On July 16, 1945, the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated approximately 60 miles north of White Sands National Monument. (White Sands Missile Range)
SANTA FE, N.M. (Tribune News Service) — New Mexico families who have endured generations of sickness and death since the Trinity detonation in 1945 say time is running out to secure compensation from the federal government.
The federal law that compensates people harmed by nuclear weapons testing is set to expire in June next year.
New Mexicans who lived near the Trinity test site, where the first atomic bomb was detonated 78 years ago, aren't now eligible for health care and compensation under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. But Tina Cordova of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, an advocacy group for families seeking compensation, shared some reason for optimism Monday in a hearing before state legislators in Los Alamos.
The U.S. Senate, she noted, voted last month in favor of expanding eligibility to New Mexico residents as part of an amendment to a broader national defense bill. But it isn't clear yet whether the amendment will make it into the final version of the defense legislation, which is now under negotiation between the House and Senate.
With next year's deadline, Cordova said, it's more important than ever to secure approval of the eligibility expansion.
"This is our best chance of this happening — ever," Cordova told members of the legislative Radioactive and Hazardous Materials Committee.
With Senate approval in place, she said, it's especially important to lobby Republican leaders in the U.S. House, where the GOP holds a narrow majority.
To that end, state lawmakers agreed to send a bipartisan letter endorsing expansion of the Radioactive Exposure Compensation Act to cover New Mexico and certain other states.
A new scientific study, Cordova said, has confirmed what New Mexico families who lived near the Trinity site already knew — that radioactive fallout from the 1945 test went far beyond what the federal government acknowledged.
A manuscript submitted for publication last month by researchers at Princeton University, the University of Colorado at Boulder and elsewhere suggests the fallout reached 46 states — New Mexico included, of course — within 10 days of the detonation.
"We're paying the price," Sen. Shannon Pinto, D- Tohatchi, said.
Cordova said the compensation could make a real difference, not just for individuals, but for the state. If, for example, 100 people receive one-time payments of $150,000, it would add up to $15 million injected into small communities like Tularosa, she said.
People who qualify, Cordova said, could also have their health care paid for.
"We have a lot of people experiencing four and five generations of cancer now," she said.
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