THE PETRIFIED RIVER

[Music] in the southwest there lies a land of stone 100,000 square miles of rainbowed Rock spread out where Colorado Arizona Utah and New Mexico meet buried beneath these Mighty MERS lie the beds of ancient Rivers preserved by time Beds which in centuries past gathered uranium that man seeks today in the Petrified River [Music] to find the Petrified River and its uranium a man must understand its origin and go back 200 million years to a Time long before the Colorado Plateau was formed in that ancient age a vast sea across California and into Colorado inundating nearly the whole Southwest for A Thousand Miles Sand Dunes circled its Shores then as the centuries passed the West slowly Rose and the Sea retreated broad Salt Flats covered a drying land Barren of Life Eastward beyond the flats the land Rose and formed Highlands that stretched through Colorado and New Mexico and into Arizona to these Highlands in that unremembered time the rains came year after year the torrents poured down and the descending Waters carried silt and gravel to the flats below this silt and gravel built a vast plane that spread from Colorado toward California a broad plane crossed by gently Meandering Rivers [Music] as the waters flowed logs and vegetation collected at the bends of the ancient streams ready to trap the uranium which was to come their way this V chapter of the West's history came to a close under a burning Sun that dried up the rivers and left the logs to bleach on the sand and then wind blown Sands buried logs and vegetation and riverbeds Century upon Century Slipped Away bringing more changes sometimes new and even more Lush Plains formed above the old burying ever deeper the Petrified Rivers sometimes the highlands were gripped by ice at one time the whole West buckled and the Earth peed forth fire from deep within the Earth's crust hot Solutions bubbled up bearing uranium Solutions which many geologists believe spread laterally into the ancient river beds or as others believe flowed into these prehistoric Rivers depositing uranium among the logs and decaying vegetation today the canyon walls of the Colorado Plateau carved by rushing Rivers reveal the sediments laid down in the past geologic time preserved a Sandstone of the dunes of the great Inland Sea the ancient Plains lie Frozen in bands of red and gray rock on one Mesa wall they stand the pages of 200 million years of History pages that a man can read flying close to them Airborne Prospectors seek traces of the Petrified riverbeds that bear uranium not by sight but by radioactivity for wherever there is uranium there is radiation which a sensitive instrument like a cellometer can detect at relatively great distances by this technique of Rim flying Prospectors today cover vast sections of the Mesa in a few hours tracking down deposits of the ore that has made the Colorado Plateau one of the world's foremost uranium [Music] producers but equally important in developing America's uranium industry is the solitary prospector who for years has been exploring this forbidding land on foot groping his way along the sheer Mesa walls as he seeks his fortune in a modern Klondike whose prize is the black or canary yellow color of uranium bearing [Music] Rock his constant companion is a guer counter which detects uranium ore lying near the surface [Music] as its slender needle flickers The prospector's Hop soore but he is not alone in the Hills today for the trained geologists and Mining Engineers are also combing the meses for Uranium if a strike seems promising the land is surveyed and a claim is staked a claim measures 600 by 1500 ft and it's boundaries are marked by Stakes proclaiming the discover's rights to whatever minerals May lie secreted beneath the silent Stone of the Mesa survey markings are inscribed on the stakes and the claim is filed in the office of the county agent a notice is also written to indicate the owner and the identifying name of the claim and posted on any convenient marker [Music] then the real costs of uranium hunting begin to mount as a bulldozer climbs the sheer Mesa wall laboriously it cuts out a precipitous and narrow road for the drill rig and trucks to follow providing access to the mine roads are hundreds of other roads leading to the claim areas built by mining companies and the government a claim may look promising but only by drilling deep into the Mesa can the ore deposits be pinpointed to determine whether they are large and Rich enough to be worth [Music] mining unscrewing the drill sharp bit the Drillers remove the cylinders of stone which the hollow shaft has cut out of the rock below [Music] arranged on trays these cores provide a cross-section of the rock through which the drill is passed examining the drill cores with a radiation counter a geologist determines whether substantial amounts of uranium exist but before mining begins additional holes are drilled at regular intervals to see how far the ore extends and whether other deposits are located nearby by connecting the points where ore is found geologists can make a complete map of the ore bodies that lie hidden beneath the Mesa and determine the most convenient point for sinking a shaft on the plateau many drifts enter from the Mesa wall following the or into the Earth miners tunnel out galleries to reach ore at other levels [Music] like explorers stepping onto a new continent the miners watch intently as their drills bring to light the Petrified image of a fertile plain that lived nearly 200 million years ago for The Rock has preserved for all time the ripples left in the Sands by the Meandering rivers of those ancient days as they flowed across the plains [Music] once the ore has been blasted loose muckers load it into the cars that will take it from the Mind cars that are always on the Move carrying thousands of tons of ore a day from the man-made tunnels that honeycomb the plateau [Music] a compressed air engine drives the mine car along down the tunnel cut by the probing drills a Meandering tunnel like the Meandering rivers of long ago that brought the uranium now entombed in stone sometimes the flickering lights pick out traces of Life along the river imprints of ferns that lined its banks and creatures that lived in its Waters sometimes they find the tracks of the dinosaurs that roam the last and lushest of the Plains [Music] along the winding roads that have been forged through the busy Mesa country a ceaseless stream of trucks carries the precious or to buying stations and more than a dozen processing Mills The Mill at uravan Colorado one of many lies in the heart of one of the oldest and richest uranium mining sections on the plat toe after each load of ore is weighed it is dumped into receiving bins from there it is carried to a series of Crushers for it must be broken to a fine size before processing begins such Mills must process hundreds of tons daily for each ton of ore yields but a few pounds of uranium [Music] in huge rotating cylinders the minerals in the finely ground ore are dissolved with acid once in solution they leave the containers as a slurry in a series of vets the solids of the slurry settle to the bottom leaving most of the uranium concentrate in solution but with a metal as valuable as uranium even the settling Sands must be combed for any remaining metal in rotating filters liquids are drawn off from the Sands and then Under Fire the Sands are dried for reprocessing the final result is a uranium compound in solution which is piped into storage tank and then through long filter presses where the liquid is squeezed out of the uranium precipitate leaving behind a clean bright clay-like material called yellow cake and thus the labors of the plateau come to an end labors that began almost a decade ago when Prospectors set out to comb the desolate Mesa country with the nation in need of uranium the atomic energy energy commission decided to open up the plateau offering miners profitable prices for their [Music] or all over the plateau are the signs of men who staked their hopes on the uranium search other signs reveal the prospecting and exploration work of government [Music] agencies from Across the Nation thousands of people came to the plateau to hunt for Uranium towns like Grand Junction Colorado and Moab Utah became boom towns bristling with drill Rigs and filled with strange [Music] faces stores specializing in instruments needed for the uranium search opened up everywhere the activities of the atomic energy commission and hundreds of mining compan geologists and Engineers who poured over their maps of the Mesa country resulted in a thousand mines that changed the face of the land for Uranium mining in the United States is a big business today sometimes a huge Earth moving job for heavy equipment and sturdy trucks a job continually expanding as new areas and new formations are discovered uranium mining is teamwork of Private Industry and government in or essaying or buying the exchange of information all the special services that keep the complex operation [Music] going tank cares and tank trucks travel ceaselessly with tons of supplies equipment of every description moves the ore all contributing to an industry now valued at several hundred millions of dollars annually and from all over the plateau the fruits of these labors flow to or buying stations and to the Mills this is an industry which did not exist a few short years ago an industry that has brought to this area enterprising men modern equipment new mines and expanding Mills Mills that work day and night to extract from mountains of ore a substance precious Beyond imagination for in it has locked the energy that created our universe energy that was born far out in space for the elements that make up our Earth came from the fiery cores of ancient Suns billions of years ago the simplest of all these elements is the hydrogen atom it has a single proton in its nucleus and an electron that circles it like a planet within Suns hydrogen atoms fuse together and are joined by two neutrons the result is a completely new element helium whose two protons attract a pair of circling electrons helium in turn becomes the next heaviest element lithium as more particles join its nucleus thus one by one all the 92 elements were forged in Stellar fire until the heaviest atom of all uranium was created uranium with a nucleus of 92 protons and nearly twice as many neutrons held together by Stellar energy uranium whose energy man has learned to liberate when a neutron strikes a uranium nucleus it is absorbed under the strain of the added particle the nucleus grows unstable and splits in two with a burst of energy releasing more neutrons in a mass of uranium the neutrons released by one fishion travel on to produce further fishion liberating more and more energy in an intense Chain Reaction this same energy will eventually light our cities run our factories and power our ships and ples but to harness it man must build Atomic reactors to keep the Chain Reaction under control as uranium slugs are pushed into a reactor and the controls adjusted uranium atoms begin to fish and the Chain Reaction builds up producing heat it is this heat that makes Atomic power [Music] possible a liquid pumped through the reactor is heated as it flows around the hot rods passing over water carrying pipes the liquid imparts its heat to the water turning it to steam thus a reactor makes steam steam to run a powerful turbine that turns a generator to produce electricity then the electricity passes through transmission lines and on toward the world of man to light his cities and lighten his labor with the energy recovered from Sons that were born and died billions of years [Music] ago but in addition to power a reactor can also produce radioisotopes in the control room of the big reactor at o Bridge Tennessee an operator watches the instruments as men prepare to load it with slugs of uranium penetrating the reactor are more than 1200 channels in which uranium fuel is inserted a radiation counter checks the ram rod for radioactivity as it is withdrawn once it is running the reactor produces intense radiation [Music] materials inserted in the reactor become themselves radioactive substances like phosphorus Cobalt and sodium withd drawn into a lead trough they are removed with tongs and placed in a lead safe to protect workers from radiation these radioisotopes have endless uses but many must first be processed and purified handled Always by remote control with instruments that carry out the operations behind thick walls and heavy windows that hold back their dangerous rays the products of the atomic pharmacy at Oakridge are stored behind a thick wall mirrors overhead enable the operator to see behind the wall and to select from a storage rack a radioisotope ordered for shipment [Music] for as long as they are used most radioisotopes will be handled thus always behind heavy walls always requiring elaborate manipulating equipment never touched but this very difficulty expresses their main virtue radiation which has made them the most valuable scientific tool since the microscope injected in minute quantities into living things their radiation reveals the paths they take as they course through the body thus radioactive iron can be followed in blood cells or radioactive phosphorus as it leaves the soil and enters a plant to nourish it radiation can also save life and the Rays from irradiated Cobalt cium and gold are used to destroy cancerous tissue industry saves over100 million a year by using Isotopes to measure products and control processes each month over a thousand shipments of radioisotopes lead the Oakridge National Laboratory for universities hospitals and Industrial plants all over the [Music] world in medicine one of the most valuable Isotopes is radioactive iodine removed from the hospital storage cell it will be used to prepare a dose of atomic medicine the normal thyroid absorbs iodine and its radioactive form as well since an overactive thyroid will take up more iodine than a normal thyroid radioactive iodine can swiftly and accurately diagnose the [Music] trouble the atomic medicine is prepared by a remote control pipet as a technician watching his movements in a mirror inserts the pipet down into a lead box he draws up the solution then transfers a measured amount into a paper cup to which water is added for the patient to [Music] drink above the suspect gland a radiation counter moves back and forth detecting the iodine's radiation and recording the spots where it is concentrating there is the diseased thyroid whose effective diagnosis will lead to early treatment the blinking of a warning light indicates another Priceless isotop as at work Cobalt 60 mounted inside a rocking cylinder the Cobalt's penetrating radiation bombards a tumor deep in the patient's body often destroying the malignant cells with its Rays as dials record the dose administered one vast New Field of research is the preservation of food by radiation exposed to it potatoes can be stored for years without sprouting [Music] because radiation destroys living cells scientists are using it to kill the bacteria that spoil food dozens of samples are prepared each [Music] day inside a lead Cask the meat is exposed to Radioactive Cobalt whose Rays kill the [Music] bacteria today irradiated meat remains fresh for weeks someday it may last for months as fresh as the day was packaged a pair of dosel burrows helps in investigating one of the most basic processes of all metabolism Isotopes are added to the feed and then the radioactivity of the Burrow's breath is measured to find out how much of the material is exhaled and how much is actually built into body tissue a study that will ultimately reveal more about how the human body works scientists are using Isotopes to unveil The Marvelous processes of life and growth absorbed by plants radio isotopes reveal how cells use energy from the Sun to build living tissues because radiation causes mutations breeding experiments can now be done in a few Summers producing strains which may be more disease resistant than the old by adding radioactive phosphorus and calcium to soils scientists have found the degree to which healthy plants require these substances but in amount so small only radiation could reveal their presence the Isotopes produced by uranium are penetrating the mystery of life itself in every cell lie chromosomes which contain the invisible genes that govern the cell's growth radiation can alter and break these chromosomes enabling scientists to learn more fully how they influence the development of life under the microscope the winding chromosomes in the cells become visible as man seeks an understanding of the still smaller World beyond the microscope probing the endless form and variety of living things scientists come ever closer to an understanding of the wondrous process by which they function following Isotopes as they are digested and built into cells and move about the body man has developed a whole new concept of what a dynamic and everchanging and ceaselessly transformed thing a living organism is thus the Isotopes formed by uranium's sunf fused energy are now fulfilling Atomic Energy's greatest promise an understanding of the nature of life itself and thus the sons of interstellar space which on the first day of creation brought warmth and light and life into the world also gave the world a means of understanding the work of that great day for in building up the elements that make up the Earth some of the life-giving solar energy was frozen in them implanted in the world from the beginning atomic energy has at last been liberated for the use of man that he might investigate and understand and wonder at the handiwork of God [Music]