Project Merlin: Unlocking Britain’s Nuclear Secrets

When a medal was finally announced for nuclear test veterans there were some who were inexplicably left out - the crews who flew through the mushroom clouds of foreign powers on secret intelligence gathering operations. Even when it was extended, the men of 543 and 27 Squadrons were still only partially recognised. Now Merlin is throwing up more evidence of how even the crews who stayed behind in...

Politicians get a bad rap but today Susie and Jon are joined by two backbenchers who have been instrumental in securing justice for the nuclear veterans. Rebecca Long-Bailey and Emma Lewell have grilled ministers, arranged debates, and got under the bonnet of government to force Whitehall to address the evidence being discovered by campaigners.  All the historic documents shown onscreen or in cred...

The British government always said it would compensate nuclear veterans, if they could provide evidence they were harmed. Neil Sampson was the lead solicitor who battled to do just that in 2007, in a legal process that stymied and blocked his best efforts but led to the creation of the newly-opened Merlin database. Together with lawyer Oli Troen, who is helping veterans with a fresh legal fight ov...

Radiation was weaponised because nuclear bombs could contaminate people and landscapes for decades. Yet the British government has always denied there was a genetic hazard to taking part in its Cold War bomb tests. Papers uncovered by investigative journalist Susie Boniface, and now found on the Merlin database behind national security, show that chief biologist John Butterfield knew there were ge...

In this episode Susie Boniface is joined by Charlotte Hennessy, founding member of the campaign group Hillsborough Law Now and whose father Jimmy was among the 97 killed in the Hillsborough disaster, and Professor Lydia Hayes of the Centre for People's Justice. We discuss how the fight for truth and justice led to the creation of the Hillsborough Law to stop future scandals, and the connection...

In 1953, Britain detonated two atomic weapons in the Outback of South Australia. The purpose was to test how much plutonium was too much for the bomb to work properly. But after one blast an oily black mist was seen rolling across the landscape, covering Aboriginal camps with greasy ash, poisoning waterholes, and killing the wildlife. In the wake of it, Yami Lester went blind. Decades later he hea...

For decades the UK government said there was no fallout at Christmas Island after its nuclear weapons tests. Then a whistleblower came forward, spurred on by Project Merlin, to reveal they had the evidence all along, and had covered it up. First reported by Susie, she and Jon discuss the ramifications of the whistleblower's secret report with veteran John Morris and Professor Kevin Ruane of Ca...

William Russia was a family man raising his grandchildren in the projects of Cincinnati when he contracted lung cancer, and unwittingly became one of the last subjects in a horrifying human radiation experiment conducted by US doctors, and believed to have been settled in the 1990s. Now research in the top secret Merlin database has found a link to the British military which was sharing informatio...

Once upon a time, it was necessary to have a weapon that could unleash hell. After American atomic scientists won the arms race, Britain was frozen out and decided to make one of her own. A project run on a shoestring in total secrecy led to a massive naval flotilla travelling to the Monte Bello Islands off the north west coast of Australia. Eric Waterfield was one of the Royal Engineers among the...

When the Soviet Union detonated the 50-megaton Tsar Bomba weapon in 1962, the world was horrified at its immense size and power - but relieved when it seemed that there was limited radioactive fallout. Now research in the Merlin database has found that a secret Whitehall committee knew toxic dust was blowing across the British Isles, and decided not to tell anyone. Special guests Alice Shadbolt an...

Campaigners and nuclear descendants Steve Purse and Alan Owen join Jon and Susie to discuss the 70-year fight for the truth about what happened to their dads at the UK’s nuclear weapons tests. David Purse and James Owen served at the same time, but 4,000 miles apart - one at Christmas Island in the Pacific where he witnessed 24 hydrogen bombs in 78 days, and another in the Australian Outback at Ma...

Historian Dr Jon Hogg and investigative reporter Susie Boniface introduce their ground-breaking research project at the Centre for People’s Justice at the University of Liverpool. After 70 years of fighting for the truth about their exposure to radiation at Britain’s nuclear weapons tests, veterans and families were resigned to injustice. After Susie uncovered a secret blood testing programme, hid...