EXPOSURE TO PROMPT NEUTRON RADIATION
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A relatively small percentage of the 250,000 atmospheric test participants
were exposed to neutrons, and it can generally be clearly determined
whether or not an individual was so exposed.

For those so exposed,

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their neutron dose can be calculated with good accuracy, and all such

neutron expddures are believed ‘to have “been low (less than a rem--generally
much less), with the possible exception of participants in the Volunteer

Neutron exposure can occur only at the time of detonation (prompt radiation).
Contact with fallout (delayed radiation)
neutrons.

will not cause exposure to

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Observer Program (officer volunteers).

Thus, the possibility of exposure to neutrons can be determined
at

with relative accuracy, since individuals' locations are known with
more certainty at times of detonations than at other times--and were
controlled with utmost rigor.

Additionally, neutrons from a detonation

are rapidly attenuated in air.

For example, at a distance of two miles

from an atmospheric nuclear detonation in Nevada, the neutron dose

to a totally unprotected individual would be less than one rem.

Of

course, no personnel were ever permitted in such an exposed location
for close-range detonations of significant yield.

Finally, neutrons

are severely attenuated by earth-~for example, by a factor of six in

an open trench, or by a factor of 100 behind three feet of earth.
Since all personnel at the Nevada Test Site who were within several
miles of a detonation were protected in trenches, any neutron exposures
that did occur were not only below one rem,

millirem range.

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but generally in the low

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