Monday, February 17, 2025
Contact    |    RSS icon Twitter icon Facebook icon  
Unexplained Mysteries
You are viewing: Home > News > Science & Technology > News story
Welcome Guest ( Login or Register )  
All ▾
Search Submit

Science & Technology

Anatoli Bugorski: the man who survived a proton beam to the head

By T.K. Randall
February 4, 2025 · Comment icon 5 comments
U-70 Synchrotron
The U-70 control room (Bugorski not pictured). Image Credit: RIA Novosti archive, image #105514 / A. Solomonov / CC-BY-SA 3.0
Back in 1978, a bizarre lab accident saw a beam from a particle accelerator pass through a scientist's head.
The incident involved Anatoli Petrovich Bugorski, a particle physicist who in 1978 had been working at the Institute for High Energy Physics in Protvino, Russia on a device known as the U-70 synchrotron, which happened to be the largest particle accelerator in the Soviet Union at the time.

On July 13th of that year, he had been checking out a malfunctioning piece of equipment when he inadvertently leaned over and stuck his head directly in the path of the proton beam.

The beam passed right through his head and out the other side, causing him to experience a bright flash of light that he described as being "brighter than a thousand suns."
The dose of radiation he was exposed to was around 2,000 to 3,000 Sieverts - approximately 1,000 times greater than the dose that would typically be expected to kill a human being.

Over the next few days, Bugorski's face swelled up and the path of the beam - which had burnt through parts of his face, his skull and his brain tissue - became increasingly apparent.

It was believed that he would almost certainly die from the incident and he was taken to a clinic in Moscow so that doctors could monitor his deterioration and death.

Incredibly, however, his condition improved and he was not only able to leave the clinic, but was even able to complete his PhD and continue with his work as a particle physicist.

Against all odds, he is still alive today - aged 82.

Source: Lad Bible | Comments (5)




Other news and articles
Recent comments on this story
Comment icon #1 Posted by Cho Jinn 13 days ago
Watch out for those proton beams, I always say.
Comment icon #2 Posted by Kleng 13 days ago
Bet he's totally cancer-free, too. Crazy how little we understand about radiation and chemosynthesis.
Comment icon #3 Posted by Abramelin 13 days ago
I remember from very long ago, that a Russian pilot fell from his plane, 10 kilometers high. The guy survived, though many of his bones were broken. He fell on a slope of the Ural Mountains, in a meters thick layer of snow. He was just lucky.
Comment icon #4 Posted by Cho Jinn 13 days ago
There was this Russian stewardess too https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulović A crazy ~4 minutes.
Comment icon #5 Posted by Abramelin 13 days ago
It just proves people are sometimes able to survive the most horrible and deadly events. Sometimes.


Please Login or Register to post a comment.


Our new book is out now!
Book cover

The Unexplained Mysteries
Book of Weird News

 AVAILABLE NOW 

Take a walk on the weird side with this compilation of some of the weirdest stories ever to grace the pages of a newspaper.

Click here to learn more

We need your help!
Patreon logo

Support us on Patreon

 BONUS CONTENT 

For less than the cost of a cup of coffee, you can gain access to a wide range of exclusive perks including our popular 'Lost Ghost Stories' series.

Click here to learn more

Recent news and articles