July 13, 1978 began as a rather ordinary day for Soviet scientist Anatoli Bugorski. He was working as a researcher at the Soviet U-70 synchrotron, a circular particle accelerator that accelerated protons to nearly the speed of light to perform experiments on fundamental forces of nature. On that particular day, Bugorski was down at the beam line of the accelerator, checking a malfunctioning piece of equipment; he leaned over to get a better look at the device, and accidentally stuck his head into the actively running proton beam.

Anatoli felt no pain, but reportedly saw a flash “brighter than a thousand suns.”

Under ordinary circumstances, a dose of radiation of 1,000 rads is almost certainly fatal. In Bugorski’s case, he was exposed to somewhere in the range of 200,000 rads. Assumed to be living on borrowed time, Bugorski was brought to a Moscow clinic to be studied in his final days. The left side of his face swelled up grotesquely, and the skin began to peel away. However, he did not die.

Fortunately for Anatoli, the way in which a dose of radiation is received is nearly as important as the amount. A pure proton beam, with its high intensity radiation, was like a surgical strike, damaging a highly localized region of Anatoli’s head which was survivable.

He did suffer from long-term problems, including paralysis of the left side of his face, occasional seizures and fatigue. His intellectual capabilities were hardly affected, and he finished his PhD and continued a career in physics. The most peculiar effect of his brush with death was the change in his appearance:

Looking at Bugorski now, you’d see the right half of his face looks like a normal wrinkled old man, but the left half of his face looks as if it was frozen in time 19 years ago.

We often forget that much scientific research can be genuinely life-threatening; Anatoli Bugorski’s brush with death is a chilling reminder of the dangers involved.

Bugorski after the accident; the line indicates the path that the proton beam took through his skull.

******

References:

Today I Found Out

Wikipedia

Wired