Bury the Evidence

In a report dated 15th April 1986, entitled 'Known Burials, 1959 to 1967, related to UK Trials in South Australia', the shocking disregard for the sacred lands of Australia is revealed.

Report by F W Cornish & D Deverell

We would like to start with a warning that this blog may contain distressing information for the indigenous people of Australia as it contains information as to the desecration of the land and the burial of radioactive material.

The report starts with an Introduction

It should be noted that the comments in relation to Operation Brumby state that 'Little of this work dealt with significantly contaminated debris'. Yet the UK Government reassured everyone that the clean-up was a success in 1967. Not according to this report.

Did Australian staff also bury materials? The UK states they have no knowledge of such burials.

6 pots of plutonium were removed in 1979, so stayed buried underground for over 20 years. Yet a category 3 pit (C), seems to contain a surprising amount of plutonium.

Because the pits were not large enough, they were mounded by approximately 1m of soil. Some pits were capped with 0.3m of reinforced concrete. By only capped, not fully lined? How much material has leaked into the surrounding soil?

Some pits are actually just bulldozed trenches. Some pits were even blasted our of the limestone. Complete disregard for the land and their meaning to the indigenous people.

There was no detailed list of the contents of any one pit.

PLUTONIUM - HOW MUCH IS IN THE PITS?

22kg was fired and it is believed that 1.5 to 2kg remains near the surface, so where is the other 20kg?

It seems possible that the plutonium in the Taranaki pits is 15 percent of the 22kg, i.e. about 3kg but there is no means of estimating the distribution of plutonium among the 21 pits.

So from 1964, until 1967, these pits were uncapped and had been open for some time and undoubtedly unrecorded additions were made.

LATER BURIALS IN UNNUMBERED PITS OR TRENCHES

Material was buried, including 40 tonnes of towers, but their locations are not recorded.

The Marcoo crater was a large crater dug to house the forward area debris, vehicles, caravans, etc.

Further pits were dug to house debris from the tests.

Were new pits dug and items moved from pit to pit?

Materials including Land Rovers, steel shelters all buried.

Washdown areas concreted over. Uranium lathes, beryllium lathes, all buried.

The vehicles were put in the pits, left to run until the engines seized, then covered with petrol and set on fire. A 10-ton tipper, caterpillar tractors, wheeled tractor, a scraper, 4 Land Rovers, a caravan, a low loader trailer, trailer compressor and a chassis mounted vacuum cleaner. All set on fire.

Contaminated waste buried during the Brumby clean-up. Slightly contaminated. So the clean-up didn't clean the site, it just buried more waste.

273 steel telegraph poles and 87,000 pickets were buried in Operation Brumby, but the UK Government has not idea where. How do you bury this much material and have no idea where they are?

High Activity (Category 1) Burials

Medium Activity (Category 2) Burials

Low Activity (Category 3) Burials

Taranaki Debris Pits

Calculated Contents of cores of Taranaki Pits

Other Numbered Debris Pits

Plan of Airfield Cemetery

Taranaki Debris Pits

Conclusion

The UK Government have always stated that the Health and Safety protocols were always followed. Yet they buried radioactive debris on sacred lands and left them open for many years before capping them with concrete.

We must remember that these lands are sacred lands, they belong to the indigenous people, the tribes who for many centuries have walked them. What right did the UK Government have to perform nuclear weapons testing on these lands in the first place, but then to have disrespect them by digging large pits, blasting limestone to create the pits, filling them with radioactive debris, setting fire to machinery, watching it burn before covering it in soil and then walking away.

The UK Government still do not have accurate records of where this material is, how radioactive it is and Operation Brumby was a disaster, it did not address the contamination, as is stated in this report.

The denial continues to this day, the disgraceful behaviour of the current government, denying any responsibility, denying that historically the UK was wrong to carry out these tests, this report shows the disregard for the indigenous people.

In 1986, when this report was published to the Technical Assessment Group, there was no outcry, it was buried along with the material, which is still hidden in the desert of Australia, is still radioactive and is still a stain on the once beautiful landscape. What the UK Government did was hideous, disrespectful and still affects us all today. How can our Veterans Minister visit Australia and not meet with the Indigenous people? If he didn't know about these burial sites, he does now as I have sent him a copy of this blog. We will await his reply.

As a UK Citizen, I am ashamed of what our government did to these beautiful lands, to the participants of the testing program, including the indigenous people, the civilians, the scientists and the servicemen. I am more ashamed that they still choose to deny any responsibility, cover-up the program and that they will not admit responsibility. Our government is meant to protect us, they are not protecting us, they are just protecting themselves.