31 5.8 Hazards Associated with Breaching of the Containment Strucfure would be swept into the lagoon. The whole area would be drenched hence, any material that had become airborne would be washed o rapidly. It is noteworthy that throughout the cleanup effort and, field Radioactivity on all but a handful of filters was too low to b detected in totally dry conditions. possible conditions Thus, even during the most (i.e., during the scraping, transportine, a dumping of the contaminated soil), the amount of airborne p’.uto negligible. to atmospheric resuspension of transuranics have been made by & and co-workers (1980) based on resuspension experiments conduc These measurements included both the cont¥yibuEnewetak and Bikini. included high activity situations such as the cultivation of op fields.” Dose rates were calculated assuming 8 hours per day o high activity work. For surface soil transuranic concentrationg equai ban on the island were violated, potential health effects from s resuspension appear unimportant. With respect to the future of the containment structure, the committee believes that the structure will maintain its physica integrity for a long period of time (probably in the range of 10 to to those at Enjebi (which averages approximately 20 pCi/g), the potential dose rate due to the inhalation pathway is estimated das mrem/yr (Robison et al. 1980). This would certainly overestimat dose rate to a visitor to Runit even if large quantities of uncc dated material were to erode from the dome. Thus, if the “off Iimits* 10° years). However, it is impossible to estimate this with an degree of certainty because the principal threat comes from the fiongterm cumulative effects of large storms. If the key-wall even were to be breached, the most likely outcome would be an erosio unconsolidated material out cf the dome to the lagoon and reef, the dome subsiding upon the consolidated material. This would nb that plutonium may be concentrated in the sea surface and subsec injected into the atmosphere by sea spray and transported by the (Cambray and Eakins 1980). Any such concentration effect, if it]does exist, would be included in the measurements reported by Robisonjand co-workers.