Palomares is an agricultural, fishing, and tourist town along the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...

in the

Almería Almería (, , ) is a city and municipality of Spain, located in Andalusia. It is the capital of the province of the same name. It lies on southeastern Iberia on the Mediterranean Sea. Caliph Abd al-Rahman III founded the city in 955. The city g ...

province of

Andalusia Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a "historical nationality". The ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

. It is about

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of the vertical distance ( height, elevation or altitude) of a location in reference to a historic mean sea level taken as a vertical datum. In geodesy, it is formalized as '' orthometric heights''. Th ...

. The village falls within the municipality of

Cuevas del Almanzora Cuevas del Almanzora is a municipality of Almería province, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Villages * Alhanchete * Aljarilla * Barrio Bravo * Burjulú * Cala Panizo * El Calguerín (also known as Cuevas de Vera) * El Ca ...

. The ruins of ''El Artial'' lie just outside the village.

Crashes of a B-52 and a KC-135 in 1966

The town is noted for a fatal accident in 1966 in which a

B-52 Stratofortress The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is an American long-range, subsonic, jet-powered strategic bomber. The B-52 was designed and built by Boeing, which has continued to provide support and upgrades. It has been operated by the United States Air ...

of the

Strategic Air Command Strategic Air Command (SAC) was both a United States Department of Defense Specified Command and a United States Air Force (USAF) Major Command responsible for command and control of the strategic bomber and intercontinental ballistic missile ...

crashed after a midair collision with a

KC-135 Stratotanker The Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker is an American military aerial refueling aircraft that was developed from the Boeing 367-80 prototype, alongside the Boeing 707 airliner. It is the predominant variant of the C-135 Stratolifter family of trans ...

plane, causing

radioactive contamination Radioactive contamination, also called radiological pollution, is the deposition of, or presence of radioactive substances on surfaces or within solids, liquids, or gases (including the human body), where their presence is unintended or undesirab ...

after its payload of four

hydrogen bomb A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a lowe ...

s (H-bombs) was dispersed and crashed. There were four

thermonuclear weapon A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a lo ...

s in the bomber. The high-explosive igniters in two of these bombs detonated on impact, spreading radioactive material, including deadly

plutonium-239 Plutonium-239 (239Pu or Pu-239) is an isotope of plutonium. Plutonium-239 is the primary fissile isotope used for the production of nuclear weapons, although uranium-235 is also used for that purpose. Plutonium-239 is also one of the three mai ...

, over a wide area of the Spanish countryside, but safety mechanisms and electronics prevented nuclear explosions. The third H-bomb landed via

parachute A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, w ...

into a stream, where it was relatively intact and was recovered. The fourth H-bomb landed in the

, and

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

searchers took three months to find and recover the device intact. A large amount of contaminated Spanish soil was soon removed, packed up, and shipped across the Atlantic for burial near

Barnwell, South Carolina Barnwell is a city in and county seat of Barnwell County, South Carolina, United States, located along U.S. Route 278. The population was 4,750 at the 2010 census. Geography Barnwell is located east of the center of Barnwell County at (33.2445 ...

, the site of a large installation of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. In 2001, the Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas (CIEMAT) still detected measurable levels of the radioactive elements

plutonium Plutonium is a radioactive chemical element with the symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exh ...

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

, and

americium Americium is a synthetic radioactive chemical element with the symbol Am and atomic number 95. It is a transuranic member of the actinide series, in the periodic table located under the lanthanide element europium, and thus by analogy was n ...

over of Palomares. Annual monitoring by American and Spanish researchers has found no evidence of health problems, or of any contaminated food or water resulting from these crashes. Nevertheless, some areas remain contaminated and they cannot be disturbed. Although they are fenced off for safety, the result is that the region is emotionally blighted, and it has missed out on tourist developments like those in most other coastal towns. On 19 October 2015, Spain and the United States signed a statement of intent to discuss further cleanup of this area. Eventually, the United States agreed to remove additional contaminated soil from Palomares to a safe burial site in the United States. The crashes are explored by American author

Charles Bukowski Henry Charles Bukowski ( ; born Heinrich Karl Bukowski, ; August 16, 1920 – March 9, 1994) was a German-American poet, novelist, and short story writer. His writing was influenced by the social, cultural, and economic ambience of his adopted ...

in his short story "Politics is like Trying to Screw a Cat in the Ass".

References

Populated places in the Province of Almería Towns in Spain Radioactively contaminated areas {{Almería-geo-stub