Reprinted from Environmentalists Against War, May 19, 2018

The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life, by Arthur Firstenberg, is not only a marvelous opus. It is one of those once-in-a-millennium books that turn into classics.

Easy to read, hard to put down, sublimely poetic and scientifically rigorous, with a bibliography almost one-third the size of the book itself, this is a history of electricity which has never been told. It’s not only that it has been written from an environmental and biological point of view; nor that it’s mostly unspoken reverence for life is so understated that its power is hard to resist.

In the end, the power of this book lies in the meticulous care with which the author has done his research, corroborated his data and revealed his stunning findings.

We rediscover not only the ancient Chinese Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine but western doctors and scientists from the 1700s to the present day: what they’ve had to say about electricity, how it has been harnessed, and which direction it has taken in the west and in the east.

We meet Yuri Grigoriev, first assigned to research the biological effects of atomic weapons at the Institute of Biophysics in the former Soviet Union before going on to write a book about the dangers of microwave radiation from cell phone use; Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtalnd, three-time Prime Minister of Norway and former head of the World Health Organization who banned cell phones from her office for health reasons; and Dr. Samuel Milham, who showed that rural electrification caused a shocking increase in cancer rates during the 1950s.

In light of imminent plans to bring us all 5G cell phone technology on the ground and to launch thousands of satellites into space to provide wireless Internet on a global scale, The Invisible Rainbow could not have arrived at a better time.

Expecting to read about the groundbreaking work on the bioeffects of non-inonizing radiation by scientists like Martin Blank, author of Overpowered, I instead found new, comprehensive, and thoroughly documented information dating back to the 1700s.

Prior to 1889, for example, we learn that influenza epidemics occurred not annually but years or decades apart and were highly correlated with sunspots, and that the 1889 pandemic of influenza, which altered that pattern occurred in the exact year the widespread use of alternating current began.

“In that year exactly,” Firstenberg writes, “the natural magnetic activity of the earth began to be suppressed.” The earth’s magnetic field now bore, for the first time in history, the imprint of power line frequencies and their harmonics. The marvelous harnessing of electricity for humans had begun but it had a byproduct: certain precautionary measures could perhaps have been taken but were not. Each step in that development had important consequences.

I found the story of influenza particularly riveting. We go on to learn that in 1918, the radio era began, ushered in by the 1918 Spanish Influenza pandemic. The radar era, we learn, began in 1957 with the building of hundreds of powerful radar stations in the northern hemisphere “hurling millions of watts of microwave energy skyward;” low-frequency components of these waves rode on magnetic field lines to the southern hemisphere as well.

The radar era was ushered in by the Asian Flu pandemic of 1957. In 1968, we learn the satellite era began with the launch of dozens of satellites “with relatively weak broadcast power but since they were already up in the magnetosphere they had as big an effect on it as the small amount of radiation that had managed to enter it from sources on the ground.” The satellite era was ushered in by the 1968 Hong Kong Flu pandemic.

At the end of the twentieth century came the beginning of the wireless era and the establishment of the High Frequency Auroral Research Program (HAARP). Firstenberg describes the environmental effects of these two technological developments in depth. He brings together history, epidemiology, and cutting edge science, but he does much more. He goes to the heart of his subject, documenting the path that led to the public health crises we are facing today.

Brilliantly researched, The Invisible Rainbow explains why cancer, diabetes and heart disease rose from their previous rarity to become major killers of humanity, painting a vivid picture of what is happening at the cellular level in terms everyone can understand.

The author is uniquely situated to write such a book, perhaps by temperament, certainly by education, fate and circumstance. A top student whose medical career was cut short by injury from x-ray overdose, the author experienced firsthand, in the early 1980s, the effects of radiation poisoning, and experienced them again in 1996 with the advent of widespread commercial cell phone use. He was not alone. As he has carefully documented, millions of people were affected.

Firstenberg writes with a passion and tenacity that only a man with his particular background could summon. This is science at its best, supported by an untold personal story that few of us know or could imagine. That Firstenberg could write such a remarkable book under the appalling conditions in which he has lived for over three decades is astounding.

Rarely do we see such an unusual and integrated work of both art and science, augmented with tables, line graphs, historic etchings and contemporary photographs. Centuries of forgotten knowledge and the careers of important scientists — from Isaac Newton to Luigi Galvani to Albert Szent-Gyorgyi to Robert Becker — are woven into an unforgettable story.

The story of electricity and its previously ignored effects on humans, plants, animals and the earth’s magnetosphere open the door to a better, more informed future. Despite thousands of peer-reviewed scientific studies, much of the population is presently unaware of this issue.

This book is an awakening: perhaps the equivalent to the Yellow Emperor’s Classic for our age of electricity. Buy the book and read it. You just might come to realize that your life and

Consigli per governi, legislatori, organizzazioni ambientaliste, scuole e leader religiosi, politici e comunitari. Se la vostra organizzazione desidera unirsi al sostegno di questo documento, inviateci un e-mail a : info@cellphonetaskforce.org

DOCUMENTO DI POLITICA GENERALE SULL’ELETTROSMOG

Cellular Phone Task Force (L’unita’ operativo su i telefoni cellulari)

_________

Sostenuto da :

World Council for Health Antwerpen Niew Society 4.0 Three Aunties, Inc. (Floride) Ethical Environmental Consulting (Colombie-Britannique, Canada) National Toxic Encephalopathy Foundation MCS Advocacy.com Asociación Vallisoletana de Afectad@s por las Antenas de Telecomunicaciones(Espagne) Vägbrytaren (Suède) Longmont for Safe Technology (Colorado) Nailsworth 5G Action Group (UK) Teslabel Coordination (Belgique) Smart Meter Education Network PEACE School (Ontario, Canada) APNEK Tunisia Prévention des Ondes Électromagnétiques (POEM26), la Drôme, France Massachusetts for Safe Technology Interconnections (Royaume-Uni) Alliance for Microwave Radiation Accountability (New York) Toxics Information Project (Rhode Island) Rhode Islanders for Safe Technology 5G Free Rhode Island Southwest Pennsylvania for Safe Technology Asociación de Afectados de Navarra por Campos Electromagnéticos (Espagne) Families for Safe Technology (Eugene, Oregon) Le Vaud sans antennes (Suisse) Robin des Toits (France) Association pour une Espace Protégé des Ondes Hertziennes (AEPOH) (France) Folkets Strälevern (Norway) Elektrosmog a zdravie (Slovaquie)

PUNTI CHIAVE

Lo studio dell’elettricità deve essere riportato alla biologia e alla medicina.

La comunicazione personale senza fili deve essere eliminata perché le radiazioni che trasportano tutti i messaggi stanno distruggendo la vita sulla Terra.

I telefoni cellulari devono essere sostituiti con telefoni fissi, il WiFi sostituito con cavi ethernet e altri dispositivi di consumo senza fili con dispositivi collegati con fili e cavi.

Le antenne e i tralicci della telefonia mobile devono essere gradualmente eliminati e rimossi.

La tecnologia wireless deve essere rimossa dai veicoli. I contatori intelligenti devono essere sostituiti da contatori analogici.

Le autostrade intelligenti (smart city), le città intelligenti (smart city) e l’Internet delle cose devono cessare di essere sviluppati e distribuiti.

Le stazioni radar devono essere limitate in numero, posizione e potenza.

I forni radar (a microonde) non devono essere utilizzati per riscaldare gli alimenti.

È necessario redigere un trattato internazionale sull’elettrosmog, che affronti le radiazioni sulla terraferma, negli oceani e nello spazio.

Introduction

Electrosmog is the totality of the electric fields, magnetic fields, and electromagnetic radiation that bathes us 24/7 from all electrical and electronic devices, electric wires, power lines, and wireless devices and antennas. With wired communication, information is transmitted via the wires, and the electromagnetic fields (EMFs) and radiation are unintentional. Proper engineering can reduce these unwanted fields and radiation to a minimum.

By contrast, with wireless communication, the radiation is the product. Radiation substitutes for wires in transmitting information. Wireless means radiation. The ability to use a mobile device everywhere on earth means that every square meter of the earth must be irradiated at all times. Mobile devices operate in the microwave spectrum, with the result that the entire planet is now swimming in a sea of microwave radiation that is millions to billions of times stronger than the radiation from the sun and stars with which life evolved (1).

Life is based not only on chemistry but more fundamentally on electricity (2, 3). The unimpeded flow of electrons is essential to the functioning of our nerves, heart, and metabolism (3). Interference with these electric currents causes neurological diseases, heart disease, metabolic diseases such as diabetes, and cancer (4). Organisms that have a very high metabolism, such as bees and other insects, are being wiped out (5, 6). Thousands of studies document the devastating effects of wireless radiation on mammals, birds, insects, amphibians, and forests (7).

Because EMFs are not a foreign substance to living beings, a toxicology model does not apply and there is not a dose response: reducing the power does not reduce the effect. Even a signal that is almost immeasurably weak can interfere with normal biological functioning (8). “While the dose rate/SAR concept is adequate for description of acute thermal effects, it is not applicable for chronic exposures to N[on]T[hermal] M[icro]W[aves].” (9). Even at near-zero power levels, microwave radiation has been found to change the structure of DNA (10) and alter brain waves (11). Some studies have even found an inverse dose response. When the power of the radiation was reduced 1000-fold, damage to the blood-brain barrier increased (12). A review of 113 studies found that radiation with the lowest power tended to cause the greatest ecological damage (5). In another review of 108 experimental studies, a lower exposure level tended to have a greater biological effect, and the difference was highly significant (p < 0.001) (13).

The damage done to our health and our world by wireless devices and their infrastructure is caused not only by the microwave carrier frequencies, but also by the low-frequency modulation and pulsations that carry the transmitted information. “Thus modulation can be considered as information content embedded in the higher frequency carrier wave that may have health consequences beyond any effect from the carrier wave directly” (14). No matter what the carrier wave, the modulation is the same because it has to carry the same information. Therefore using light as the carrier wave, as is being done over short distances with LiFi, or using sound as the carrier wave, as is being done in the oceans, does not reduce the harm.

The finding that only a single two-hour exposure to a mobile phone during their lifetime, even when the power of the phone was reduced

DON’T IRRADIATE THE BIRDS!

In mid-October 2019, the Maui Forest Bird Recovery Project (MFBRP), in cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the State of Hawai’i, The Nature Conservancy, the American Bird Conservancy, Pacific Bird Conservation, and San Diego Zoo Global, attached VHF radio transmitters to a harness on the legs of 10 kiwikiu before releasing them into the Nakula Natural Area Reserve, on the southern slope of Haleakalā volcano. Kiwikiu, a species of honeycreepers found only on Maui, are critically endangered. They are small, weighing less than an ounce. Fewer than 150  of these intelligent, long-lived little birds remain.

The birds — some captive-raised and some wild — were released into the forest between October 27 and October 30, 2019. By November 16, every bird was dead except the three who had succeeded in removing or disabling their transmitter. The details are shocking.

Seven wild kiwikiu were captured from the Hanawī Natural Area Reserve and transported to aviaries in the Nakula reserve on the morning of October 17 in preparation for release in the proposed new bird sanctuary. One of the birds, number WILD9, received his transmitter on October 29. He had been strong and healthy prior to that moment, but as soon as it was attached, he hopped onto the ground and stayed still on the floor. Half an hour later, he tucked his head under his wing. Bird Recovery staff then removed the transmitter, but he did not recover. He continued to sit quietly on his perch, and was found dead the next morning.

Another wild bird, number WILD10, received her transmitter on October 26. She attacked the harness holding it onto her ferociously, bit it apart, and removed it. It was found on the ground on October 28. Later on October 28, the Bird Recovery team put a new transmitter on her. On October 29, she was lethargic and not eating. On October 30, she was “fluffed and inactive.”  She was found dead on the morning of October 31.

The other five wild-captured kiwikiu were released into the Nakula reserve with their transmitters intact. WILD5 died on November 11. WILD8 died on November 5. WILD11 died on November 16. WILD7 removed his transmitter on November 8, and he was last observed, doing well, on November 12. WILD1 succeeded in disabling his transmitter the day after his release, and he was observed, doing well, with the harness still attached to his legs, on November 24. He eventually removed the harness as well and was observed again, doing well, on July 23, 2021, 632 days after his release into the forest.  

Five captive-bred kiwikiu were also part of the project. They had all been raised in bird conservation breeding centers on Maui and Hawai’i, and were between 5 and 18 years old. Two of these birds died during the two-week preparation for release, although they had thrived for years in the bird conservation centers. Bird number MP022 received his transmitter on October 29. Like WILD9, he hopped onto the ground and stayed on the floor after his transmitter was attached, but unlike WILD9 he rolled onto his side and kept on attacking the transmitter with his beak until finally he got his mandible stuck in the harness. Staff removed the transmitter and released him into the Nakula reserve without it, but he did not recover and died on November 2. Bird number MP026 was released with his transmitter on October 29 and died on November 5. Bird number MP023 was released with his transmitter on October 28, and succeeded in removing his transmitter the following day after being observed “moving on a direct path out of Nakula NAR.” Presumably he flew as far away from his captors as he could. Bird number MP027 also survived because he was not released with a transmitter. This bird had had a transmitter attached in a previous trial on April 8, and immediately lay on his back on the floor of his cage and did not move. Seeing this, staff removed his transmitter after only a few minutes. On October 23 they attached a transmitter to him again briefly but decided not to include him in the experiment and returned him to the Maui conservation center where he was still alive and well as of the date of publication of the MFBRP report on March 15, 2021.

The writers of the report attributed every kiwikiu death to malaria, despite the facts, stated in the report, that malaria had never before been found in birds in the conservation breeding centers or the Hanawī reserve where all the birds came from; that malaria had never been known to infect more than about 10 or 15 percent of any population of honeycreepers; that malaria does not kill all birds it infects and honeycreepers are known to develop resistance to it; that other parasites were also found in the birds; and that the average time from first symptoms to death for the birds in this project was “1-2 days” which is not typical of malaria. Two “large, healthy male kiwikiu” died within hours of their first signs of reduced activity. The authors of the study wrote:

“[I]t was not clear if these birds could have contracted the disease in Nakula NAR as these birds developed symptoms more rapidly than is typical and died more rapidly than has been reported for other honeycreepers.” 

They went on to speculate:

“The necropsies found parasites in multiple organ systems indicating a severe systemic infection that had moved out of the blood stream into other tissues. This could be the result of increased replication of the malaria parasite following some change in the immune system of the birds, such as in response to environmental stress.”

The environmental stress that they did not consider was the radiation from the VHF transmitters that they attached to the birds. Even after discovering that the bird who disabled his transmitter less than one day after his release was

Number of planned low-orbit satellites NOW EXCEEDS ONE MILLION

On Sunday, SpaceX launched 23 satellites from Cape Canaveral in the morning, and 22 more from Vandenberg Air Force Base in the evening. This brought the total number of operating satellites irradiating the Earth to about 8,800.

SpaceX has been sending up satellite-laden rockets every few days this year, in its haste to satisfy an insatiable demand for bandwidth by the billions of human beings who use cell phones. But SpaceX is not the only one. Hundreds of companies are competing for a share of the global market to supply Internet from the sky to the world’s population.

On January 5, 2022, I sent out a newsletter listing 147 companies and government agencies from 34 countries that were operating, launching, or planning fleets of satellites that, if they were all launched, would total about half a million in our skies, far outnumbering the visible stars. On October 17, 2023, the journal Science, reviewing filings with the International Telecommunication Union, informed the world that the number of filings and the number of planned satellites have again more than doubled. There are more than 90 filings for constellations of over 1,000 satellites each. Twenty-three have over 5,000 satellites, and eight have over 10,000 satellites. As of December 31, 2022, the number of satellites being planned by 300 companies and governments exceeded one million. And in June, 2023, E-Space, a company based in France and founded by Greg Wyler in 2022, filed a plan for a single megaconstellation containing 116,640 satellites. E-Space had previously filed a plan, via the government of Rwanda, for an even larger constellation containing 327,320 satellites. Two days after his new filing with the ITU, Wyler clarified that “Our filing in France is in addition to our filings in Rwanda.”

Our new network, People Without Cell Phones, is more important than ever. The only way to diminish the demand for bandwidth that is turning the Earth into a giant computer, with all living beings electrocuted inside of it, is to stop using cell phones. Not to use them less frequently, but to throw them away. The ability to use them, no matter how infrequently, requires the entire planet to be irradiated. Please join our network by forming a local chapter where you live. You can set your own rules, but it is important to have meetings in person. Please contact me if you need help and let me know that you are doing it. Our goal is to establish an expanding global presence of communities that do not use cell phones. It is up to us.

Arthur Firstenberg President, Cellular Phone Task Force Author, The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life P.O. Box 6216 Santa Fe, NM 87502 USA phone: +1 505-471-0129 arthur@cellphonetaskforce.org October 17, 2023

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HUMANS, BEES AND WILDLIFE IN 2023 1 Babies are being killed by hospitals

A correspondent in North Carolina sent me this account a few days ago of a healthy newborn who was irradiated nearly to death by the hospital environment: 

“I want to relate what happened to my Goddaughter’s baby brother at the Duke Medical Center earlier this spring. Baby Emiliano was born in excellent health, but when I returned 12 hours later, he had been moved to a different room and I became concerned because I myself developed dizziness, tremor, and headache within about 5 minutes of visiting his room.

“I knew to check my RF meter because these are microwave sickness symptoms which I get when the RF levels are high. The Cornet measurements hovered between 11 and 15 milliwatts per square meter! Personally I need the RF levels below about 0.006 milliwatts per square meter, so I can’t imagine what it was doing to an infant who was only 12 hours old. When I opened the curtains I noticed there was a round 5G pole outside on the street; also straight out of his hospital window you could see a rooftop cell array that looked like several large white panels on top of another hospital building across a small green quad. You could see them clearly because the other building was shorter, which meant that the roof panels lined up horizontally nearer to the level of the baby’s window.

“By day 3, Emiliano had developed jaundice and soon was put in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, which also had very high radiation levels. While on that unit, his jaundice numbers continued to climb, and he developed a rash. I found it interesting because I developed a rash too. I developed a butterfly rash across my face and the baby had a full-body rash on one side of his body. I told the nurse that I had a 5G rash, just like the baby. She had no clue what I was talking about. She explained that lots of babies get this rash, but they don’t know what causes it.

“After several more days in the Duke Main NICU his condition continued to worsen. I was forcing myself to visit him in the hospital, despite my being horribly sick there, because I am very close with the family. My own rash would return along with the dizziness, tremor and headache every time I visited. These would go away within 12-24 hours of leaving the hospital and returning home. The baby had to stay in the radiation, though.

“After many more days in the NICU, being irradiated 24/7, the baby developed a staph infection near his tiny fingernail. The infection began spreading down his finger and they were talking about amputating his finger. By then, I had been working for days to persuade his mother to have him transferred to Duke Regional, a smaller hospital in the northern part of the city, and finally she asked to transfer him. My reason is that I knew that Regional had much lower RF levels based on her prior visit there during early contractions when she had stayed overnight and background radiation levels in the room were between 0.003 and 0.01. (Durham Regional is in a less affluent part of town, with lower-tech overall.) They transferred the baby by helicopter and the baby’s health improved immediately. Within 48 hours of being transferred away from the high radiation at Duke Medical, the rash improved dramatically, the jaundice scores declined, and the staph infection began to improve.

“The radiation levels at Regional were about a thousand times lower than at Duke Main. Also at Duke Regional there were no visible 5G poles or roof arrays outside the baby’s windows. The baby recovered fully there and is home now.”

2 Cancer in young people is skyrocketing

A review of cancer statistics in young people in 44 countries has been published by an international team of scientists. The rate of cancer in people under 50, they found, has increased dramatically in every one of those countries. The study, published in Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, is titled “Is early-onset cancer an emerging global epidemic?” The authors speculate on various possible causes for this epidemic, including diet, lifestyle, obesity, the microbiome, and genetic susceptibilities, but are forced to conclude there is no evidence that any of these factors have caused the global increase. There is one mention of ionizing radiation in a single sentence, and no mention whatsoever of RF radiation.

Investigative journalist Felice Freyer interviewed two of the study’s authors as well as six other cancer specialists from Harvard, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and Tufts University about the results of that study. I mailed her a copy of my book along with the following letter:

“I read with interest your article of July 22, 2023 in the Boston Globe titled “Rise in cancer among younger people worries and puzzles doctors.” I also read the Nature Reviews paper referred to in your article (‘Is early-onset cancer an emerging global epidemic?’).

“I too have been following the increase in certain cancers in young people, but in relation to a very specific environmental factor: radio frequency (RF) radiation from the cell phones younger people have been carrying much of their lives. There is extensive literature on this connection, including a plausible causative mechanism. I believe exposure to wireless technology, especially cell phones, is the cause of much if not most of the recent rise in cancer in young people.

“Supplementary Table 1 in the Nature Reviews study lists trends of 13 types of cancer in 44 countries. The types of cancer with a rising trend in at least 75% of those countries are cancers of precisely the organs most heavily irradiated by cell phones:

breast colorectal thyroid prostate endometrial kidney

“During use, cell phones are held either right next to the thyroid gland or

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 3, 2023

Media Contact: Kathleen Burke kathleenmariaburke@yahoo.com +1 505-255-0103 calls only

ENVIRONMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS ISSUE POLICY BRIEF ON ELECTROSMOG

with guidance to governments, legislators, environmental organizations, schools, and religious, political and community leaders.

SANTA FE, N.M. – A growing list of environmental organizations worldwide are supporting a first-ever Policy Brief on Electrosmog for global application. The brief defines electrosmog as “the totality of the electric fields, magnetic fields, and electromagnetic radiation that bathes us 24/7 from all electrical and electronic devices, electric wires, power lines, and wireless devices and antennas.”

The document was developed in response to an emergency situation in which the irradiation of the earth is accelerating at such a rapid rate that it has become the single most urgent threat to life. The recommended actions to political leaders, government agencies, etc. provide a path to health and survival.

The document opens with key points, an introduction, and a purpose statement. It proceeds to essential actions that should be taken in order to counter this threat to our future, and concludes with a list of scientific references. It outlines elements of a suggested international treaty as well as actions that should be taken by governments, schools, churches, environmental organizations and others to address this emergency. The policy brief addresses radiation on land, in the oceans, and in space, and includes recommendations about wireless technologies, radar, and satellites.

Most governments defer for guidance on electrosmog to the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) or the World Health Organization, which also defers to ICNIRP. ICNIRP is not an environmental agency but rather “a self-appointed private organization with 14 members answerable to no one”. The policy brief prescribes that “RF radiation should be regulated transparently within each nation by their own environmental agencies based on the totality of science. It should be addressed within the UN not by the World Health Organization, but by the United Nations Environment Program, which presently does not address it at all”.

The lead author of the Policy Brief on Electrosmog, Arthur Firstenberg, is an American author who is educated in mathematics, physics, and medicine, and is the author of two books on this subject: The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life (White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green 2020), published in 11 languages, and Microwaving Our Planet: The Environmental Impact of the Wireless Revolution (NY: Cellular Phone Task Force 1997). He can be reached at arthur@cellphonetaskforce.org.

Texel Island, early June, 2022

“The sky is falling! The sky is falling!” cried Chicken Little. And the sky fell, and no one listened, and all was still.

A scholarly literature search for “electromagnetic” + “biological effects” produces the astonishing number of 76,400 studies, more studies than for most other environmental threats, yet the world continues on, looking yet blind, listening yet deaf, mistaking silence for comfort, the advancing flames for a bright future.

On the Dutch island of Texel, being the south end of a line of islands separating the Wadden Sea from the North Sea, a large breeding colony of seabirds called Sandwich terns (“great terns” in Dutch) made headline news last month by dying. Of the 7,000 birds nesting in the De Petten nature reserve until the end of May, none were left by the middle of June. 3,000 avian corpses were collected, and the rest either died or abandoned their nests.

The correspondent who sent me this news, Antonia in the Netherlands, also sent me to a Dutch website that monitors all cell towers and antennas throughout the country. The tern catastrophe was being blamed on “bird flu” and she suspected something else might be going on. When I looked at the website I was floored. The first 35 dead terns at De Petten were found on May 29, 2022. There are three cell towers on the edge of the reserve, and actually in the territory which the terns inhabit. According to the website, 18 new 4G antennas had just been added to those towers – 6 by Vodafone to its 83-foot tower on May 25, 2022, and 12 by KPN to its 108-foot tower on May 29, 2022. The number of frequencies emitted by those two towers had increased overnight from 5 to 11.

In addition to having all those antennas right at the reserve, De Petten is located on the northern edge of a waterway that separates the North Sea from the Wadden Sea, and a large number of antennas on both sides of that waterway — the antennas in Den Helder to the south and the antennas on Texel to the north — are aimed at that busy waterway, which is intensely used by the ships that continually pass through it. Consequently, according to my research, there are a total of 105 4G antennas within 7 miles of De Petten that are aimed directly at it.

Were Texel’s Sandwich terns already in bad shape from all the radiation they had been exposed to in the last few years? And did the sudden increase in both the number of antennas and the number of frequencies finally kill them?

I decided to investigate further. What I have discovered, both in the Netherlands and elsewhere, is consistent but not simple. Here are some rough rules:

(a) A sudden dramatic increase in the number of antennas and frequencies whose source is within a breeding colony or on its border is lethal. Nesting birds cannot avoid the radiation; they must either abandon their nests or die.

(b) The effect of antennas aimed at a breeding colony from a distance depends on the human population. In a sparsely populated region, the antennas emit little radiation and few frequencies because few people are using them. By contrast, cell towers located in major ports are heavily used, both by residents and ships, and emit maximal radiation. The same is true of antennas aimed at heavily used shipping lanes.

(c) Distance does not matter as much as terrain and tower height. The radiation from a taller tower travels further. And when there is nothing but water between the tower and the bird colony, the water reflects and amplifies the signal and distance matters very little.

(d) 4G towers are generally worse than 5G towers. This is because 4G towers broadcast their radiation in all directions while 5G towers emit most of their radiation in focused beams, aimed directly at people holding 5G phones in their hands.

With these rules in mind, let us look at a few other breeding colonies of Sandwich terns and see what has happened to them this year:

Another large breeding colony of Sandwich terns made headlines a bit later, and for the same reason: the one at Waterdunen, at the opposite end of the Netherlands, in Zeeland province. Like De Petten, the Waterdunen nature reserve is located on a busy shipping lane at the entrance to a busy port. The largest colony of these birds in the Netherlands, Waterdunen hosted 7,000 pairs of terns that flew up from Africa to breed there this spring. But on June 24, 2022, it was reported that 4,600 dead adult and young Sandwich terns had been collected there during the previous two weeks. By the end of June, this colony no longer existed either.

The nature reserve at Waterdunen has 318 heavily-used 4G antennas aimed in its direction from distances of from 0.5 to 8 miles. Most of these emit between 1,000 and 2,000 watts of radiation each. 46 of these antennas are new, having been added to existing towers in April, May and June 2022. One 55-foot tower less than 2 miles down the beach from Waterdunen was upgraded on May 18, 2022 from 6 antennas to 12 and from 2 frequencies to 4. Another, 40-foot tower in the same location was upgraded on June 22, 2022 from 6 antennas to 18 and from 2 frequencies to 6. As Sandwich terns live on fish, those towers are within the foraging area for that colony.

Did the same thing happen to all nesting Sandwich terns in the Netherlands? No. Just 20 miles from Waterdunen was a small, healthy colony of terns at a nature reserve called Yerseke Moer. And from April to July, i.e. throughout the 2022 nesting season, this colony thrived and no dead birds were found there. Unlike De Petten and Waterdunen, this reserve is located in a relatively isolated place, is not near a major

Horse named Lost in Limbo dies at Churchill Downs

RACEHORSES AT CHURCHILL DOWNS

Racehorses are among the most finely tuned, exquisitely sensitive creatures on earth. So what happens when you give them all cell phones to wear during a race? They start dropping like… well, horses.

That is exactly what started happening this spring at Churchill Downs in Louisville, home of the world-famous Kentucky Derby. Churchill Downs hosts three “meets” every year during which there are horse races four to five days a week — a spring meet lasting all of May and June; a September meet; and a fall meet throughout November. The spring meet this year at the Downs began on April 29 and was to continue until July 3. And beginning on April 29, and in every race on every day thereafter, every horse was fitted with a device they had never worn before. It is a wireless device, shaped like an iPhone, that fits into the cloth underneath the saddle on the horse’s back. Horses also began wearing these devices this spring during morning workouts.

This STRIDESafe device monitors the horse’s movements 2,400 times per second throughout the race, sending 2,400 pulses of radio frequency (RF) radiation every second through the body of the horse. It also contains a GPS component that communicates with global positioning satellites. It also communicates with the RFID chip implanted in the left side of every horse’s neck, ensuring that the chip also emits radiation throughout the race. And because every racehorse wears horseshoes made of aluminum, which is one of the best conductors, the frequencies that are conducted from both the STRIDESafe device and the RFID chip throughout the horse’s body are absorbed and reradiated by its four shoes. Each horse, then, carries not one but six continuously radiating antennas throughout each race at Churchill Downs. So with 14 horses normally competing in each race, there are 84 antennas among animals in close proximity to one another running around the track.And on April 29, 2023, horses racing at Churchill Downs began to die during races or suffer such severe injuries during races that they were euthanized. So many horses have died this spring that on June 2 it was announced that the spring meet at the Downs would be suspended as of June 10. Officials at Churchill Downs are panicked because horses racing there have died in much larger numbers this spring than ever before. In 2022, nationwide, about 1.25 deaths occurred for every 1,000 horses starting at the gate. But since April 29, 2023, 12 deaths have occurred among just 1,600 starts at Churchill Downs, a sudden and unprecedented 8-fold increase in racehorse mortality.

Officials have carefully inspected the track and every part of the racing grounds and have found no change in any part of it from previous meets, and no reason for horses to be more prone to injury or collapse. But they have the same blind spot as the rest of society: they treat wireless devices, and the radiation they emit, as if they do not exist.

The horse named Parents Pride simply collapsed and died for no apparent reason during a race on April 29. No drugs were found in her system, and no poisons. She was running normally before the race. No abnormalities were found in her heart, brain or lungs.

Code of Kings “flipped” and broke his neck in the paddock just prior to a race and was euthanized, also on April 29. The paddock, also called the parade ring, is where horses are paraded before a race so the racegoers can get a good look at them.

Take Charge Briana suffered catastrophic damage to her right foreleg during a race on May 2 and was euthanized.

Chasing Artie completed his race on May 2 and then collapsed and died on his way to the unsaddling area, for no apparent reason.

Chloe’s Dream suffered a “catastrophic injury” to his right knee during a race on Derby Day, May 6, and was euthanized.

Freezing Point fractured his left forelimb during a race on Derby Day, May 6, and was euthanized. His jockey said that he was not bumped during the race and that the track was in good condition.

Bosque Redondo finished his race on May 13 but was taken away in a horse ambulance and was euthanized due to unspecified injuries.

Rio Moon was at the finish line of a race on May 14 when he suffered a “catastrophic injury” to his left foreleg and then was euthanized.

Swanson Lake finished his race on May 20 but was immediately taken to a veterinarian where he was euthanized because of a “significant injury” to his left hind leg.

Lost in Limbo, the horse pictured at the top of this newsletter, was removed from the track near the finish of a race on May 26. He had crashed nose-first on the track and lay heaving in the dirt. He was so jittery even before the race that he threw his jockey before it started and bolted. After the race a veterinarian found a “significant injury” to his left front leg and he was euthanized.

Kimberley Dream ruptured a ligament in her left front leg during a race on May 27 and was euthanized.

And two days before the spring meet began, while training on the racetrack on April 27, Wild on Ice broke his left hind leg and was euthanized.

We have known for decades that horses’ lives are shattered by radio waves. Hearings were held in Christchurch, New Zealand, and racehorse trainer Penny Hargreaves spoke out in an interview published in 1998. An FM radio tower in Ouruhia had had such devastating effects on her 90 horses that she was forced to relocate them to a different part of Canterbury. All her horses were affected, some more than others, and two died.

“They were very nervous and jumpy,” she said. “They