layer of the stuff making kongelap look as though it had been the
scene of a freakish s:owfall in the middle of the Pacific, only 600
miles nortu of tne equator.
Villagers scuffed up the powder as they walked, and some tried to
orusn it off their hair and bodies.
Children, delighted with the
unexpected event, played with the snow.
Several people, like the
Japanese fishermen, tried tcsting the powder to determine just what
it was.
Sometime in the early morning the Rongelapese spotted a plane or
planes buzzing by the island.
Someone conjectured that the snow they
iad seen nad been dropped by the planes and that perhaps its purpose
was to kill mosquitoes.
kastward, on Utirik, the snowfall began 22 hours after the
explosion.
It was lighter and described as "mistlike”.
That evening, as the sun set and darkness fell over Pongelap,
fallout ceased.
Whe powder now had reached a depti of about one 7
one
half inches and
at nignt|
night gave the island an eerie aspect.
oneHattince
agat
in the
afternoon
the
it rained,
Sometime earlier
The raindrops spattered the white powder,
and as it increased, rivulets of water carried the radioactive ash from
leaves to the yround, and from rooftops into water catchment tanks.
The fallout of Bikini's pulverized and irradiated coral reef had
ended~-but its long lasting effects had just begun to work.
tit 34 to il + 78
Thirty-four hours after the boww (li+34) the 28 Americans were
safely aboard ship.
Tuat sawe day, according to reports from the
ee
82