Image: Karen Silkwood (Public Domain)

On this day in history, November 13, 1974, 28-year-old Karen Silkwood died in a car crash near Crescent, Oklahoma. Silkwood was employed as a technician at a plutonium plant run by the Kerr-McGee Corporation, and she condemned the plant’s health and safety procedures. The evening she perished, she was going to a conference with union representatives and a reporter from the New York Times, allegedly with a dossier full of documents proving that Kerr-McGee had acted carelessly when it came to worker safety at the facility. However, no such dossier was ever found in the remains of her car wreck, giving credibility to the hypothesis that she had been forced off the road to prevent her from recounting her story.

Silkwood worked at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron Fuel Fabrication Site in Oklahoma, manufacturing plutonium pellets, and she became the first female on the union’s negotiating team. After complaining to the Atomic Energy Commission about her fears, she was found to have plutonium pollution in her body and her home.

After her death, her family sued Kerr-McGee for the plutonium contamination. The company settled for US $1.38 million out of court without admitting liability. Her story was recounted in the 1983 movie Silkwood in which Meryl Streep portrayed her.

After starting work at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, in 1972, Silkwood joined the local Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers Union. She was appointed to the union’s bargaining committee, the first woman to gain that position at the Kerr-McGee plant. She was then designated to scrutinize health and safety concerns. She uncovered what she felt were several infractions of health regulations, including exposing workers to contamination, defective respiratory gear, and improper storage of samples. She felt the absence of adequate shower facilities could raise the risk of employee contamination.

The union stated that the plant had falsified product inspection records and risked the safety of employees. They threatened a lawsuit. In mid-1974, Silkwood told the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) that she had been contaminated, asserting that safety standards had fallen because of a production acceleration.

On November 5, 1974, Silkwood completed a self-check and found that she contained almost 400 times the legal limit for plutonium pollution. She was decontaminated at the facility and sent home with a testing kit to collect feces and urine for additional assessment.

As she went to a union meeting the next day, Silkwood tested positive for plutonium again, although she had only done paperwork duties that morning. She was provided with more rigorous decontamination. As she entered the plant on November 7, she was found to be severely contaminated, even discharging contaminated air from her lungs. A health physics team returned to her home and found plutonium traces in many areas, especially in the bathroom and the refrigerator. When the house was decontaminated, some of her belongings had to be destroyed. Silkwood, her boyfriend Drew Stephens, and her roommate Dusty Ellis were taken to Los Alamos National Laboratory for comprehensive testing to determine the extent of the contamination in their bodies.

Inquiries developed over how Silkwood became contaminated over these three days. She said the contamination in the bathroom happened when she spilled her urine sample on November 7. This was compatible with the evidence that the samples she took home had very high contamination levels. In contrast, samples taken in new jars at the plant and Los Alamos showed considerably lower contamination.

She felt she had been contaminated at the plant. Kerr-McGee’s management stated that Silkwood had contaminated herself to make the company look bad. Security at the plant was so sloppy that workers could easily sneak out plutonium pellets. The type of plutonium found in Silkwood’s body came from a production area she had not been in for four months. The pellets had subsequently been stored in the vault at the facility.

Silkwood said she had collected documents supporting her claims, including company papers. She publicized the evidence and contacted David Burnham, a New York Times reporter, who had shown interest in her story. On November 13, 1974, Silkwood went to a union gathering at the Hub Café in Crescent. Another person at that meeting later confirmed that Silkwood had documents with her at the café.

Silkwood then drove alone to Oklahoma City, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) away, to meet with Burnham and Steve Wodka, an official of her union’s national office. Later that evening, Silkwood’s body was found in her car, which had veered off the road and struck a culvert on State Highway 74. The vehicle included none of the documents she had at the union meeting at the Hub Café. She was declared deceased at the scene in what was deemed to be an accident. The trooper at the scene stated that he found one or two tablets of the sedative methaqualone (Quaalude) in the car and cannabis. The police report determined that she fell asleep at the wheel. The coroner found 0.35 milligrams of methaqualone per 100 milliliters of blood at her death – almost twice the recommended dosage for inducing drowsiness.

Some reporters have speculated that another vehicle hit Silkwood’s car from behind. Skid marks for her car were on the road. Investigators also noted damage to the rear of Silkwood’s car that, according to her acquaintances and family, had not been there before the accident. As the crash was a front-end collision, there was no explanation for the damage to the vehicle’s rear. An analysis of the back of Silkwood’s car showed paint chips that could only come from a rear impact by another vehicle. Silkwood’s family knew of no accidents she had had with the car, that the 1974 Honda Civic she owned was new when bought, and that no insurance claims were filed.

According to her family, she had obtained numerous menacing phone calls shortly before her death. Foul play has never been proven.

Because of contamination concerns, the Atomic Energy Commission and the State Medical Examiner requested an analysis of Silkwood’s body. Public skepticism led to a federal investigation into plant safety and security. This probe found that 20 to 30 kilograms (44-66 lb) of plutonium had gone missing at the facility.

Kerr-McGee shuttered its nuclear fuel plants in 1975. The Department of Energy (DOE) noted that the Cimarron plant was decontaminated and decommissioned in 1994.

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