World War II brought out the insanity lurking beneath that famous British reserve. Not only did they try to blow up an entire island, but they rendered another one uninhabitable for decades – after they killed a bunch of sheep, of course.
We tend to forget how poorly WWII was going for the Western Allies before 1943. Preparing for the worst or perhaps eager to inflict the worst on Nazi Germany, the British began secretly developing an offensive biological weapons capability in early 1942. Military scientists made an aerosol out of anthrax and managed to rig a munition to disperse it. To see if the setup would work and produce lethal results, they needed somewhere very remote and very empty to test it.
Enter Gruinard Island. In Scotland, of course. Because they flipped a coin and it was either that or Ireland. Because Britain.
The island's small handful of residents was displaced by the government. More accurately they were replaced. Replaced with sheep. Eighty sheep were imported to see how they would react to being blasted with weaponized, extra-virulent anthrax. Ooh, the suspense! Are you ready for a shock? They died. Autopsies revealed that they died of anthrax. Watch some highly strange footage of the "experiments" here.
The tests proved, in case anyone was skeptical, that bombing German cities with anthrax would have lethal consequences that could linger for decades (note: anthrax is a rugged, hard to kill spore, which explains its popularity as a bioweapon). This proved remarkably prescient, as the British soon discovered that poor Gruinard Island was thoroughly, perhaps permanently, infected with literal tons of anthrax bacteria. Eventually the displaced owners and the general public started clamoring to clean up the problem in the late 1970s. A legitimate cleanup effort began in 1986, and it turned out that after an entire island gets drenched with liquid anthrax it's really hard to decontaminate it. For the next four years the tiny (0.75 square mile) island was bathed repeatedly in 300 tons of formaldehyde mixed with seawater. Some very nervous sheep were introduced in 1990 and their health was monitored closely.
They lived. The sheep lived.
The original owners were sold their island by the UK government for the 1942 purchase price of 500 pounds, and 26 years later there have been no cases of human, sheep, or any other mammal contracting anthrax on Gruinard. Hard to imagine what could grow in formaldehyde-soaked soil, but I guess nature is resilient.
The punchline? The secret project was called Operation Vegetarian. That famous British wit.
mago says:
Anthrax, formaldehyde and seawater? Where do you find this toxic island arcana? Shit's scary.
seniorscrub says:
Ed,
Here's your footage put to music
https://youtu.be/yEhlxdk_PoU
Gang of Four – Anthrax
Skipper says:
Kind of like the time that Massachusetts "disappeared" four towns so that Boston folk would have plenty of drinking water. The residents were moved out. The bodies were exhumed from the cemeteries and moved away. Then, the towns were flooded, creating Quabbin Reservoir. To this day, when the water is low, you can still see the stone walls and foundations of the farms that were there.
Oh, and now the state wants to build a resort for rattlesnakes on one of the islands in the reservoir. As expected, some residents near to Quabbin are nervous about this, especially because rattlesnakes can, and do, swim.
schmitt trigger says:
I shudder when some scientists talk about "terraforming" Mars.
Skepticalist says:
Duck and cover.
Robert says:
Skipper – I wonder if that was part of Lovecraft's inspiration for "The Colour Out of Space". There's a reference to a remote New England area being drowned by a reservoir.
Schmitt trigger – from everything I've read, Mars is like Antarctica only much farther away. A good place to do science you can't do anywhere else, and maybe a tourist destination for people bored with Everest, but not a good neighborhood for raising your kids.
Dave Dell says:
This post reminds me of a half remembered quote from what I think of as the best golf book of all time: Dan Jenkins "Dead Solid Perfect".
"People. What we can't fuck up we'll shit on."
Katydid says:
@Robert: Mars ain't the kind of place to raise your kids; in fact, it's cold as hell. To coin a phrase.
Deep Thought says:
"Hard to imagine what could grow in formaldehyde-soaked soil, but I guess nature is resilient"
This is Scotland we're talking about. Formaldehyde would be a step-up from Buckfast.