and debate over whether to expand RECA to cover areas previously excluded by the program.
"Despite the political impasse, Intermountain Health’s Radiation Exposure Screening Clinic at St. George Regional Hospital remains open to assist downwinders — the term given to people exposed to radiation from nuclear weapons testing — get answers about how radioactive fallout may have impacted them and their families, and to conduct free cancer screenings.
"'The Department of Justice cannot accept RECA applications at this time due to the expiration of the program,' Becky Barlow, project director at the St. George clinic, said in a news release. 'But anyone who thinks that they would have qualified for the program if it was still active is welcome to call me to discuss what they could be doing while we wait for the bill to start again.'"
https://www.sltrib.com/news/2024/08/22/nuclear-fallout-victims-can-get/
#NoNukes #NoWar #RadiationExposureCompensationAct #NoUraniumMining #NoUraniumEnrichment #RethinkNotRestart
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Dayton Daily News investigation found #contamination, sick workers at #PiketonOhio plant
By Lynn Hulsey
May 15, 2019"A polluted former #UraniumEnrichment plant in #Piketon closed years ago but it's impact continues to resonate through the community, including this week when a #MiddleSchool was closed after traces of radioactive #neptunium were found at an air monitoring station at the school.
"Contamination with radiation and multiple toxic substances at the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant led to an ongoing, multibillion dollar environmental cleanup and sickened plant workers who had to fight for compensation as they battled debilitating terminal illnesses related to their years at the plant.
"A massive 2006 investigation by the Dayton Daily News found five plumes of poisoned #groundwater, contamination with radiation, #beryllium, polychlorinated biphenyls (#PCBs) and #asbestos.
"The investigation found lax safety practices, routine mishandling of toxic and #radioactive material and at least 400 accidental releases of #UraniumGas or toxic fluorine. Toxins were dumped into unlined #landfills and ditches and leached into #groundwater and the Little #BeaverCreek, a tributary of the #SciotoRiver.
"The plant was operated by the federal government and contractors from 1954 to 2001 and enriched uranium to high levels for #NuclearWeapons and #NuclearSubmarines and to lower levels for #nuclearpowerplants.
#WaterIsLife #Ohio #NoNukes #NoWar #UraniumEnrichment #UraniumHexafluoride #RECA #PortsmouthGaseousDiffusionPlant #InvestigativeJournalism #RadiationExposureCompensationAct #NoUraniumMining #NoUraniumEnrichment
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I discovered this website recently... Seems like a good source for #mainstream #NativeAmericanNews (this is where I found out about Radiation Exposure Compensation Act - #RECA - not being reauthorized).
https://cronkitenews.azpbs.org/category/indigenous-communities/
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So, apparently, aging #NuclearPowerPlants and #NuclearWeapons programs get TONS of cash, while people who lived #Downwind of #NuclearWeaponsTests and #UraniumMines (and #UraniumMills) get NOTHING?!! Wow...!
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/07/world/europe/reca-nuclear-radiation-congress.html
https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/07/26/the-advance-act-a-bipartisan-surrender-to-the-nuclear-lobby/
#Downwinders #NoNukes
#NoWar #BanTheBomb
#NoUraniumMining #RECA #NuclearWar #AdvanceAct #NuclearWeapons
#ICANN #Oppenheimer
#HaulNo #InformedConsent
#EnvironmentalRacism #WaterIsLife -
#Navajo #uranium miners, people #downwind of atom bomb tests demand justice as Congress lets aid program lapse
by Keetra Bippus / Cronkite News
July 5, 2024WASHINGTON – "A federal program to compensate people exposed to fallout from U.S. nuclear testing expired June 10.
"The #Radiation Exposure Compensation Act has paid out $2.6 billion to over 41,000 people since 1992. In March, the U.S. Justice Department projected that another 1,070 claims would be approved by the end of September.
“'Why do we have to beg to pass #RECA?' said #MaggieBilliman, whose father, a #NavajoCodeTalker during World War II, died of stomach cancer she attributes to exposure to #fallout that affected their hometown in #Arizona. 'You don’t put a price tag on human life.'
"Starting with the #ManhattanProject’s Trinity test on July 16, 1945, weeks before bombs destroyed #Hiroshima and #Nagasaki, the U.S. government conducted 94 tests that produced radioactive mushroom clouds in remote areas of the West. Most were over #Nevada. One was over #NewMexico.
"People #downwind – including many in #Arizona – were exposed to dangerous #fallout, typically without warning.
"The Billimans’ hometown, #SawmillArizona, on #NavajoLand, is part of the large affected area where Congress made residents eligible for compensation.
"#Radioactive particles fell throughout Arizona, according to research from Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security. The state’s population grew from about half a million just before World War II to over 1.3 million in the early 1960s.
"Congress adopted RECA in 1992 to address claims from downwinders and uranium miners.
"The program offers an apology, and lump sum compensation ranging from $50,000 to $100,000 to those who developed certain illnesses linked with radiation exposure, and who either lived in the #FalloutZones or worked at #UraniumMines and #UraniumMills.
"The law came in response to lawsuits from uranium workers who accused the government of failing to warn them about radiation hazards.
From 1944 to 1986, nearly 30 million tons of uranium ore was extracted from Navajo lands. The Manhattan Project itself, led by physicist #RobertOppenheimer, was disbanded in 1947, two years after Japan surrendered to end World War II.
"An estimated 3,000 to 5,000 Navajo people worked in the mines. They and their families lived nearby.
“'The closer you live to mine waste, the higher your risk of chronic #metabolic disease,' said Chris Shuey, director of the Uranium Impact Assessment Program at the Southwest Research and Information Center, a nonprofit research and advocacy group. 'People who live in these communities next to these wastes, they’re exposed through all of the pathways: air, water, land.'
"Claims from Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and #Colorado account for $1.8 billion of the payouts under RECA.
"Most of the #NavajoNation was covered due to potential fallout. About one in seven approved claims – 5,480 through the end of 2023 – have come from #NativeAmericans, 86% of them Navajo, totalling $372.6 million.
"The Environmental Protection Agency counts 523 abandoned uranium mines on or near the Navajo reservation that spans Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, an area bigger than Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont combined.
"The Senate voted 69-31 in March to extend the RECA filing period for five more years, with 46 Democrats and 20 Republicans in favor, along with Sen. #KrystenSinema of Arizona and two other independents. Sen. #MarkKelly, D-Ariz., also supported the bill.
The bill has stalled in the House, with no explanation from Speaker Mike Johnson or Majority Leader Steve Scalise, both Republicans from Louisiana.
"Their aides did not respond to multiple requests for comment."
#Downwinders #NoNukes #NoWar #BanTheBomb #NoUraniumMining #NuclearWar #NuclearWeapons #ICANN #Oppenheimer #HaulNo #InformedConsent #EnvironmentalRacism #WaterIsLife
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"Utah ‘downwinders’ are in DC as radiation-exposure compensation hangs in the balance"
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Thanks, and bye bye
"Atomic vets are on the verge of losing federal benefits. Congress hasn't helped"
#ColdWar #NuclearWeapons #RECA #AtomicVets
https://www.npr.org/2024/05/06/1248955334/nuclear-veterans-compensation-expiring
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"The ‘clock is ticking’ on RECA; downwinders call on public to pressure House speaker.
Earlier this March, the U.S. Senate passed a measure expanding Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, which expires June 7"
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January 27th is the National Day of Remembrance for America’s Downwinders in the USA. These are people who lived downwind of the Nevada Nuclear Test site, and were exposed to radioactive fallout. Much of that fallout remains radioactive and is now embedded into the ecosystem.
The US government has paid a token compensation to a minuscule portion of this community through #RECA.
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"‘The fight isn’t over’: Idaho downwinders persist after Congress cuts compensation for them.
Residents work to understand the ongoing impacts of nuclear test fallout and radiated clouds over Idaho decades ago"
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"Navajo Nation, New Mexico outraged at removal of expanded nuclear radiation compensation from proposal"
#nuclear #NuclearPower #NuclearWeapons #ColdWar #Navajo #RECA
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How The #Trinity #Nuclear Test Spread #Radioactive #Fallout Across #America
Story by The Physics arXiv Blog, July 26, 2023
"The #TrinityNuclearTest on 16 July 1945 is a key incident in the blockbuster #Oppenheimer movie and in the history of humankind. Many scientists think it marks the beginning of the #Anthropocene, a new geological era characterized by humanity’s influence on the Earth. That’s because Trinity’s radioactive fallout will forever appear in the geological record, creating a unique signature of human activity that can be precisely dated.
"But there’s a problem. In 1945, radioactive monitoring techniques were in their infancy so there are few direct measurements of fallout beyond the test site. What’s more, #weather patterns were also less well understood so the spread of fallout could not be easily determined.
"As a result, nobody really knows how widely Trinity’s fallout spread across the U.S. or indeed, how the fallout dispersed from other atmospheric nuclear tests on the U.S. mainland.
"Today, that changes thanks to the work of Sébastien Philippe at Princeton University and colleagues. This team have used a state-of-the art weather simulation for the 5 days after each nuclear test to simulate how the fallout would have dispersed.
"The result is the highest resolution estimate ever made of the spread of radioactive fallout across the U.S. It marks the start of the Anthropocene with extraordinary precision and it throws up some significant surprises. Some parts of the U.S. are known to have received high levels of fallout and the new work is consistent with this. But the research also reveals some parts of the US that received significant fallout without anybody realizing.
"The findings 'provide an opportunity for re-evaluating the public health and environmental implications from atmospheric nuclear testing,' say Philippe and co.
"Between 1945 and 1962, the U.S. conducted 94 atmospheric nuclear tests that generated yields of up to 74 kilotons of TNT. (Seven other tests were damp squibs.) 93 of these tests took place in #Nevada but the first, the Trinity test in the Oppenheimer film, took place in #NewMexico.
"The new work also has implications for the way compensation is paid to people who suffered from radiation exposure. The U.S Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (#RECA) provides monetary compensation for this in various counties and #tribal lands.
"But the new work reveals places that are not covered by the Act but that also received high exposure. 'There are locations in New Mexico, and in other parts of the United States, including #Utah, #Nevada, #Wyoming, #Colorado, #Arizona, and #Idaho, where #radionuclide deposition reached levels larger than those we estimate in some counties covered by RECA,' say the researchers.
"That’s interesting work with important implications. And it has been released in conjunction with the Oppenheimer movie, presumably to give it maximum exposure, and rightly so."
