The Cold War legacy lurking in U.S. groundwater

Even after regulators say uranium mine cleanup is complete, polluted water and sickness are often left behind

Uranium contamination extends several miles in an aquifer under the Bluewater disposal site in New Mexico. (Mauricio Rodriguez Pons / ProPublica) In America’s rush to build the nuclear arsenal that won the Cold War, safety was sacrificed for speed.

Uranium mills that helped fuel the weapons also dumped radioactive and toxic waste into rivers like the Cheyenne in South Dakota and the Animas in Colorado . Thousands of sheep turned blue and died after foraging on land tainted by processing sites in North Dakota. And cancer wards across the West swelled with sick uranium workers.

The U.S. government bankrolled the industry, and mining companies rushed to profit, building more than 50 mills and processing sites to refine uranium ore .But the government didn’t have a plan for the toxic byproducts of this nuclear assembly […]

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