It did not seem prudent to further move the natives around by dividing thea
up between the two ships, inasmich as no great overcrowding was evident.
The Munro, had a medica. officer on board and offered his services which
fortunately were not needed. It was comforting to know he was available however, should any of the pregnant women fall due and payable while on
board.
Reception and handling of the natives on board worked out fairly well
and generally as was expected.
cach one was monitored as they came on beard
and readings were around 7 mr/hr’which was substantially lower than the
average of 20 ar/hr readings on the beach.
This indicated that wading cut
to the rafts nad helped quite a bit in reducing presence of fall-out ma-
terial on feet and clothing.
Some of the children were routed through tne
showers as scon as thay came on board. But it was decided to feed all of
them before starting decontamination of adults. Serving lines were set up
on the fantail using regular steam table trays of food and giving the natives
paper plates, cups, etc. They didn't eat very well, pernaps from the ex-
citement or maybe they just don't like meat loaf.
bread, masned potatocs and oranges.
They did better on tne
Aftar lunch the Trust Territory official made some suggestions for
changing and improving our facilities which included careful partitioning
and segregation of tne women's side of the head and washrooms. He explained
that under conditions of excitement and strange surroundings the women are
extremely modest. Then commenced decontamination measures and consideratle
resistence was encountered. But by prodding end cajoling we managed to
get all about 10% of them through the showers. These were the aged, infim
and sick.
With no readings higher than 7 ar/hr it was decided not prucent
to force the old people in the showers. Next the problem of clothing arose,
Ne had sufficient clean dungarees for them all and planned to run all their
clothes through the laundry and give them back to put on before leaving tne
ship. But here again stiff resistence was encountered. We tried but they
couldn't seem to understand taking their clothes away and the women wanted
no part of the dungarees. Clothes were monitored and since they averaged
only about 3-4 mr/hr it was decided tnat the situation did not call for sucn
drastic measures. All of these cattears were discussed with the Trust Terrmtory official, and decisions were concurred in or made on his recommen-
dations. Careful observation of the natives and questioning of the inverpreter as to their mood, excitement and general morale convinced us that
forcing them to give up their cicthes would really snake them up.
By late afternoon they ware settled down on their mats and generally
quiet except for the kids, some of whom took several showers.
bright-eyed and cute as could be.
They were
Some faw of the women, as 1s their wont,
talked quietly but steadily all aftemicon from the tine
they came accam
[e355
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EXCLOSURE (1,
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