Navajo Family's Health Battles Tied to Uranium Contamination in New Mexico
Teracita Keyanna's youngest son, Kravin, was born with a congenital heart defect—a hole in his heart—after she spent decades residing in a uranium-contaminated Navajo community in New Mexico. Kravin, now 19 years old, endured a severely weakened immune system throughout his first decade of life, leading to frequent hospital visits and chronic ear infections that resulted in sensitive hearing.
"We spent a lot of time in the hospital because he was more sickly than most kids," Teracita explained to the Daily Mail. "Due to his compromised immune system, doctors hesitated to perform surgery, fearing it might cause long-term harm." Remarkably, after approximately 11 years, his heart closed up naturally without any surgical intervention.
Daughter's Ongoing Medical Struggles
Meanwhile, Teracita's 11-year-old daughter, Katherine, has developed abnormal tissue growths beneath her skin near her lymph nodes, necessitating multiple surgical removals. "She's undergone four different surgeries in five locations," Teracita detailed. "Her first procedure was at age 3, and the most recent occurred last year when she was 10."
Both children spent much of their childhood on Red Water Pond Road, a Navajo settlement less than two miles from the New Mexico border. Their family home was situated between three abandoned uranium mines that remain highly toxic to this day.
Cold War Legacy and Radiation Risks
These mines were part of a Cold War-era uranium boom that fueled America's nuclear arsenal. Extremely high radiation levels from hundreds of forgotten sites across the Navajo Nation have exposed generations of Native American families to elevated health risks, including cancer and other ailments.
Teracita, born in 1981, has lived most of her life in the Red Water Pond Road community. Uranium extraction continued nearby until 1986 at Quivira Mining sites, while the United Nuclear Corporation's Northeast Church Rock Mine operated until 1982.
"When I was young, nobody ever told me personally about the dangers of uranium," she recalled. "I didn't realize the mines near my home were uranium mines. It was like living with a time bomb, unaware it was there."
Expert Analysis on Uranium Exposure
Doug Brugge, chair of the Department of Public Health Sciences at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, noted that while Kravin and Katherine's conditions cannot be definitively linked to uranium exposure, the possibility should not be dismissed. Brugge led a 1990s project interviewing Navajo uranium miners, many of whom developed lung cancer from radon gas exposure.
"The effects on miners are unequivocally well established," Brugge stated. However, the impacts on their families—including wives, children, and grandchildren—remain murkier and harder to pinpoint.
Brugge, who grew up in the Navajo Nation, highlighted communication failures: "Many people told us they didn't know. They had no idea there was anything hazardous associated with this mining. A lot didn't speak English, had limited education, and restricted access to news and media."
Environmental and Health Hazards
Teracita emphasized that the mines lacked fences or barriers, allowing people and livestock to wander into contaminated areas freely. In March 2024, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) took soil samples from Church Rock No. 1, the nearest Quivira-owned mine to her home. Exposure to contaminated soil there carries an estimated one-in-100 cancer risk—meaning one additional person per 100 exposed could develop cancer in their lifetime.
Brugge described this risk level as "really high," noting that the EPA typically expresses concern at one in 100,000 or one in a million. Teracita also lived half a mile from the Church Rock uranium mill, owned by United Nuclear Corporation, where a catastrophic 1979 spill released 1,100 tons of radioactive waste and 93 million gallons of contaminated wastewater into the Navajo Nation via the Puerco River.
This disaster, the largest accidental release of radioactive material in U.S. history, left children with serious skin burns from swimming or herding sheep in the river. Teracita reported that many neighbors on Red Water Pond Road have mysteriously developed diabetes or liver cirrhosis without excessive drinking or smoking.
Broader Context and Cleanup Efforts
The Department of Energy identifies 4,225 uranium mines across the United States, mostly abandoned. The Navajo Nation—spanning 27,000 square miles in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah—contains over 500 abandoned uranium mines identified by the EPA, representing just over 11% of the country's abandoned mines despite occupying only 0.8% of U.S. landmass.
Between 1944 and 1986, private companies contracted by the federal government extracted an estimated 30 million tons of uranium ore from Navajo land. "The government prioritized national security and inexpensive uranium access over the health and well-being of people living there," Brugge asserted.
This disproportionate exposure extends beyond the Navajo; a 2015 study found that about 25% of uranium mines in the western U.S. are within 6 miles of a reservation, though Native American land comprises only 5.6% of the region.
Relocation and Future Concerns
Teracita and her family moved to Gallup, New Mexico, in 2018 after the EPA offered financial assistance to relocate during mine cleanup. "I was already trying to safeguard our kids, since nobody safeguarded me as a child," she said.
Doctors worry that Katherine may have sustained permanent genetic damage. Brugge explained that uranium exposure can damage DNA, with harm depending on where in the gene sequence damage occurs: "If it happens in a non-coding area, the damage is zero. There's randomness, but generally, more damage increases health risks."
Ongoing Remediation Challenges
Cleanup of the Red Water Pond Road mines has been a protracted process, involving complex planning and navigating tribal, state, and federal regulations. In August 2025, United Nuclear Corporation and its parent company, General Electric, signed a $62.5 million settlement to remove about 1 million cubic yards of uranium waste from the Northeast Church Rock Mine, with permanent storage established at the former mill site.
The Quivira-owned mines, including Church Rock No. 1 with 929,000 cubic yards of nuclear waste, are expected to be cleaned up within six to eight years. Despite the contamination, Teracita and her four children hope to return to their ancestral land.
"I plan on moving back because that's my home," Teracita expressed. "It's a physical tie to the land—our traditional way of life, where our umbilical cords are buried. My kids call our current place 'home' but often say they want to go 'home, home,' feeling that connection too."
