Karen Silkwood was a chemical technician at the Kerr-McGee Nuclear Power Plant outside Crescent, OK, from 1973 to her death on November 13 of the next year. Her job was manufacturing plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods, which is also Homer Simpson’s job at the Springfield Power Plant.

As soon as she began working at the plant she joined a labor union and became one of its chief speakers and strike organizers, complaining of numerous health code violations: workers were being exposed to nuclear contamination, their respiratory equipment was grossly faulty, nuclear samples and waste were improperly stored, and worst of all, there were not enough shower facilities to accommodate all the plant’s workers. This meant that after working with plutonium-239, which is extraordinarily poisonous, workers were going home to their families with plutonium residue possibly on their clothing.

Plutonium-239 is the isotope typically used in nuclear weapons and reactor fuel. It has a half-life of 24,100 years, and is more poisonous by inhalation or skin contact than hydrogen cyanide. Silkwood testified about these problems to the Atomic Energy Commission in the summer of 1974. She alleged among other things that workers were not handling the fuel rods correctly, and that Kerr-McGee knew this and was falsifying reports to save money and avoid lawsuits.

On November 5, 1974, she performed a routine self-check and found almost 400 times the legal limit for plutonium contamination. She was decontaminated at the plant and sent home with a testing kit to collect urine and feces for further analysis. Oddly, though there was plutonium on the exterior surfaces of the gloves she had been using, the gloves had no holes in them. This means that the contamination did not come from inside the glovebox, but somewhere else.

She tested positive for plutonium the next morning at the plant, even though she had not gone anywhere near any plutonium. She was decontaminated more intensely. The next morning, upon arrival for work, she was so contaminated that she was exhaling plutonium. A health team took her home and tested her house, and found plutonium everywhere, especially in the bathroom and refrigerator.

She and her spouse and children were flown to the Los Alamos National Laboratory to be tested in depth. No one has agreed to this day how she was contaminated so intensely over a 3-day period. She claimed that she being deliberately poisoned, probably by the plant, to keep her quiet. Kerr-McGee countered that she had poisoned herself, to blame and sue the plant. It is a fact that at the time, security was so light, that workers could smuggle plutonium pellets out in their lunchboxes. One worker gave a pellet to his son to take to show-and-tell at school.

Kerr-McGee found several pieces of lab equipment in her house, including beakers and test tubes, and accused her of contaminating herself to sue them. She countered that she had no idea any such equipment was in he house and accused the plant of breaking in and putting it there to kill her.

By November 13, she had a large stack of documents proving her claims, she said. A witness testified that she had a binder and papers. She left a union meeting that morning, and drove for Oklahoma City, 30 miles away. Her car was found that evening, having run off the road and smashed into a concrete bridge railing. She was dead and there were no documents in her car. Quaaludes were found inside, and twice the dose for drowsiness was found in her blood. But skid marks were found leading to her car, indicating that she slammed on the brakes and desperately tried to get back on the road, while being pushed from behind by another vehicle. This means she was awake at the time of her death, but the official cause of death, overseen by a plant employee was “one-car sleeping-driver accident.”

Her family sued Kerr-McGee and won 1.38 million. The conspiracy theory states that there must have been a very good reason for Kerr-McGee to take such a risk in putting a hit out on someone as publicly known by then as Karen Silkwood. A reason better than proof of lax security and occupational hazards. A federal investigation the next year discovered that an amount between 44 and 66 pounds of plutonium-239 went missing from the plant. It is still missing, and the theorists believe that ex-Kerr-McGee chairmen know exactly where it is, or to whom it was sold. The company was shut down in 1975, and the site is still being decontaminated after 30 years. 44 pounds of plutonium can make 4 nuclear weapons, each powerful enough to level all 5 boroughs of New York City.

Union activities

After being hired at Kerr-McGee, Silkwood joined the local Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers Union and took part in a strike at the plant. After the strike ended, she was elected to the union's bargaining committee and assigned to investigate health and safety issues. She discovered what she believed to be numerous violations of health regulations, including exposure of workers to contamination, faulty respiratory equipment and improper storage of samples. She also believed the lack of sufficient shower facilities could increase the risk of employee contamination.

In the summer of 1974, Silkwood testified to the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) about these issues, alleging that safety standards had slipped because of a production speedup which resulted in employees being given tasks for which they were poorly trained. She also alleged that Kerr-McGee employees handled the fuel rods improperly and that the company falsified inspection records.

On November 5, 1974, Silkwood performed a routine self-check and found that her body contained almost 400 times the legal limit for plutonium contamination. She was decontaminated at the plant and sent home with a testing kit to collect urine and faeces for further analysis. Oddly, though there was plutonium on the exterior surfaces (the ones she touched) of the gloves she had been using, the gloves did not have any holes. This suggests the contamination had come not from inside the glovebox, but from some other source.

The next morning, as she headed to a union negotiation meeting, she again tested positive for plutonium. This was surprising because she had performed only paperwork duties that morning. She was given a more intensive decontamination. On November 7, as she entered the plant, she was found to be dangerously contaminated — even expelling contaminated air from her lungs. A health physics team accompanied her back to her home and found plutonium traces on several surfaces — especially in the bathroom and the refrigerator. The house was later stripped and decontaminated. Silkwood, her partner, and her housemate were sent to Los Alamos National Laboratory for in-depth testing to determine the extent of the contamination in their bodies.

Debate has centered over how Silkwood became contaminated over this three-day period. Silkwood herself asserted that she was the victim of a malicious campaign, and that the testing jars she had been given were laced with plutonium. The contamination in the bathroom would have occurred when she spilled her urine sample on the morning of November 7. It was also consistent with the fact that samples she took at home had extremely high levels of contamination, while samples taken in "fresh" jars at the plant and at Los Alamos showed much lower contamination.

Kerr-McGee's management asserted that she had contaminated herself in order to paint the company in a negative light. According to Richard Raske's book The Killing of Karen Silkwood, security at the plant was so lax that workers could easily smuggle out finished plutonium pellets.

Raske's book also asserts that the soluble type of plutonium found in her body came from a production area to which Silkwood had not had access for four months. The pellets had since been stored in the vault of the facility.

Going public

Silkwood said she had assembled a stack of documentation for her claims. She now decided to go public with this evidence, and made contact with a New York Times journalist prepared to print the story. On November 13, 1974 Silkwood left a union meeting at the Hub Cafe in Crescent. Another attendee of that meeting later testified that Silkwood had a binder and a packet of documents at the cafe. Silkwood got into her car and headed alone for Oklahoma City, about 30 miles (48 km) away, to meet with New York Times reporter David Burnham and Steve Wodka, an official of her union's national office.

Death

Later that evening, Silkwood's body was found in her car, which had run off the road and struck a culvert. The car contained no documents. She was pronounced dead at the scene from a "classic, one-car sleeping-driver accident". The trooper at the scene remembers that he found one or two tablets of the sedative methaqualone (Quaalude) in the car, and he remembers finding marijuana. The police report indicated that she fell asleep at the wheel. The coroner found 0.35 milligrams of methaqualone per 100 milliliters of blood at the time of her death — an amount almost twice the recommended dosage for inducing drowsiness.

However, some have theorized that Silkwood's car was rammed from behind by another vehicle with the intent to cause an accident that would result in her death. Skid marks from Silkwood's car were present on the road, suggesting that she was desperately trying to get back onto the road after being pushed from behind.

Investigators also noted damage on the rear of Silkwood's vehicle that, according to Silkwood's friends and family, had not been present before the accident. The crash was entirely a front-end collision, so there would be no explanation for the damage to the rear of her vehicle. A microscopic examination of the rear of Silkwood's car showed paint chips that could have come only from a rear impact with another vehicle. Silkwood's family claimed to know of no accidents of any kind that Silkwood had had with the car, and that the 1974 Honda Civic she was driving was new when purchased. Further, there had been no insurance claims filed on the vehicle.

The car contained no documents, though her relatives swore she had taken these with her and had placed them on the seat beside her, leading to allegations that they were stolen from her car immediately after the crash in order to silence her allegations concerning her workplace. According to Silkwood's family, she had received several threatening phone calls very shortly before her death. Speculation about foul play has never been substantiated.

Silkwood's organs were analyzed as part of the Los Alamos Tissue Analysis Program by request of the Atomic Energy Commission and the State Medical Examiner. Much of the radiation was in her lungs, suggesting that the plutonium had been inhaled. When her tissues were further examined, the second highest deposits were found in her gastrointestinal organs.

Public suspicions led to a federal investigation into plant security and safety, and a National Public Radio report alleging 44 to 66 pounds of misplaced plutonium. Silkwood's story emphasized the hazards of nuclear energy and raised questions about corporate accountability and responsibility. Kerr-McGee closed its nuclear-fuel plants in 1975. The grounds of the Cimarron plant were still being decontaminated 25 years later.

Estate of Karen Silkwood v. Kerr-McGee

Silkwood's father and children filed a lawsuit against Kerr-McGee on the behalf of her estate. The trial was held in 1979. Gerry Spence was the chief attorney for the estate; other key attorneys were Arthur Angel and James Ikard; William Paul was the chief attorney for Kerr-McGee. The estate presented evidence that the autopsy proved Silkwood was contaminated with plutonium. To prove that the contamination was sustained at the plant, evidence was given by a series of witnesses who were former employees of the facility.

The main witness for the defense was Dr. George Voelz, a top-level scientist at Los Alamos. Voelz stated that he believed the contamination was within legal standards. Spence ultimately probed enough to get Voelz to admit he was unsure of the level of contamination needed to cause cancer. The defense later proposed that Silkwood was a troublemaker who might have poisoned herself. Following the summation arguments, Judge Frank Theis told the jury of the longest civil trial in Oklahoma history, "If you find that the damage to the person or property of Karen Silkwood resulted from the operation of this plant, Kerr-McGee is liable."

The jury rendered its verdict of US $505,000 in damages and US $10,000,000 in punitive damages. On appeal, the judgment was reduced to US $5,000. In 1984, the U.S. Supreme Court restored the original verdict. The suit was headed for retrial when Kerr-McGee settled out of court for US $1.38 million, admitting no liability. According to Richard L. Rashke's book The Killing of Karen Silkwood, investigators of Silkwood's death, as well as the Kerr-McGee corporation and their Cimarron plant, received death threats. One of the investigators disappeared under mysterious circumstances. One of the witnesses to the Silkwood incident committed suicide very shortly before she was to testify against the Kerr-McGee corporation about the alleged happenings at the plant.

According to Rashke's book, the Silkwood family's legal team were followed, threatened with violence, and physically assaulted. The book also claims that 44 pounds of plutonium missing from the plant had been stolen by a secret underground plutonium-smuggling ring in which many government agencies, including the highest levels of government and international intelligence agencies CIA, MI5, Israeli Mossad, and a shadowy group of Iranians, were involved. The book states that the United States government covered up many details about Silkwood's death, and allegedly carried out the Silkwood assassination rather than Kerr-McGee personnel.

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