WEBVTT - The Industrial Disaster That Makes Chernobyl Look Like Kindergarten 0:00:03.240 --> 0:00:08.520 What poisoning my giant city of hundreds of thousands of 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:13.520 people due to industrial negligence. Robert Evans host Behind the Bastards, 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:15.920 the podcast where we tell you everything you don't know 0:00:15.960 --> 0:00:18.720 about the very worst people in all of history. Uh. 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:25.240 My guest today is the inimitable, the inevitable, the inimicable. 0:00:25.880 --> 0:00:33.880 Jamie Loftus is inevitable, just a natural part of life. 0:00:35.520 --> 0:00:38.440 Hi am, I am. I allowed to tell the listeners 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:40.800 that I didn't know what we were talking about today 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:43.760 until I think, I think you just revealed it. I 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:46.360 did a little bit. If you know much about this 0:00:46.440 --> 0:00:55.640 particular disaster. No, no, not your call that disaster. Well, 0:00:55.720 --> 0:00:58.720 I'm I'm glad that you first of Jamie Loftus, co 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:04.520 host of the Bechtel Cast. Yeah, the the actress and 0:01:04.520 --> 0:01:10.479 and creative visionary behind a one woman show that's going 0:01:10.520 --> 0:01:15.000 to be in Scotland soon. Boss whom is girl? Yeah, 0:01:15.040 --> 0:01:21.520 August Baby, come out, Scotland Heads, Scotland heads, check her out. Um. Yeah, 0:01:21.640 --> 0:01:25.640 it's actually I'm I'm really glad that you guessed Chair Nobyle. Um, 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:28.280 because I think a lot of people, having heard that intro, 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:30.360 would have guest Chair Noble and Judging by the state 0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:33.000 of my Twitter mentions a month or so ago. I 0:01:33.000 --> 0:01:36.399 think about everybody I know was watching chair Noble. One 0:01:37.040 --> 0:01:41.880 it's because Jared's Jared was it Jared Harris? Um, it's 0:01:41.959 --> 0:01:46.240 because he's uh, sexy daddy, and people love sexy daddy's 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:50.000 on TV. I know everybody loves a sexy dad. Sometimes 0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:53.960 I adopt children just to be sexier. Yeah, don't take 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:56.080 care of them, don't raise them, just adopt him. Well, 0:01:56.120 --> 0:02:03.840 that sounds extremely negligent, and um, honestly, off, I love it. Yeah, yeah, 0:02:04.000 --> 0:02:08.120 so yeah, I haven't seen the chair Nobile TV show yet. 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:09.560 I am going to watch it. I just haven't have 0:02:09.639 --> 0:02:11.720 time to get into it. Um. And a lot of 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:13.840 people have begged me to do an episode on cher Nobile, 0:02:13.840 --> 0:02:15.760 and I expect I will one of these days because 0:02:15.800 --> 0:02:17.840 it's it's a really terrible disaster. There were a lot 0:02:17.880 --> 0:02:21.600 of bastards, you know, behind it. Uh. But I think 0:02:21.800 --> 0:02:25.160 most people who watched the series but didn't do much 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:27.920 outside reading on Chernobyl would be surprised to learn that 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:30.840 the the immediate death toll from the disaster was quite 0:02:30.840 --> 0:02:33.520 a lot lower than I think. TV dramatizations might lead 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:38.919 you to believe. UM, the explosion killed two people directly. UM. 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:41.280 Another twenty nine died in the hospital in a few 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:44.880 days following the disaster. UM. And that's it as far 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:48.720 as a direct death toll from like the actual meltdown itself, 0:02:49.280 --> 0:02:52.760 actually kind of no big deal. Well I wouldn't say that, um, 0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:54.679 but it is, it is. It is, like the long 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:57.200 term health consequences are a little bit harder to pin down. 0:02:57.240 --> 0:03:00.239 Can I put you on record as Chernobyl n b D. Yeah, 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:07.800 Chernobyl n b D in fact maybe good, maybe maybe great? Okay, yeah, 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:10.200 uh no. As of like two thousand eleven, there have 0:03:10.280 --> 0:03:12.880 been a total of twenty eight deaths due to acute 0:03:12.919 --> 0:03:18.440 radiation syndrome and another fifteen fatal cases of child thyroid cancer. UM. Now, 0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:21.640 because radiation lasts a very long time, the eventual death 0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:24.960 toll from Chernobyl decades from now will probably number into 0:03:25.000 --> 0:03:28.320 the thousands. Uh. In two thousand sixteen, the World Health 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:32.040 Organization estimated the eventual death toll of Chernobyl at around 0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:36.840 four thousand people. UM. It's pretty serious disaster, very bad, Yeah, 0:03:37.200 --> 0:03:40.800 terrible tragedy. But today we're going to talk about a disaster. 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:44.920 The dwarfs chare Nobyl, a calamity many times deadlier than 0:03:44.960 --> 0:03:47.920 the worst nuclear disaster in human history, with longer lasting 0:03:47.960 --> 0:03:51.360 catastrophic impacts on the people who live around it. Today 0:03:51.520 --> 0:03:54.600 we are talking about the worst industrial disaster in the 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:59.520 history of our species. Today we're talking about Bopaul India. 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:03.680 You've heard of bow Paul, I have not. Oh good, 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:10.360 I'm glad to hear this new disaster to mester m everybody. 0:04:10.400 --> 0:04:14.080 We all are. That's a disaster capitalism, baby, Oh, I 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:16.680 love it. Oh, I would get I would pay thirty 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:20.039 dollars for a T shirt that says disaster capitalism and 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:23.080 you think too hard about how it was made? Sophie, 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:27.880 Can we get the T shirt? People on that? What 0:04:27.920 --> 0:04:29.000 do you? What do you? What do you do that 0:04:29.040 --> 0:04:32.040 to my dream? Sophie. But I'll do it and then 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:35.560 I'll put it in the bechtelcast store. We'll sell it 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:39.400 with another show. Yeah, just cash that check on somebody 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:43.599 else's account. So, uh. The question I want everybody to 0:04:43.600 --> 0:04:45.960 ask themselves sort of at the end of this episode 0:04:45.960 --> 0:04:48.080 and kind of be thinking about as we go through 0:04:48.120 --> 0:04:50.960 this story. Um, because this is something that I think 0:04:51.000 --> 0:04:53.640 about a lot, is why does every Western school kid 0:04:53.839 --> 0:04:57.360 learn the name Chernobyl, but nobody knows. Are very few 0:04:57.360 --> 0:05:01.160 people in the West have heard of bow paul Um. 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:03.520 So let's keep that keep that one in your head 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:06.400 as we go through this. Bopaul is a city the 0:05:06.520 --> 0:05:09.880 capital of the Indian state of Madya Pradesh. Uh It's 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:11.960 known as the City of Lakes and is famed for 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:14.040 being one of the greenest cities in all of India. 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:17.160 It's a little bit like India's Portland, um, you might say, 0:05:17.200 --> 0:05:21.919 at least geographically um. In the early nineteen eighties, it 0:05:21.960 --> 0:05:24.440 was home to more than a million people. Now in 0:05:24.480 --> 0:05:26.560 the middle of the last century, India was hit with 0:05:26.560 --> 0:05:29.200 a major food crisis due to an exploding population and 0:05:29.200 --> 0:05:31.640 farmland that had still not really recovered from the damage 0:05:31.680 --> 0:05:34.840 done to it by centuries of British misrule. So India 0:05:34.920 --> 0:05:38.480 launched the Green Revolution in the early nineteen sixties with 0:05:38.520 --> 0:05:41.120 the goal of using science and technology to reform their 0:05:41.120 --> 0:05:45.120 agricultural practices and increase their crop yields. In the late sixties, 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:47.880 the government started reaching out to foreign companies, offering them 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:50.560 incentives to bring jobs to India, and one of the 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:54.520 companies they approached was a Union Carbide, an American chemical 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:57.039 giant with a name that like sounds like they're going 0:05:57.120 --> 0:06:00.720 to do to say that sounds like bad writing anytime. 0:06:00.800 --> 0:06:04.040 That's it's like, can someone just tell the people naming 0:06:04.040 --> 0:06:08.080 these companies? I guess now that like now things aren't 0:06:08.160 --> 0:06:11.240 quite as on the nose sinister now. It's just like 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:17.080 every evil company ends with an L y. Yeah yeah, yeah, 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:21.760 like murder Le murder Lee is only slightly less subtle 0:06:21.800 --> 0:06:25.479 than Union Carbide. Union Carbide. Yeah. That that also sounds 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:29.480 like a really good name for cartoon villain Union Carbide. Yeah, 0:06:29.520 --> 0:06:32.479 oh yeah, yeah. We meet him early in the movie 0:06:32.520 --> 0:06:34.640 and he's like, my name's Union and you're like, oh, 0:06:34.760 --> 0:06:38.320 that sounds good. And he's like Union carbide and you're like, oh, 0:06:38.320 --> 0:06:43.159 ship ship kill us, just like all carbides do exactly. 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:47.840 M hm. Now, Union Carbide one of their big, big 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:49.960 They made a lot of different chemicals, but one of 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:53.200 their big money makers was a pesticide called seven and 0:06:53.240 --> 0:06:56.719 it's spelled se v I N Are you kidding me? Yeah, 0:06:56.839 --> 0:06:59.520 that's such a sinister name for a pesticide, isn't it. 0:07:01.640 --> 0:07:04.640 I mean, I don't, I don't like, but it's just 0:07:04.839 --> 0:07:12.160 it's really gaudy. Yeah, yeah, seven, Like why, I don't 0:07:12.160 --> 0:07:14.600 know why. That's maybe because of the movie Seven with 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:18.600 Brad Pitt, but it just sounds so yeah like met 0:07:18.640 --> 0:07:23.280 Ball evil, like really can't be evil anyways, Yeah, yeah, 0:07:23.360 --> 0:07:28.680 can't be exaggerated evil. A pesticide called seven, a pesticide 0:07:28.720 --> 0:07:31.720 called seven now seven was popular in Latin American popular 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.560 in Asia. Um and so since it was so popular 0:07:34.600 --> 0:07:38.840 in Asia, from like a balance sheet standpoint, having a 0:07:38.840 --> 0:07:41.120 manufacturing plant in India made a lot of sense for 0:07:41.240 --> 0:07:44.480 Union Carbide. So the company worked out in an arrangement 0:07:44.480 --> 0:07:46.760 with the Indian government where the Indian government would hold 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:49.920 a twenty two percent steak in the Union Carbide subsidiary 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:53.200 company that was formed to manage the plant, Union Carbide 0:07:53.360 --> 0:07:56.520 India Limited. There was a great excitement around the deal 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:58.880 at first, and Union Carbide began to market their products 0:07:58.960 --> 0:08:02.200 using the slogan science helps build a new India, which 0:08:02.240 --> 0:08:08.560 is again so fucking sinister, Like god, yeah, it's just 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:10.920 when people are so villainous they don't even care if 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:15.600 they come off that way. That is they were, they 0:08:15.600 --> 0:08:20.040 were inadvertently foreshadowing. This just sounds like have you seen 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:23.480 have you seen Paddington? To Robert no way of not 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:28.120 Paddington to about this. It's basically a rehashing of this. 0:08:28.240 --> 0:08:30.640 It sounds like, no, it's uh, this is more Caitlin 0:08:30.680 --> 0:08:35.040 Tonto's department. But in Paddington to Hugh, Hugh Grant plays 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:37.240 this over the top villain who sounds like you would 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:41.040 have a pesticide called seven and say and say like quick, 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:46.200 like a quippy villain. Yeah. Yeah, Also an incredible dance number. 0:08:47.320 --> 0:08:50.320 Well that's good. That's good, Hugh Grant, you say yes, yes. 0:08:50.360 --> 0:08:55.000 And the career defining role. Yeah, that's that's good because 0:08:55.040 --> 0:08:58.839 his career needed some definition after that garbage he put 0:08:58.840 --> 0:09:01.560 out in the nineties. I see, I can. I can 0:09:01.679 --> 0:09:06.240 rarely tell the difference between uh, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant. 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:11.680 And that's my feminism as I understand it. Uh, if 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:16.560 water rolls off of its back, it's Colin Firth. If 0:09:16.600 --> 0:09:23.920 you throw it in water and it floats, Okay, that's 0:09:24.000 --> 0:09:29.600 very helpful, thank you. So water bottle to test whether 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:33.640 or not it's Colin Firth or Hugh Grant. So. Construction 0:09:33.640 --> 0:09:37.200 of the Union Carbide plant started in nineteen sixty nine. Now, 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:40.720 the plant's purpose would be to manufacture carborrell which was 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:43.920 the active ingredient in the popular pesticide seven, and another 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:47.880 chemical called alid carb for a pesticide named Timmock. Both 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:51.640 bug poisons required large amounts of a regular poison to manufacture. 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:56.000 The key ingredient was something called methyl isocyanate, which is 0:09:56.040 --> 0:10:00.240 an inspeakably deadly gas at like room temperatures uh m 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:02.280 I see, as we will refer to it in most 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:05.640 of this episode. Is colorless and heavier than air. It 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:09.280 functions similarly to fos gene gas, the deadliest poison gas 0:10:09.280 --> 0:10:12.760 of the First World War, and appropriately enough, phosgene gas 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:14.920 is one of the byproducts of producing m I C. 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:19.200 So they're making bug poison out of this unspeakably deadly 0:10:19.840 --> 0:10:24.760 uh poison gas critical ingredient. I am very curious about 0:10:24.760 --> 0:10:27.520 what their graphic design game is because this all sounds 0:10:27.559 --> 0:10:30.440 so sinister, and I'm wondering if it matches. You know. 0:10:30.520 --> 0:10:32.360 There there are some ads I've seen. One of them 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:34.720 was like a Latin American ad, and it's got like 0:10:34.880 --> 0:10:38.560 a smiling um like in the background, like a smiling 0:10:38.640 --> 0:10:41.240 Mexican farmer, and all white clothes with a bushel of 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:43.840 fruits and vegetables. In his arm, and then in the 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:46.920 foreground you've got the seven pesticide, which has been like 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:50.360 anthropomorphized as a tiny person beating the ship out of bugs. 0:10:50.679 --> 0:10:59.079 Oh my god, it's great. Okay, well, okay, didn't didn't disappoint. Yeah. Now, Initially, 0:10:59.120 --> 0:11:01.640 all the methyl ice so cianate used in the Bopaul 0:11:01.720 --> 0:11:04.760 plant was manufactured in the good old us of A. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:07.280 The site where the plant was constructed had only been 0:11:07.360 --> 0:11:10.679 zoned for light industry and commercial use, not for manufacturing 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:13.679 tons and tons of poisonous chemical gas, as it was 0:11:13.720 --> 0:11:17.360 surrounded both by bodies of water and densely populated slums. 0:11:17.679 --> 0:11:20.600 But by the late nineteen seventies, financial pressure from competition 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:23.800 led Union Carbide to decide they should start manufacturing m 0:11:23.840 --> 0:11:27.160 I C in Bopaul. They called the process of refitting 0:11:27.160 --> 0:11:29.960 their plant to manufacture the raw materials and the final 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:37.240 product backward integration. Now, Union Carbide instituted rigorous safety procedures 0:11:37.240 --> 0:11:39.040 in order to keep the plant and the citizens of 0:11:39.040 --> 0:11:43.040 Bopaul safe. There were two sirens allowed continuous one to 0:11:43.040 --> 0:11:45.080 warn members of the public and a quieter one to 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:48.160 announce problems to the factory workers. Within the plant itself, 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:51.360 there were also a number of safety measures within the plant. 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:53.960 A refrigeration unit to chill the m I C, thus 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:56.760 condensing it into a liquid and rendering it much safer. 0:11:57.040 --> 0:12:00.240 Event gas scrubber to remove dangerous substances from the ands, 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:03.120 industrial exhaust in a flare tower in order to burn 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:07.000 off excess deadly gases. But the most important safety feature 0:12:07.000 --> 0:12:09.920 of the Union Carbide plant was a well trained workforce. 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:12.959 All plant operators were required to have a college degree 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:16.080 in either a related scientific field or in engineering. They 0:12:16.120 --> 0:12:18.560 received six months of training to ensure that they had 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:21.600 a working understanding of not just their own specific jobs, 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:24.120 but the jobs of everyone else on their shift. This 0:12:24.160 --> 0:12:26.760 is critical in plants working with chemicals is dangerous as 0:12:26.920 --> 0:12:29.600 m I see. Workers obviously need to understand the whole 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:32.200 plant so they could spot potential problems or mistakes before 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:36.240 a disaster occurs. Great. That sounds above board, leaps and 0:12:36.320 --> 0:12:40.800 bounds over there, enos very much better than the people 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:43.040 are qualified to be doing their jobs. I like this. 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:45.800 I actually I was looking up some of the advertising 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:50.280 for this as well, and I found did you see 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:54.880 the advertising campaign? That's just a gigantic white hand pouring 0:12:55.160 --> 0:13:00.000 a vial of chemicals onto. I swear to God, it's 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:07.240 a gigantic white man's hand pouring chemicals onto India and 0:13:08.280 --> 0:13:11.800 build a new India, India. Union Carbide a hand in 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:15.920 things to come. Gigantic. I mean, she's a hand in 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:19.280 things to come. Come on, people, it's just it's it's 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:24.280 it's hideous. I mean, if you're if you're listening to 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.480 this podcast and a Hollywood producer, there's your intro for 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:30.400 the mini series based on Bopaul India. Just animate all 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:33.520 of these horrifying ads and slogans. It's like, you know, 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:38.120 there's there's another one with the huge white man's hand 0:13:38.400 --> 0:13:42.160 pouring chemicals onto a factory in India. What do you 0:13:42.559 --> 0:13:47.280 supposed to mean? Oh, more jobs through science Hollywood, Netflix, 0:13:47.320 --> 0:13:49.080 you're just leaving money on the table if you don't 0:13:49.080 --> 0:13:53.679 produce this the Yeah, please check out the very menacing 0:13:53.679 --> 0:13:59.480 white man's hand advertising for Union Carbide. It is it 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:03.880 is of fying. Wow, there's there's at least ten of them. 0:14:03.880 --> 0:14:07.040 He's holding a he's holding strawberries and wine, he's holding 0:14:07.360 --> 0:14:12.480 dirt in one, pouring chemicals in a lot uh one 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:16.480 in his hands on fire, Oh cool, fingers of flame. 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:19.920 That pierce solid rock. What the fund is wrong with 0:14:19.960 --> 0:14:23.680 these people? Why would you why? This one is wild 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:27.400 fingers a flame that pierced solid rock. Yes, through a 0:14:27.480 --> 0:14:31.040 dramatic new process known as jet piercing. Holes can now 0:14:31.080 --> 0:14:35.240 be burned straight through solid rock. The harder the rock, 0:14:35.480 --> 0:14:39.560 the more efficient the operation. A special combination of oxygen, 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:42.080 fuel and water does the job, and does it just 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.680 the fraction of the time of the old drill attack. 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:49.400 So there's a yeah, there's a flaming hand just punching 0:14:49.520 --> 0:14:54.600 through rock. Cool. Cool, Okay, Well these all sound like 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:58.800 great ads that were dreamed up by coked up people 0:14:59.080 --> 0:15:02.760 who had like a gut level intuition that their company 0:15:02.840 --> 0:15:04.960 was going to do something horrible. And what year are 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:07.520 we in right now? For We're in like the nineteen 0:15:07.720 --> 0:15:10.640 seventies at this point, Like things get up and running. 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:13.560 We're full on in Like this is a Don Draper joint. 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:17.760 Yeah yeah, firehand punching through rock, got it? Yeah? Yeah. 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:20.480 So you know, I just walked through all of the 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:22.400 kind of the safety features of the ba POL plant 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:24.800 and on paper that's how everything worked. But you know, 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:28.320 as I talked about earlier, increasing financial pressures led Union 0:15:28.360 --> 0:15:31.600 carbide to start cutting costs, and the easiest place to 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:35.840 cut was basic safety procedures. In nineteen seventy six, the 0:15:35.840 --> 0:15:38.640 two trade unions that represented the plants workers sent out 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:41.440 letters of complaint to their managers and the Indian Ministry 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:45.200 of Labor, talking about unsafe levels of pollution within the plant. 0:15:45.560 --> 0:15:50.440 They received no response. The nineteen eighties started, and Union 0:15:50.480 --> 0:15:54.080 Carbides financial woes continued, conditions that the factory began to 0:15:54.120 --> 0:15:57.080 degrade further as wages were cut and standards for workers 0:15:57.120 --> 0:16:01.200 started dropping. Union Carbides stopped require all of their employees 0:16:01.240 --> 0:16:05.000 to have degrees. Six months of training turned into eight weeks. 0:16:05.520 --> 0:16:08.040 In nineteen eighty one, things had gotten bad enough that 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:11.120 fos gene gas spewed out of a badly maintained holding 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:13.560 tank and into the face of a worker. He ripped 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:16.280 off his mask in a panic and died horrifically three 0:16:16.360 --> 0:16:20.680 days later. His managers yeah terrible. His managers, of course, 0:16:20.680 --> 0:16:23.080 management of the plant blamed him because he'd removed his 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:26.400 mask after getting sprayed in the face with poison. UH. 0:16:26.720 --> 0:16:29.080 The union pointed out that the faulty valve had been 0:16:29.080 --> 0:16:31.600 responsible for the accident, and that the plant had not 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:34.080 provided the worker with proper protective gear, so the mask 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:36.080 would not have done much if he'd left it on 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:39.960 his face. Plant management ignored this, of course, they does 0:16:40.160 --> 0:16:44.560 it sounds very inconvenient. Sounds very inconvenient for them. In 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:47.280 January of nineteen eighty two, there was another false gene leak. 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:50.400 Twenty four workers were hospitalized, but at least this time 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:54.480 nobody died. Workers began to agitate for better safety precautions. 0:16:54.720 --> 0:16:57.160 In February of nineteen eighty two, and M I C 0:16:57.400 --> 0:17:00.800 leak injured another eighteen workers. In August of the same year, 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:03.840 a chemical engineer suffered burns to thirty of his body 0:17:03.880 --> 0:17:06.680 from another m I C leak. Leaks continued to happen 0:17:06.720 --> 0:17:10.600 every month or so, injuring workers at a steady pace. Now, 0:17:11.880 --> 0:17:15.120 if you were a responsible corporation, you might say, boy, 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:17.919 the monthly poison gas leaks might be a sign that 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:21.520 something is awry with our factory, and perhaps major changes 0:17:21.560 --> 0:17:25.000 should be made. But what if you were the type 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:29.560 of company whose mascot is a gigantic Caucasian hand, what 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:31.639 would you what would you do if that were that 0:17:31.760 --> 0:17:35.640 were more your vibe? Well, uh, I think you would 0:17:35.680 --> 0:17:40.040 continue cutting costs uh and I think this is we're 0:17:40.040 --> 0:17:42.120 getting to one of the most fucked up crazy things 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:45.719 of this whole story. So Union Carbide, to their credit, 0:17:45.800 --> 0:17:47.920 did make some concessions for the health and well being 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:51.160 of their Indian employees. It provided them with twice yearly 0:17:51.240 --> 0:17:54.200 medical exams from the plant doctor, which sounds sounds great. 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:56.560 They did some year in tests that sounds like some 0:17:56.640 --> 0:17:59.960 bare minimum stuff that never happens. It was. It was 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:02.560 a little less than bare minimum because while they were 0:18:02.600 --> 0:18:05.359 given blood and urine tests, workers were never actually given 0:18:05.359 --> 0:18:09.639 the results of their exams. UH. Union Carbide India management 0:18:09.640 --> 0:18:12.359 put out brochures advising employees that they could develop a 0:18:12.440 --> 0:18:15.520 resistance to poison by drinking six or seven glasses of 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:17.680 milk per day and eating a lot of fish and eggs. 0:18:18.240 --> 0:18:23.120 What milk? What is the logic behind that? Is it? 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:26.160 It's just like I'm like a mommy thing like shut 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:28.119 up and drink your milk and there's no way and 0:18:28.200 --> 0:18:33.000 you'll never die. By this, Union Carbide knows that the 0:18:33.040 --> 0:18:34.800 plant's not going to be there forever. They've got a 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:37.199 couple of years more and they're gonna gradually kind of 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:39.240 like pull all the assets out of it and shut 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:42.959 it down, and they the unions are agitating for expensive 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:46.400 work to make the plant safe and stop killing workers 0:18:46.440 --> 0:18:49.400 and stuff. So this was sort of a delaying tactic. 0:18:49.600 --> 0:18:51.240 We're not going to give them any money or better 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:54.520 medical care. Tell them to drink milk again, so over 0:18:54.560 --> 0:18:59.560 the top villainous. Yeah, it's really fucked up, Like you 0:18:59.600 --> 0:19:03.280 can pick you're someone in a gigantic like money thrown thing, like, 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:05.879 just tell them to drink milk. I don't care, and 0:19:06.520 --> 0:19:12.280 drink milk. It's amazing. Did they provide the milk? Why 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:15.919 would you do that? No, of course not hate it. Yeah, 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:18.359 it's awful. And at the same time, by the time 0:19:18.400 --> 0:19:21.240 we're through with this, you'll barely remember that because of 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:25.200 how fucked up everything else is like this fucking story. 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:28.199 By the end of two most of the original m 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:31.840 I C operators had resigned workers from other union carbide 0:19:31.840 --> 0:19:34.320 plants without the proper training and experience to work with 0:19:34.359 --> 0:19:37.159 such a dangerous chemical, were brought in to manage the plant. 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:42.200 They received fourteen days of training. That's clearly enough, jeez. 0:19:43.119 --> 0:19:45.960 Due to fears of industrial espionage, these new workers did 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:48.280 not have access to manuals that told them how to 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:51.520 do their job. Only the manager could access the manual, 0:19:51.760 --> 0:19:54.560 which was of course printed in English, a language not 0:19:54.680 --> 0:20:00.440 spoken by the majority of the workers. Cool. Cool, I mean, 0:20:00.480 --> 0:20:03.040 I mean it seems fair to I love a good 0:20:03.359 --> 0:20:07.800 tale of oppressing the poor, especially when it's being done 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:11.480 by evil, wet American like milk. Oppressing the poor does 0:20:11.480 --> 0:20:14.240 a body good. That'll be funny to the three or 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:17.880 four people who remember that old milk industry campaign. I do, 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:21.080 I do remember it. Yeah, I'm still stuck on the 0:20:21.119 --> 0:20:25.240 milk thing. I mean, I just it's fucking wild. God, 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:28.840 have someone punched that up. At least have someone punch 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:32.120 up this villainy. It's it's coming in a little stale 0:20:32.160 --> 0:20:35.560 for me a little bit. Yeah. At this point, the 0:20:35.640 --> 0:20:39.119 union card by plant in Bopaul was already dangerously ill maintained, 0:20:39.160 --> 0:20:42.480 as I think we've established, But company management decided there 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:45.320 were still more costs to be cut. They started slashing 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:48.280 worker training even more. According to a U. C. Davis 0:20:48.320 --> 0:20:51.800 paper by Ingrid Eckerman on working conditions in the plant quote, 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:55.720 during the training period, technicians were treated as casual workers. 0:20:55.760 --> 0:20:58.359 After the training, they were only paid an hourly rate. 0:20:58.760 --> 0:21:00.720 A technician who accepted a job at the m I 0:21:00.760 --> 0:21:03.479 C plant got a paper about receiving six months of training, 0:21:03.520 --> 0:21:05.520 but after five weeks he was asked to stop the 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:08.639 training and to take charge as a full fledged plant operator. 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:11.879 In the matter of promotions, individuals with little experience but 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:15.679 with unquestioning loyalty to the bosses were invariably selected before others. 0:21:15.880 --> 0:21:18.680 A demand for extra safety precautions led to warnings that 0:21:18.720 --> 0:21:22.119 appointments could be terminated in nineteen eight three. In nineteen 0:21:22.160 --> 0:21:25.120 eighty four, there were personnel reductions in order to cut costs. 0:21:25.320 --> 0:21:28.800 Workers were encouraged to take early retirement. Three hundred temporary 0:21:28.800 --> 0:21:31.680 workers were laid off and another hundred fifty permanent workers 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:33.560 were put in a pool to be assigned to jobs 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.240 as needed. The operating shifts were cut from twelve to 0:21:36.320 --> 0:21:39.520 six and maintenance shifts from six to two. So they 0:21:39.560 --> 0:21:41.760 just cut out two thirds of the maintenance shifts. Like, 0:21:41.800 --> 0:21:43.960 we don't need that on this deadly poison, right, we 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:48.720 don't need anyone checking our work. No, they're okay, So 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:52.600 do we know? Like what what am I trying to say? 0:21:52.800 --> 0:21:56.439 I like, are are they dodging existing labor laws? Or 0:21:56.640 --> 0:21:59.840 are the labor laws in India at this time uh, 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:02.800 sort of allowing this to happen, or is the company 0:22:02.840 --> 0:22:06.959 having to sort of like dodge around stuff. Both of 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:12.080 those things are simultaneously true. So they are skirting some 0:22:12.160 --> 0:22:16.720 laws and regulations, primarily about safety. Um, and they're able 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:18.800 to get away with it because of their connections in 0:22:18.840 --> 0:22:21.280 the Indian government and because of the amount of money 0:22:21.320 --> 0:22:23.880 that that this all represents. So both of those things 0:22:23.880 --> 0:22:27.360 are true. Um. You know what else is true, Jamie? 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:31.240 What's true? Robert? None of the sponsors of this show 0:22:31.480 --> 0:22:36.800 have contributed to an industrial disaster of the ski Can 0:22:36.840 --> 0:22:40.600 you be so sure, Robert? This is a terrible ad player. 0:22:43.000 --> 0:22:47.000 These advertisers are not guilty of any major disaster that 0:22:47.080 --> 0:22:50.320 we're currently aware of. Of course, this is always subject 0:22:50.320 --> 0:22:53.800 to change, and it's entirely possible the next ad will 0:22:53.800 --> 0:22:56.200 be a Coke Industries ad. And one of the things 0:22:56.240 --> 0:22:58.760 Coke Industry has gotten attacked for is that at their 0:22:58.760 --> 0:23:01.320 oil refining plants they were doing the same thing that 0:23:01.359 --> 0:23:03.560 Bow Paul was doing, where they were giving people screenings 0:23:03.560 --> 0:23:05.639 through levels of toxic chemicals in their blood, but not 0:23:05.680 --> 0:23:07.639 giving them the results of their blood tests, and so 0:23:07.720 --> 0:23:10.800 people died because they got sick. But Coke industries wanted 0:23:10.840 --> 0:23:12.600 to ring a little bit of extra productivity out of 0:23:12.640 --> 0:23:15.120 them before they went to get treated. Yeah, how fun. 0:23:15.640 --> 0:23:19.679 How fun? So if if the AD is for coke industries, 0:23:19.920 --> 0:23:23.280 they have in fact contributed to industrial disasters on a 0:23:23.320 --> 0:23:29.400 significant scale. But you know, Dick pills, haven't Yeah, Dick pills. 0:23:29.880 --> 0:23:31.960 Do you do brain pills? We just turned down brain 0:23:32.119 --> 0:23:34.440 We don't do brain pills. I won't do brain pills. 0:23:34.520 --> 0:23:37.840