Getting your player ready...
An Energy Department investigation has alleviated fears that a significant amount of plutonium was missing from a national laboratory, but it also has heightened concerns about flaws in the system for controlling the U.S. stockpile of weapons materials.
A routine inventory in February at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico found a plutonium shortage estimated at 2.2 pounds, setting off a frantic national effort to locate the material. This week, the confidential investigation, whose results were leaked, concluded that statisticians at the lab had miscalculated the amount of plutonium at the facility and that none was actually missing.
![Newspaper advertisement offering reward for the return of an escaped man to his oppressors, Princess Anne, Maryland, April 1, 1861. Text reads: “0 Reward. Ranaway from the subscriber on Tuesday Morning, 26th Ultimo [last month], My negro boy calling himself Severn Black. The said negro is about 5 feet six inches in height, chesnut color, has a scar on his upperlip, downcast countenance when spoken to, blink-eyed, showing a great deal of white, long bushy hair, is about twenty years old, had on when he lefta [sic] blue fustian Jacket, pantaloons of a greyish color, blue striped shirt, a Black slouch hat and shoes nearly worn out. The above reward will be paid by me for the apprehension and delivery of the said negro in the county jail at Princess Anne, Somerset County, Maryland. April 1, 1861. Richard E. Snelling. Somerset Herald Print, Princess Anne, Md.’ The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 obliged citizens and lawmen of free zones to return escaped men to those whom they fled. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)](/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/GettyImages-53262583-16x9-1.jpg?w=620 "GettyImages-53262583-16x9-1")
