How Prince Philip came close to being landed on Britain’s nuclear test site

Squadron Leader Eric Denson (pictured) suffered chronic headaches and eventually killed himself in the wake of the Cold War experiment

This year sensational new files were discovered by Shirley Denson, 83, the widow of a pilot who flew in one MoD experiment in 1958.

Shirley, who lives in Morden, south London, obtained the papers afters years of research into her husband Eric’s service.

She believes radiation is the cause of the birth defects like extra teeth in her family. One young relative was recently born with an extra urinary tract.

Her husband had suffered such a high dose of radiation to his head he went on to have chronic headaches which led him to killed himself in 1976.

Eric and Shirley had already had one daughter together before he was involved in the experiment. She was born healthy.

However, 37 per cent of their descendants from children born after Eric passed through the radiation cloud were born with defects or unexplained medical conditions.

These included skull deformities, missing or extra teeth and spinal problems.

The MoD continues to deny that Eric and his crew was subjects of an experiment, despite the emergence of new papers

Two of his four children with Shirley were born with abnormalities, as were some of their grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

RAF hero Eric was involved in early tests into the radiation caused by atomic and hydrogen bombs.

In 1958 he was stationed in the Pacific Ocean on Malden Island and Christmas Island – the site of Operation Grapples, which saw the UK carry out some of its earliest nuclear weapons tests.

Eric was ordered to fly his Canberra B6 bomber through a cloud left in the wake of a 2.8 megaton nuclear explosion on April 28, 1958, documents reveal.

X-ray badges were stuck to his seat to measure the barrage of radiation as he and two others entered the cloud.

They were placed behind his head, on both armrests and by his groin.

The documents reveal ‘care was taken to ensure as little shielding effect as possible’ was given to the X-ray badges. Of course, this meant Eric and his crew became vulnerable to the deadly radiation.

The document was an Atomic Weapons Establishment paper looking at ways of testing the badges to make sure they were accurate.

They detail the exact amount of radiation absorbed by the head, arms and groin and the bomber’s pilot, navigator and wireless operator.

They also note the time spent inside the cloud, the height of the plane and the time the bomber entered the cloud after the bomb detonated.

The documents goes on to set out the pros and cons of the badges in measuring radiation. They also suggest re-running the experiment with more badges.

One of the documents showed Flight Lieutenant Denson recorded a radiation reading of 13 Roentgens after carrying out the flight

When Eric’s bomber touched down after the test he began to experience vomiting and developed a rash – common symptoms of radiation poisoning.

The documents, written by scientists running the experiments, show that Eric, who was 24 at the time, had his head exposed to 65 years’ worth of normal ­background ­radiation.

This amounted to 17,500 dental X-rays worth of radiation during just six minutes of flight.

The badge placed near Eric’s groin recorded a dose of 8.8 Roentgens – about 30 years’ worth of background radiation.

In total he received 18.8Rs, the worst of the three-man crew which flew that day.

Shirley is seeking an apology from the Ministry of Defence, who have insisted veterans were not used as guinea pigs during nuclear tests.

Read more at DailyMail.co.uk