Declassified Porton Down Cold War Biological Warfare film - The Lyme Bay Trials

The declassified MRE Porton Down film - The Lyme Bay Trials - records a significant piece of UK/US/CAN Cold War Biological Warfare (BW) experimentation. During the years 1963-1975, UK military scientists from the Microbiological Research Establishment conducted at least 113 large-scale germ warfare 'attacks' on the southern coast of England. These 'attacks' used huge amounts of live bacteria (known as BW simulants because they were judged to be harmless, rather than real 'hot' BW agents which obviously could not be used in a populated area).

The trials procedure was for the spray ship (ETV ICEWHALE) to sail a straight line cross-wind track across Lyme Bay, all the while spraying massive amounts of two types of live bacteria from equipment mounted on its stern. The resulting massive (Porton's own description) bacterial aerosol cloud was carried onshore by the prevailing wind - where mobile teams of Porton scientists attempted to sample the cloud as it travelled up to 50 miles inland.

Two types of live bacteria were released in these field trials: E coli MRE162; and, Bacillus subtilius var niger (aka Bacillus globigii or BG).

MRE Porton Down obtained the Bacillus globigii from the US Army Biological Warfare Laboratory at Fort Detrick. In 2004, the US Institute of Medicine (part of the US National Academy of Sciences) identified Bacillus globigii as a human pathogen (capable of causing disease in humans).

The second type of live bacteria that was used in the Lyme Bay Trials, E.coli MRE162, was isolated from a toilet bowl at Porton Down during 1949, and given the MRE culture collection number 162. An Independent Review of the possible health effects of those exposed to the bacterial aerosols found that any infections caused by the release of the massive amounts of bacteria would probably have been restricted to individuals who were particularly susceptible to disease [the very young, the old, and people with an underlying illness], and were most likely to have been chest infections (or possibly blood infections) caused by the inhalation of E.coli MRE 162.

particularly susceptible to disease [the very young, the old, and people with an underlying illness],

Sound familiar? West Nile? Avian Flu? Now there's a "Summer Flu"? Really? A Summer Flu?

I guess big-pharma wasn't making enough $$ off of the winter-variety so they had to go and release a new warm-weather strain


Thanks for the topic and vid OP. * und F for you

Fascinating piece of history. I drive regularly from Exeter to Poole and back across Lyme Bay and hope we have no further tests whilst I am rocketing past.

There was a village called Tyneham in that area which during the war was evacuated and used purely to train the troops and the inhabitants never went back to live there. It is occasionally open to the public and worth taking a picnic as its a beautiful spot but a bit eerie.

One can't help wondering how many of these bacterial illnesses have found their way out from laboratories?

reply to post by TXRabbit


There's a summer flu now? It really makes you wonder what % of non historical (new since we had the capability to manufacture diseases/illnesses) are really from nature and not spread by TPTB for whatever reasons they have...

reply to post by spolcyc88


I read recently that vaccines against polio in India appear to actually be spreading that disease. I still worry about the horrendous amount of injections a baby, with its immune system is subjected to. So much of this seem to be arbitrary today and with so many politicians with links to the big pharma companies, I think we do have reason to wonder if our health is truly being protected.

zero lift,

is there an NA reference for the document describing the WV787 LIDAR BW trials ? Or was the data obtained via an FOI ? I've seen the NA docs regarding the earlier spray trials but not heard of the LIDAR trials - interested to learn more.

regards

abadonna

I still remain a believer that Lyme's disease, found in certain regions of the Northeast US, was a concocted pathological warfare bacteria specifically tested on the local animals and spread to humans through the last few decades

Since I don't believe in coincidence...I will say the name seems all too familiar.


I've read about both sides of the coin and still think it wasn't supposed to "get out".

Nice find.