Reexamination of U and Pu in particles from Thule and Palomares by µ-XRD

In January 1966, four plutonium-bearing nuclear weapons were released at an altitude of 8500 m above the Mediterranean village of Palomares (Spain) following a collision during refuelling between two US aircrafts; a B-52 bomber and a KC-135 refuelling tanker. The bombs detonated conventionally on impact on land, and plutonium and uranium were dispersed over a terrestrial area of about. 500 ha (NEA, 1981). Traces of plutonium were also identified in sediments from the submarine canyon system situated south of the mouth of the Almanzora river (Romero et al., 1991). In January 1968, an American B-52 bomber carrying four plutonium-bearing weapons crashed on the sea ice in Bylot Sound (northwestern Coast of Greenland), 11 km west of the Thule Air Base. The aircraft and the chemical explosive component of all four weapons exploded on impact, causing the release of kilogram quantities of plutonium, assumed to be in the form of insoluble Plutonium oxide (PuO2), to the snow pack and underlying seabed sediments (Aarkrog, 1971)