Spain – Nuclear Weapon Accident

Before dawn on January 17, 1966, the six-year-old author was asleep in the

Buffalo, New York suburb of North Tonawanda. Simultaneously, two US planes
collided over the Iberian Peninsula during a mid-air refueling operation
between a B-52 bomber and a KC-135 tanker. The B-52 was completing one of
the US Air Force’s Strategic Air Command’s daily armed surveillance
routes. In a matter of seconds, three thermonuclear bombs fell to the land,
and a fourth fell into water, near Palomares, a village located about two
kilometers west of the Mediterranean, in Almeria, Andalucía, Spain. All of
that happened, before I got vertical that day. Two bombs were destroyed
upon impact, although neither produced a nuclear explosion. Instead,
several kg of plutonium (Pu) dusted the tomato fields and residences of
Palomares on a windy day. A local resident found another bomb, largely
intact with its opened parachute. However, the last bomb was somewhere deep
in the Mediterranean, instantly redirecting the Air Force’s top priority
into using all resources available on the critical mission: find the lost
bomb before the Soviets can do so. The successful recovery became the
narrative of Palomares, amplified by the two nations and in the world
press. Today, photos of the recovered bomb onboard the USS Petrel are some
of the most common internet images of Palomares.

 Beyond Nuclear 5th April 2026 

 https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2026/04/05/palomares-remembered/