-2of major operational changes had been instituted. On January 26th, Mr. Otter- man and Harry Brown arrived in Kwajalein via MAC. I was requested by Mr. Brown to "keep the medical survey team away from the ship” for a period of three days due to the hazardous conditions posed by off-loading a large amount of equipment. On January 29th, Mr. Otterman, Mr. Brown and I met aboard the ship; at this time I was informed of major changes in the logistic support for the forthcoming survey. Vo_u, Charter/Contract Deficiencies: During the initial contract negotia-~ tions in San Diego, Mr. Otterman presented a brochure outlining his proposed method of operation for transferring patients from ship to shore._ I assumed since he was an experienced maritime contractor, that he had studied the charts carefully and knew of the existing oceanographic characteristics of the beaches he was attempting to approach. In essence, what he proposed was bringing the ship as close as possible to the shore, bow on, and then positioning a set of barges to provide a walk-on capability for the patients from the island. I informed him at the time that the beach was extremely shallow at Utirik. I asked him specifically “what was the minimum draft, forward obtainable by trimming the ship? feet. He indicated that he could reduce the forward draft to four (Please see enclosure 1, copies of his initial proposal.) During those initial negotiations, I had indicated both to Harry Brown and to Wayne Munk from Holmes & Narver that I considered the ship marginal in size but that the walk-on capability swung the decision in favor of U.S. Oceanography. Therefore, any change in that plan of operation should have been transmitted to me immediately, It was not. During our initial discussion on 29 January, I was informed that if I "insisted" on using the barge concept there would be a two to three week delay in the sailing of the ship. k Pre, SoS 674 Since we were already four