A three-week vacation in Spain this fall brought to mind a foreign business trip twenty-three years ago. Let me explain.
The impetus for our vacation was to spend time with the Talley family–our daughter Melinda, husband Matthew, and their three wonderful rambunctious boys. As always, we enjoyed our time with them immensely. But to give them a break in the middle of our stay, we left for a week to travel the length of the country. My first priority was to visit the Prado Museum in Madrid. Why? That brings me to my story.
In the spring of 1999, I had two nuclear forensics meetings in Europe on successive weeks. The first was a visit to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna. I was accompanied by Lothar Koch, my fellow co-chair of the International Technical Working Group (ITWG), which I featured in my debut newsletter. During the first several years of the ITWG, we had an uneasy relationship with the IAEA. Representatives from the IAEA challenged me more than once at ITWG meetings with “but you’re not a real group,” meaning we had no formal standing. My response, “that’s true, but the ITWG includes all of the world’s leading experts in nuclear forensics.”
This Vienna meeting was an attempt to reach agreement on a working relationship between the IAEA and ITWG. My sense was that the IAEA wanted to insert nuclear forensics into its programs and eventually make the ITWG obsolete. At that early stage of nuclear forensics, I was concerned that incorporating it into the well-established culture of IAEA nuclear safeguards would hinder its development. The IAEA would likely take a “cookbook” approach to implementing nuclear forensics, and in my opinion, applying this relatively new capability required a more flexible approach.
The fact that Lothar Koch had a long-standing and very positive relationship with the IAEA was a big plus. By the end of our two days of conversation, which I would characterize as amiable but guarded, we reached a tentative agreement. The ITWG would continue to develop nuclear forensics and the IAEA would make some of our “products” available to their international community. A couple years later the IAEA asked me to create a technical report on our “Model Action Plan” for investigations involving nuclear forensics. In 2006 the IAEA published the document, Nuclear Forensics Support, which was used widely enough that a revised version was published a decade later.
This is where the Prado enters the story. After the IAEA meeting ended, I rushed to the Vienna airport to catch an evening flight to Madrid, where I planned a weekend layover before going on to Seville for a scientific conference (the conference had sessions on nuclear forensics, including talks by Lothar Koch and me). My only reason for spending the weekend in Madrid was to visit the Prado Museum. I usually included a visit to an art museum during my European trips, whether on vacation or on travel for the Lab. The Prado was of special interest to me because of its vast holdings of Spanish masters, notably Goya and El Greco.
Alas, when I got to the airport, my flight was cancelled due to a strike by Spanish pilots. I stayed overnight at an airport hotel and caught a flight the next day that got me to Madrid in late afternoon. I wasn’t too upset, because I could still visit the Prado the next day.
I walked from my hotel to the Prado that Sunday morning, timing my departure so I would arrive when the museum opened. When the museum came into view, I was puzzled by seeing so few people. I looked in vain for a queue of people that would indicate the location of the entrance. Growing increasingly alarmed, I walked around the entire building, looking for the entrance. When I finally found it, a small sign announced that the museum was closed for that day.
My heart sank. Dejected, I turned around and walked back to my hotel.
Twenty-three years later, I finally had another chance. The picture with my wife, Debbie, shows us as we are about to enter the Prado. The art was glorious! Our aging bodies could only handle about five hours, but we got to see everything that I wanted to see. Goya was the standout for both of us.
Oftentimes, the events that stick in my mind longest are the ones where something went wrong. In the case of the Prado, the memory of my failed visit twenty-three years ago has been displaced by the joy of my second visit.
