A. COMMENTS ON AUSTRALIAN RECORBS AND DATA 1. Ref: NBD 3/4/1378, dated July 21, 1958. a. Paragraph 3: (Tab A, Appendix II) The statement "they sailed throngh the Pacific 500 miles west of the last atom explosion center in the Caroline Islands" is, of course, not consistent with our knowledge of the location of the suspected event which took place at Bikini Atoll. On the other hand, they were about 520 miles from Fniwetok and 720 miles from Bikini ac- cording to their position as show on course plot (Tab 4, Appendix III) and as reported to our Government in their official advisories. b. Paragraph 3: The statement "it was about 70 milliroentgens" is meaningless either as a dose or dose-rate figure in the context in which given. No time mit is indicated. This is further confused by the fact that Captain Matsubara is reported in the local (Rabaul) newspaper as using a figure of 70 to indicate that this represented a number such as "20 counts per minute above the limit of human safety." In actuality, the number 70 really indicates 20 coumts per minute above the higher normal background limit of the instrument in question. Ref- erence next paregraph below and page 4 story, RABAUL TIMES, dated 25 July 1958, column 3, paragraph 1, under subhead "above limit." (Tab B, Appendix VI). ‘ce. Paragraph 4: The numbers quoted are well within the normal background range quoted in their second interview with the Australian authorities. Reference NED 3/4/1410 dated July 24, 1958, paragraph 8, st ts *". s<¢ DOE ARCHIVES rs COMMDENTIA