Across several Generations
They Don't Work For You**
Look at the map before anyone tells you this was one rooftop or limited to a single event.
The Army told the Senate in 1977 it ran 239 open-air tests from 1949 to 1969 at 66 military and civilian locations in the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii, and even in Canada. Live bacteria in 80 of those tests. Powders and chemicals in the rest. Twenty-seven of the releases were on public property.
That is the official count. Here is what the public file actually names.
Bacteria in shared air
San Francisco Bay, September 1950, ship offshore, Serratia and Bacillus. Washington National Airport and the Greyhound terminal, May 1965. New York subway, 1966, light bulbs on the tracks. Key West and Panama City. Pennsylvania Turnpike tunnels. Hampton Roads and other ship work. Hawaii tests in the mid-1960s.
Metal dust in city air and on long flight lines
The National Research Council later reviewed zinc cadmium sulfide releases in Minneapolis, St. Louis, Fort Wayne, Corpus Christi, San Francisco, Winnipeg, Palo Alto, Camp Cooke and Oceanside in California, Chippewa National Forest in Minnesota, Oklahoma, Texas, Washington state, Nevada, the Carolinas and Georgia under Operation Dew, and Dugway in Utah. Operation LAC ran C-119 lines across a belt from the Rockies toward the Atlantic, including paths such as South Dakota to International Falls and Toledo toward Texas. Particles from Midwest lines were reported more than a thousand miles on.
Why those towns? The NRC record is blunt.
Minneapolis, St. Louis, and Winnipeg were picked because they resembled Soviet cities. Fort Wayne and Corpus Christi stood in for flatland. San Francisco and Panama City stood in for other target types. Forests, deserts, and empty ranges existed. They still used downtowns, terminals, and trains.
So no, not every county in America has a named release in the table. Yes, the footprint was national. Coasts. Midwest. Gulf. Desert. Islands. A commute. A ticket line. A public-housing roof.
If the goal was only to watch a cloud move, empty land was available no reason to involve people...repeatedly test after test after test over decades.
They chose populated air instead. Why?
They Dont Work For You.
Which state are you in, and did you know it sat on a test path? Like share and bookmark. Follow for the water file.
Sources: U.S. Army report to the Senate health subcommittee, 1977 (239 tests, 66 locations).
National Research Council, 1997, Toxicologic Assessment of the Army’s Zinc Cadmium Sulfide Dispersion Tests, including Table B-1 sites. Operation LAC, 1957-1958. Operation Sea-Spray, 1950.
Operation Dew, 1952.
Here is a high definition map it does not include Hawaii, Canada or Alaska but they were tested too.