gallery

Click thumbnails to enlarge.

Set 5: Palomares Then and Now

Photo credit (1966 photos): Lewis Melson
Photo credit (2007 photos): Barbara Moran

1966: Palomares	1966: A closer shot of a Palomares house
1966: Villagers picking tomatoes, a key crop in Palomares	1966: Children picking tomatoes. Tomatoes that were contaminated with alpha radiation were cleaned off and fed to airmen.
1966: A typical house in the area	2007: The road into Palomares
2007: Typical street in Palomares	2007: Though some older farmhouses remain, this is a typical modern house.
2007: Palomares has become a resort destination for European tourists. Construction was booming when I visited in 2007.	2007: Zone 2, the most contaminated area. Several months before I visited, the Spanish government put a chain-link fence around the area. A farmer's field is to the left, adjacent to the fence. The Mediterranean Sea and construction cranes are in the far distance.