One day in 1992, a worker named Zhang Youchang in Jiangxi accidentally picked up a sparkling piece of metal while working. It had a dazzling luster like a gem. At this time, Zhang Youchang never imagined that this piece of metal was like an opened Pandora's box, and that bad luck was about to come.
In a very short period of time, a total of
What is the strangely glowing metal that Zhang Youchang picked up? Why does it appear where Zhang Youchang works? Why is it so toxic?
The small days of ordinary migrant workers
The whole incident starts with Zhang Youchang, an ordinary migrant worker. He comes from a rural area in Shanxi . Like most ordinary rural people, he went to the city to do soil work and made a living by selling his physical strength.
After getting married, Zhang Youchang and his wife began to go out to work together. The money earned by the two working part-time is enough to support the daily expenses of the whole family. The couple is happy in poverty and can be said to be very loving.
Soon the wife became pregnant with a child, and they were about to welcome the family's first little life. Looking at his wife whose belly was getting bigger day by day, Zhang Youchang felt very distressed, so he asked his wife to raise the baby quietly at home, while he alone was responsible for working and earning money.
One more person means one more mouth. In order to welcome the new life that is coming, Zhang Youchang worked hard on the construction site. In addition to completing the work on his own construction site, he often takes on some private work. Whether it was digging out manure pits or working at heights, he was willing to do it as long as he could pay for it.
After a day's work, he heard from his colleagues on the way home that the Environmental Monitoring Bureau of Xinzhou City, Shaanxi Province had a job for them to do, and asked Zhang Youchang if he would take it. After learning that the salary was high, Zhang Youchang expressed his willingness. Nowadays, a job with such a high salary is very rare, so he quickly signed up with this coworker. He never thought that his co-workers' kindness in wanting him to earn more money would actually be the beginning of pushing Zhang Youchang into hell.
This work requires several workers to go down an abandoned well to clean the mud at the bottom of the well and dredge the well. After listening to Zhang Youchang, he felt that it was not difficult. On the day of work, he went down to the well with several co-workers. As soon as they got down into the well, it was pitch dark all around. They turned on the tool lights and started working together. Two people dig out the mud below, and one person is responsible for transporting it up.
In this way, a few people cooperated in an orderly manner, and the mud at the bottom of the well was quickly cleaned up. Because it was no longer covered by mud, a mysterious cylindrical object that emitted a metallic light appeared in front of Zhang Youchang.
Mysterious object appears
When Zhang Youchang saw this object, he initially thought it was just ordinary metal. After all, metal can be sold for money. Not surprised, Zhang Youchang picked up the cylindrical metal block from the mud with his hands and used the wastewater from the bottom of the well to clean the mud on its surface.
He held it in his hand and looked at it repeatedly. The object was heavy and emitted a dazzling light, which was very beautiful. Zhang Youchang thought that it would be nice to take it home as a decoration.
Little did they know that at this time, misfortune, like a ghost, began to haunt Zhang Youchang and his family members and co-workers who had come into contact with him. No one thought that this metal block had the power from hell and would affect the fate of hundreds of people, even the unformed child in his wife's belly. What exactly is this mysterious metal block? Why is it so dangerous?
After working for a long time, the mud at the bottom of the well was finally dug out. Zhang Youchang put the metal piece into his trouser pocket. There was nothing unusual about him and he returned home like a normal person.
His body was normal at first, but after returning home, he began to feel nauseated and vomited and could not eat. His whole body began to become edematous, and his body temperature reached an astonishing 40 degrees Celsius.My wife Zhang Fang was very worried about this. A good man suddenly fell ill and became seriously ill. She was afraid that Zhang Youchang was possessed by evil spirits at the construction site.
At first, my wife and Zhang Youchang thought it was just ordinary food poisoning and they would be fine in a few days. So his wife started making arrangements to ask Zhang Youchang to go to the town's health bureau to prescribe some medicine.
After treatment, Zhang Youchang did not vomit anymore, and his family members thought his condition had improved. However, his physical condition suddenly declined rapidly. His high fever persisted, his gums began to bleed, his hair began to fall out, and a large number of bruises began to appear on his body.
His wife thought that he might be suffering from some kind of infectious disease, so she hurriedly sent Zhang Yongchang to a well-known large hospital in the province. Zhang Youchang's father and second brother also hurriedly came to inquire about his condition and accompanied Zhang Youchang to the large hospital.
The cause of the bizarre condition is unknown.
Zhang Youchang's condition puts The First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University in a dilemma. They were unable to detect any cause of the disease from Zhang Youchang. In this way, Zhang Youchang spent a day in the hospital without knowing his condition.
Unfortunately, from the next day, Zhang Youchang's father Zhang Mingliang and his second brother Zhang Youshuang also began to suffer from the same symptoms. A large number of bloody spots began to appear under their skin, their faces began to swell, they continued to vomit, and their hair fell out. For this reason, the hospital quickly isolated the three of them into the infectious disease ward, fearing that they would infect other people.
This went on for several days, and doctors could not find any cause in their bodies. Finally, on a cold winter morning on December 2, , Zhang Youchang passed away with edema all over his body. He could not know the cause of his death until his death, and his father and second brother also passed away after his death.
Soon after, the doctor discovered that Zhang Youchang's pregnant wife also began to lose a lot of hair and had a lot of spots on her body. The doctor concluded that this must be an unknown infectious disease, so the hospital put on emergency alert and handled the incident with infectious disease prevention and control.
Zhang Youchang's wife's father saw that the First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University could not find the cause of his daughter and son-in-law's illness, so he took his daughter to Peking University People's Hospital, hoping that more advanced hospitals could investigate and deal with the cause.
After several days of examination, the major hospitals in Beijing were still unable to determine what disease Zhang Youchang’s wife was suffering from, which stumped many experienced doctors.
This challenge stimulated Lu Daopei, director of the Beijing Institute of Hematology. After learning about the incident, he quickly formed a three-person research team with Mao Bingzhi, director of the Radiology Research Institute of the People's Liberation Army Military Hospital, and Huang Shimin, deputy chief physician of the hematology department, to jointly investigate this major infectious disease incident.
Top international medical talents soon discovered something unusual about Zhang Youchang's wife during the discussion. The three people took her report sheet and found that her hemoglobin was only 3.5 grams per liter. The range of normal people is between 110 grams and 150 grams. Moreover, Zhang Youchang's wife's white blood cell was only 1/10 of normal people.
In addition, it was also found that among the 300 somatic cells in Zhang Youchang's wife's body, the malformation rate reached 44.7%, while the malformation rate of cells in our normal people's cells is only 0.03%. With such a high malformation rate, there is only one possibility that can cause such a big change in the human body, and that is radiation .
The cause of radiation appears
After comparative analysis, experts concluded that Zhang Youchang's wife suffered mild radiation . Experts believe that the radiation received by Zhang Youchang's wife was indirect radiation, while Zhang Youchang and his father's second brother were directly harmed by radiation, which is why they passed away in such a short period of time.
The expert team quickly notified Shanxi Hospital of the inspection results. In fact, before the Beijing experts made the radiation identification, some staff at Shanxi Hospital had already suspected that this was a disease caused by radiation.However, at that time, Shanxi Hospital's medical equipment and physician resources were not satisfactory, so we did not conduct in-depth research on this suspicion. We only thought that it was an infectious disease caused by the virus .
Next, in the small county town where Zhang Youchang lives, many schools and factories have suspended classes and operations, hoping to survive the radiation period safely. After discovering the cause, experts began to search for where the radiation source came from.
Experts studied Zhang Youchang’s identity and background and found that Zhang Youchang’s wife Zhang Fang was just a rural woman and was pregnant. Her usual range of activities was near home and she had not been to any far away places, let alone to places with radiation.
So the source of radiation can only be her husband Zhang Youchang who works outside the home. But Zhang Youchang is just an ordinary migrant worker, and his scope of work is the construction site.
Searching for radiation sources
Searching for radiation sources has become an urgent local task, because after Zhang Youchang's death, a large number of his relatives, friends, and even doctors who had been in contact with him have suffered from major or minor physical problems.
This incident has attracted great attention from the central government. The Shanxi Provincial Government has regarded finding the source of radiation as an urgent task. It immediately established an investigation team, hoping to find the source through the power of the province, with a view to stopping the tragedy as soon as possible.
A group of people chased the invisible radiation, going around and around for several days, but the result was like a cow in the sea. A lot of police force was invested, but nothing was found. Fortunately, experts found a breakthrough in Zhang Fang's father.
According to Zhang Fang's father's recollection, he heard Zhang Youchang's father once mentioned that when he was hospitalized, he took out a metal with a mysterious light from his son's pants pocket. He didn't care at first, thinking it was just an ordinary piece of metal, so he threw it in the trash can.
After hearing this description, the experts concluded on the spot that the metal block should be the radioactive source . Because it was in Zhang Youchang's trouser pocket, Zhang Youchang was the first to have the problem.
Experts therefore listed this piece of metal as a key search target. After some inquiries, they learned that anything thrown into the trash can will be sent to Taiyuan City Garbage Treatment Station for incineration.
So they gathered a lot of manpower and material resources to search the Taiyuan City garbage disposal station. But after rummaging through the garbage dump, no special metal was found. This inevitably dealt a major blow to the investigation team, and the clues were cut off again.
But they did not lose heart. People's safety was more important than Mount Tai, and they could not accept letting a piece of seriously harmful radiation fall outside. If it was picked up by others, it would endanger the lives of countless people, so they once again started to investigate from the source.
The hard work paid off, and they finally learned from a cleaner that because the cleaner was lazy, he did not send the hospital's garbage to the Taiyuan garbage disposal station, but dumped it directly on a road.
This news made the investigation team both happy and frightened. was happy that they once again found clues to radioactive materials. What they were afraid of was that this thing was just discarded casually on the street where people come and go. Once someone found out that they had picked up this item, the consequences would be disastrous, so they hurriedly searched for it in the garbage pile on the roadside.
A group of staff wearing radiation-proof protective clothing arrived at the intersection tremblingly. Finally, 40 meters away from the intersection, they discovered a cylindrical object with a strange light. They carefully packaged the cylindrical object in radiation-proof packaging and returned it to the research center. After testing,
found that the cylinder was cobalt 60. This test result shocked everyone. Why was this highly radioactive object picked up by a migrant worker?
Cobalt 60 The mystery of life experience
Cobalt 60 can cure diseases and save lives for medical staff. It is often used in chemotherapy for cancer patients and is also used in agricultural genetic modification technology.But if normal people are exposed to it, it can cause a sharp decrease in the number of human white blood cells, leading to cell deformities and a very high fatality rate. So why did such an important metal appear randomly in an abandoned well? Everyone hopes to find out the truth as soon as possible.
According to the investigation, In 1973, the Science and Technology Bureau of Xinzhou City, Shanxi Province approved six pieces of cobalt-60 from the central government and placed the six pieces of cobalt-60 in special wells sealed in the experimental farmland.
Over time, these six pieces of cobalt 60 changed hands several times. In 1991 , they had already arrived at the then environmental monitoring station . At that time, because of the need to expand the workplace, the monitoring station transferred these six pieces of discarded cobalt-60 to the then radioactive waste library. When
was registered at the waste warehouse, six cobalt-60s were mistakenly registered instead of five due to staff negligence. What Zhang Youchang picked up was the sixth piece of cobalt-60 that they had forgotten for many years and had not been recycled.
After the truth came out, the law provided reasonable compensation to Zhang Youchang’s family and the victims. The staff who handled cobalt-60 back then also paid a corresponding price.
No matter how much we try to make up for it, the damage that has been done cannot be reversed. Because of this accidental negligence, Zhang Youchang and his son died. The child in the belly of Zhang Youchang's wife was also born with intellectual problems because of the radiation. All in all, a total of
Hazardous objects are just thrown away in an abandoned well. We can't help but question the ability of national public officials to do their jobs. Behaviors that seriously endanger people's survival interests must be punished by law. We hope that every public official can work sincerely for the people at work and avoid further incidents that endanger people's safety!
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