Upon arrival at Kwajalein Atoll, the personne] evacuated from Rongerik were
monitored for personal contamination and decontaminated.

The decontamination

program, consisting of repeated showers and radiation monitoring, continued from
2 March through 6 March. While at Kwajalein, the film badges that had originally been
issued to the Rongerik detachment were collected and processed. In addition, urine
samples, both pooled and individual, were collected and sent to laboratories in the
United States for analysis.

Late in April, the servicemen from Rongerik were

transferred from Kwajalein to Tripler Army Hospital (Honolulu, Hawaii) for further
observation and subsequent return to duty (References 3, 4).
2.2

AVAILABLE DATA AND ASSUMPTIONS.
Just prior to the first evacuation on 2 March, a gamma intensity reading was

obtained with an uncalibrated AN/PDR-39 radiation survey meter.

Because the

operating condition of the instrument was not known at the time of its use, this

reading (2000 mR/hr @ H+28.5 hours--Reference 5) is used only to indicate the
general magnitude of the fallout intensity at the time of the first evacuation.

The

first radiological survey with calibrated instruments on the atoll was conducted on 10
March

1954, nine days after the shot.

At this time the rad-safe survey team

encountered average outdoor radiation intensity readings of 280 mR/hr on the island
where the military personne! had been stationed.
were as discussed in Section 3.1.

Other survey readings on 10 March

Additional surveys were made in subsequent weeks,

but the readings were not as comprehensive and had less internal consistency.
likely arose from differential weathering and decay.

This

Therefore, these later readings

are not used in this analysis.
The only other radiation intensity data available from Rongerik were obtained on

| March when a low-level gamma background monitoring instrument at the weather
station began to register at 1407 hours and then went off scale (100 mR/hr) at 1437
(H+7.9 hr). The data from this instrument establish the time of arrival of the fallout.

After Shot Bravo, analyses of fallout samples were made to determine the decay

of gamma intensity with time.

Unfortunately, the only data adequate to characterize

Select target paragraph3