Legionnaires' Disease | S1 E7 | Forensic Files | FULL EPISODE | Forensic Files

as America celebrated its 200th birthday as an independent nation its birthplace
Philadelphia played host to millions of tourists and hundreds of business Gatherings Philadelphia made history
that summer but not for the bicentennial it was the mysterious death of 34 people that left a tragic Legacy
and launched the most extensive medical investigation in history [Music] [Music]
[Applause] the summer of 1976 was a busy time for the city of Philadelphia filled with
Bicentennial celebrations tourist activities and business conventions it should have been a time of celebration
for City officials as well but they faced a number of unexpected difficulties sanitation workers staged a
work slowdown over a wage dispute and the mountains of uncollected garbage created serious health concerns then
there was a terrorist threat an anonymous tip warning of possible violence at the upcoming American
legionnaires convention in protest against recent US foreign policy decisions that convention was to be
headquartered here at the Belleview Stratford Hotel one of Philadelphia's finest and it was having some of its own
problems hello I received a service call I'm here to check the air conditioner sure come on in the hotel's air
conditioning system was malfunctioning and men were doing all they could to get it up and running before the
convention hotel security was also working to make sure that prostitutes were kept away from the hotel during the
busy summer season on July 21st 4500 legionnaires from around the state of Pennsylvania arrived in Philadelphia for
their annual get together it was a time for business and to renew old friendships everybody was looking
forward to it uh a jolly jol old time where we uh naturally had meetings to attend and so forth but normally the
business would be over by noon and we could then uh go out and visit the city I had
been to three or four conventions I think in Pittsburgh one in Harrisburg and I I really didn't know
that much about Philly I knew it's a big city I was anxious too after 3 days of business and pleasure
the 4500 legionnaires returned home the convention had ended but a mystery began
to unfold Lord welcome into your presence 8 Days Later in Williamstown Pennsylvania
legionaires James Dolan and John Ralph died suddenly under mysterious circumstances both had attended the
convention in Philadelphia I don't think we've had two Korean veterans die in the
same year alone uh 2 days apart from each other the official cause of death pneumonia the coroner described their
lungs as resembling brillo pads within days other legionnaires fell ill I laid around the house for about two days and
uh I I just kept feeling worse and worse my oldest boy was there and he said Dad I'm taking you to the doctor
there must be something wrong with you the mysterious illness struck swiftly first headache then muscle and chest
pain and fever which could get as high as 107° within 3 weeks 11 more legionnaires
died and I thought boy here I am if I'm going to die I mean I had five kids that makes you think a
lot and I thought oh boy I hope that's not me authorities in the state capital of Harrisburg feared an epidemic and
quickly called in the Centers for Disease Control to investigate Dr David Frasier led the
investigation we had a situation which when we first heard about the uh the problem there had been four deaths
quickly thereafter we heard of 11 deaths uh and and and it increased from that point so uh this was occurring from
unknown cause in a major city in in the United States and uh had to have everybody's attention Frasier's first
task to find out why some Legionnaire were getting sick and others weren't which at its most basic involves
comparing what people did who became sick with what people did who stayed well the investigation would be
complicated the legionnaires were spread throughout the state and gathering information would be difficult Dr
Frasier had some theories but little else the investigation into the death of the American legionnaires would become
the largest and most complicated medical investigation in history by the time Dr David Fraser and
his team arrived in Philadelphia the death rate among the infected legionnaires was 20% and Rising 11
legionnaires were dead and 39 more were seriously ill all of the legionnaires who died had a form of pneumonia but
investigators had no idea what was causing it there more deaths in Pennsylvania from a disease still not
identified because of the the outbreak was worldwide news and the Press had given it a name ever since the
Legionnaire disease became a major national story The Daily Press reports fueled the fear many citizens felt and
nowhere was that fear more evident than in the town of messen Pennsylvania Andrew hornack was a bus
driver who had driven a drum and bugle core to the legionnaires convention in Philadelphia after he arrived home he
fell ill and died from legionaire disease although he was extremely popular few of his friends went to pay
their last respects well we've had a very sparse uh visitation at the funeral home because uh our uh people seem to
feel that there might be some danger involved to their own life Dr Lewis pulk was Philadelphia's Health commissioner
and understood people's fears if you deal with a catastrophe of a known cause whether it's a flood a fire an
earthquake whatever even though it may cause a lot of damage and even kill a lot of people somehow as human beings
all of us can deal with a known cause catastrophe better than an unknown cause a true mystery Dr Frasier and the
Centers for Disease Control needed to gather information investigators Chris Cross the state to interview sick
legionnaires at the go-getter breakfast on Friday did you have the coffee just the coffee no no Ro they sent detailed
questionnaires to everyone who attended the convention on Friday the 23rd how often did you ride the main
elevators man I don't know how many they collected hundreds of dust air water and
ice samples as well as rat and pigeon droppings from every Hotel used by the legionnaires anything which might be of
interest to the biologists and toxicologists of the CDC was sent to Atlanta for analysis and tissue samples
from the autopsies were also collected and analyzed CDC investigators had plenty of competing theories swine flu
was at the top of their list since the symptoms were similar parrot fever was also a possibility a disease spread by
sick pigeons perhaps a massive case of food poisoning caused by a problem at one of the
convention's half dozen hotels there were some thoughts early on that people in town for a convention possibly might
have overindulged in one of several ways whether it's drinking or sex or something was it
a new strain of venial disease called super ganara the symptoms were similar to Super ganara and there had been two
outbreaks in other cities earlier that year or did the outbreak stem from the rats and the recent sanitation strike
which left mountains of uncollected garbage in the very streets the legionnaires walked through and what
about the anonymous tip about a possible terrorist attack was it possible the legionnaires had been poisoned but one
of the most puzzling questions was why some legionnaires developed the disease While others did not after legionaire
Bob mcgary's roommate developed pneumonia the CDC wanted him to get to a hospital right away when I told him what
I was there for they rolled out the red carpet and uh they uh gave me a physical
like I never had before in my life they wanted every type of uh Slava urine and anything else that I
could give them to be sent to the Disease Control Center in Atlanta Georgia what we found though in in our
survey of Roommates was that being a roommate of somebody with legionaire disease didn't increase your chance of
getting Legionnaire's Disease and and uh that's that was a very important finding because it
suggested that first of all exposure wasn't occurring in the bedrooms there and it also suggested it
wasn't spread person to person within 48 Hours the first tissue specimen analyzed
by the CDC eliminated typhoid the Lassa and marberg viruses peruses and the plague and after 5 days they eliminated
many more including herpes MPS and measles viruses as well as some of their top suspects blood tests also eliminated
the possibility that it was super ganara the CDC had eliminated a number of possibilities but they still couldn't ID
identified the killer the questionnaires yielded some important information among
the various hotels we surveyed the highest rate of illness that looked like legionaire disase was among people who
were registered at the B Stratford hotel and specifically in the week of the American Legion convention however there
were some victims of Legionnaire disease who weren't legionnaires at all hadn't attended their convention and never set
foot inside the Belleview Stratford Hotel there were people who walked along the sidewalk in front of the Bell
statford who got sick who never went inside or on the street across the way indeed we found that people the more
time people spent on the sidewalk in front of the B statford the more likely they were it get sick but for some
unknown reason none of the employees of the Belleview Stratford Hotel contracted
the disease what were the common factors among those who did most were over the age of 50 50 17 of the first 21
fatalities were smokers and some had other underlying illnesses when Frasier reviewed the Belleview Stratford's
employees he discovered that on average they were 10 years younger and healthier
than those who got sick by now 27 were dead the death toll was mounting and Frasier still had no idea what was
killing these people or how it was being spread Dr Frasier and his team were convinced the outbreak of Legionnaire's
Disease had something to do with the Belleview Stratford hotel but they hadn't found the connection it's just
amazing you know I just can't figure it out why some would get sick and others did not right right because as I said I
slept in the same room with two Fells that are dead Frasier believed that the agent or cause of the disease came from
somewhere near the Belleview statford hotel and since individuals on the street had also developed the disease
that told him something else we had uh uh some evidence that it was not water born or foodborn and so we were
developing the idea that this might be an Airborne infection but we had some additional questions to answer about
that but if the agent was inside the hotel Frasier's medical Detective detectives couldn't find it and since
the outbreak was slowing down he believed the cause might now be gone his only hope was that the scientists in the
lab could find it at the University of Connecticut Dr William Sunderman received an anonymous letter saying that
the legionnaires were intentionally poisoned while in Philadelphia Sunderman turned the letter over to the FBI but
Sunderman was an expert on nickel carbonal a clear odorless liquid easily transformed into a lethal gas he did a
little of his own research nickel could spread through the air that it certainly
could cause pneumonia that it caused a particular pattern of pneumonia that was not so different from what we were
seeing in the Legionnaire cases as to be obviously uh excludable tests on liver samples revealed that nickel was present
in those who died Dr William Sunderman the chief toxicologist doing the research work at
the University of Connecticut has pretty well established that it was nickel carbonel but Dr sunderman's Discovery
was not the Breakthrough after days of testing researchers suspected that nickel was peeling off of the scalpel
used during the autopsies when plastic scalpel were used the nickel was no longer present investigators were no
closer to finding the cause of Legionnaire's Disease there is a possibility that we may never find the
answer however I will pledge and I'm sure Dr sensor would that this effort and investigation will continue if it
takes a year or two years to continue the investigation to get to the bottom of it over the Christmas holidays some of
the CDC staff decided to take some much needed time off they had been working around the clock to find the cause of
the Legionnaire's outbreak without success there were no new cases of Legionnaire's Disease but still no
answers Dr Joseph McDade a CDC microbiologist and his wife were looking forward to the Christmas holidays Joe
it's been six months since this first broke out but what should have been a diversion turned to frustration as
friends asked why he and his colleagues were unable to find the cause of the outbreak come on honey think frustrated
angry and embarrassed McDade cancelled his Christmas vacation and returned to his
lab he pulled the slide of a guinea pig which had been injected with liver tissue from a Legionnaire's victim it
was a slide he had seen hundreds of times before but this time in his deserted lab he noticed something he didn't
recognize a new bacterium one Dr McDade had never seen before Dr Joseph McDade a CDC
microbiologist saw something he never noticed before as he examined tissues of guinea pigs exposed to the mysterious
disease but at first he thought he was looking at a contaminated specimen so they were
probably some other kind of bacteria and he as I understand it uh decided to retest those
specimens no longer assuming that these were contaminants but on the off chance that this was the agent he tested his
Newfound organism with a blood sample from a Legionnaire's Disease Survivor that blood sample would contain
antibodies which successfully fought the disease if the antibodies were present the sample would turn
green McDade looked through the microscope and saw a bright green glow so he demonstrated that the bug was
present in the uh in the liver of the guinea pig and he demonstrated that that legionnaires developed antibodies that
specific to that agent well that was the Breakthrough 147 days after the outbreak the
bacterium which killed 34 and hospitalized 221 others was officially given its name Legionella numafa in
honor of the legionnaires in Philadelphia and researchers identified an antibiotic which would kill it
erythromycin but the question remained where did the bacteria come from and how was it spread by the time
researchers knew what they were looking for they couldn't find it in any of the samples from the hotel the bacteria had
long since died but researchers quickly discovered its properties it multiplied in warm watery conditions and could
travel through the air in contaminated water droplets or Mist since some of the victims never set foot inside the
Bellevue statford Hotel but were on the side walk in front of the hotel Dr Frasier believes that the bacteria most
likely came from the roof of the hotel from the air conditioning water cooling towers inside the cooling towers warm
water is cooled as it Cascades over wooden louvers the excess water falls into a collection pan at the bottom
where it stagnates if it fails to drain properly investigators believe it was here
inside these water cooling units where the deadly Legionella bacteria grew and multiplied it was drawn up into the air
by the unit's powerful fans now Airborne the deadly mist of bacteria and warm water flew up into the atmosphere and
floated down the side of the building making its way to the street below it landed on pedestrians walking by the
hotel and was also drawn into the hotel lobby by intake fans on the south side of the building Hotel employees probably
developed an immunity to the bacteria or weren't susceptible because they were younger and healthier than those who
contracted the disease the cooling tower theory was never proven probably because
the bacteria in the Belleview Stratford's cooling towers had already died but investigators discovered the
same bacteria in similar cooling towers in other parts of the country scientists
believe Legionella has been killing for thousands of years and when blood samples from earlier unexplained
outbreaks were examined they discovered the Legionella bacteria Austin Minnesota 1957 the
earliest documented outbreak Washington DC 1965 where Legionella killed 16 people
Bob McGary and Charlie Davis were two of the more fortunate Legionnaire from the
1976 convention Charlie Davis developed Legionnaire's Disease spent three weeks in the hospital but recovered Bob McGary
escaped the disease altogether even though he and Charlie roomed together Bob was younger didn't smoke or have any
previous respiratory ailments but the outbreak had a lasting effect on these two lifelong friends they lost many of
their brothers that summer and neither one ever attended another legionnaires convention I was at the wrong place at
the right time as far as that was concerned had it not been for the unfortunate incident
that occurred with the rest of the delegates and brothers I could say today it was a
great time but I was not going to press my luck I seen it once I don't want to do it again
[Music]

After a Philadelphia convention, 180 legionnaires contract pneumonia-like symptoms and 29 of them die.

Brief Summary

The 1976 Legionnaires' disease outbreak in Philadelphia killed 34, linked to the American Legion convention and traced to hotel cooling towers.

Key points

Mysterious Deaths at the Bicentennial. In the summer of 1976, Philadelphia faced a tragic outbreak that left 34 dead.
The Investigation Begins. The CDC launched the largest medical investigation in history to uncover the cause of the outbreak.
Discovery of Legionella. After months of investigation, a new bacterium was identified as the cause of the outbreak.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It was a time of celebration for city officials, but they faced unexpected difficulties.

City officials were dealing with sanitation strikes and health concerns during the Bicentennial cele

1:00WatchMar 5, 2025

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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