The Anthrax Attacks (2022)

September 10, 2022 9:44 AM

Days after 9/11, letters containing fatal anthrax spores spark panic and tragedy in the US. This documentary follows the subsequent FBI investigation.
posted by geoff. (7 comments total)

I completely forgot about this happening but I think if I was under heavy FBI investigation for several years I'd probably come off looking as guilty of well anything. He might have probably done it but his only charge was really being weird.
posted by geoff. at 10:01 AM on September 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

It was a bit disorienting when Phil Coulson showed up. Clark Gregg's performance was admirable as the quirky (quirky to the point of unhinged) Ivins.
posted by SPrintF at 10:51 AM on September 11, 2022

Where is this available?
posted by kitten kaboodle at 2:30 PM on September 11, 2022

kitten kaboodle, it's currently streaming on Netflix.
posted by SPrintF at 3:50 PM on September 11, 2022

related the anthrax files

a lot of insight into Mueller's investigative competence. by my reckoning, it couldn't have been ivins, he was scapegoated after the fbi stalled out. and, more recent developments also suggest the anthrax was not the ames strain.

steven hatfill, a contemporary at usamriid, was also a suspect who was practically hounded out of his career by meuller's investigation. he later turned into an anti-vaxxer hydroxy freak and became a covid advisor to the trump white house.

I'll be checking out this new doc, ty.
posted by j_curiouser at 11:39 AM on September 13, 2022

watched last night. quite good. i like how it gave appropriate coverage of the postal workers' fucked up experience.
posted by j_curiouser at 11:53 AM on September 14, 2022

I worked in a building with people who were working with Ivins and back then was a terrible time for them. Maybe he did it, but we'll never know because the FBI did a bad job. I remember thinking if the FBI were riding me and my colleagues the way were him, one of us might have cracked. Does this documentary go into the method the FBI used to conclude that the strain was the same as we had at Detrick? One of my colleagues said it was a novel and untested technique. He thought it was ingenious, but not necessarily right. Anyway, I think of Ivins and Hatfill every time I go by their houses.
posted by acrasis at 3:40 PM on September 14, 2022