The origin of the Beads of Courage

(A clip from the documentary In the Dark Valley, 2021).

Each bead represents something different.

For example, red represents when she had a blood transfusion.

Black when she got poked with a needle.

Yellow for inpatient stays.

White for chemotherapy.

#SantaSusana
#children
#hibakusha

14/
This intense grassroots mobilization has fueled an incredible petition with over 600,000 signatures, demanding that the government and current site owners take real accountability and fully clean up the Santa Susana Field Laboratory once and for all.

How much longer will these communities be forced to pay the price for secrets kept 60 years ago?

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#TheEarthGazer #SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #children

13/
These families have shared deeply moving symbols like Beads of Courage, where every single glass bead a child receives physically represents a painful medical milestone—such as enduring chemotherapy or a blood transfusion.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #children

12/
The Human Cost: Beads of Courage

The response from the local communities to this invisible, multi-generational threat has been profound. Local parents, such as Melissa Bumstead, whose own daughter battled a rare leukemia, began using everyday tools like Facebook and Google Maps to map out clusters of sick children right in their own neighborhoods.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #children

10/
Today, this legacy remains an active threat through what researchers call the "incinerator chimney effect". When a massive wildfire—such as the recent Sandy Fire—tears through the area, the intense heat vaporizes the contaminated soil and plant life.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #contamination
#radioactive #wildfires #SandyFire

9/
running down intermittent streams past a children's camp (the Brandeis-Barden Institute) and directly into the headwaters of the Los Angeles River. This pulls a toxic path directly into the watersheds and residential backyards of half a million people living within just 10 miles of the site.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #contamination
#radioactive #children #rivers

8/
Gravity’s Revenge & The Incinerator Chimney Effect

Because the lab sits on a mountain plateau with no physical barrier holding back the pollution, inescapable physics dictate the flow of contamination. When it rains, rainwater washes heavy metals and mixed fission products out of the saturated soil...

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha #contamination #radioactive

7/
• Open Burn Pits: Hazardous materials were disposed of by dragging 55-gallon drums of toxic chemicals to open pits and literally shooting them with rifles to ignite them, creating huge plumes of toxic smoke.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha

6/
A Toxic Cocktail
Beyond the nuclear fallout, decades of environmental negligence created a massive chemical hazard:

• Rocket Engine Testing: The site hosted over 30,000 high-powered rocket engine tests.

• Groundwater Contamination: Workers routinely flushed these engines with a highly toxic solvent called TCE, trapping half a million gallons of it in the groundwater.

https://youtu.be/oH8BilL6H1Q

#SantaSusana #NuclearAccidents #LA #SSFL #SRE #hibakusha