EXPOSURE
ATOLLS
TO
le,
Lessard,
TT.
FALLOUT:
IR.
THE
P.
lr. A. Conard and 2T. McCraw
RADIATION
DOSE
Miltenberger,
EXPERIENCE
‘'S.
H.
AT
Cohn,
RONGELAP
35.
V.
AND
UTIRIK
Musolino, |
lBrookhaven
National
Laboratory,
Upton,
New York
11973,
U.S.A.
and
2Departnent of Energy, Office of Operational Safety, Washington, DC
20545,
U.S.A.
From June 1946 to August 1958, the U.S. Department of Defense and the
Atonic Energy Commission conducted nuclear weapons tests in the Northern
Marshall Islands.
series,
produced
On March 1, 1954,
a
lJlarge
amount
shift.
to
subsequently
In
fell
order
on Rongelap and
avoid
BRAVO, an aboveground test in the Castle
of
radioactive
debris,
some
of
which
Utirik Atolls
external
and
due
internal
to
dose
an
from
wnexpected
the
wind
deposited
radioactivity,
affected area,
the inhabitants of these atolls were relocated out of the
They returned to Utirik in June 1954 and to Rongelap in June
were
of
1957.
Environmental and personnel radiological monitoring
programs were
initiated in the mid 1950's by Brookhaven National Laboratory.
The objective
was to maintain a comprehensive radiological safety progran.
Post-return
body-burden histories and activity-ingestion rate patterns were determined as
estimates
internal
committed
effective
dose
equivalent.
External
exposure rate and living pattern data were also collected.
Relationships
between body burden or urine activity concentration and a declining continuous
intake scenario were developed in order to model retrospective and prospective
dose equivalent (See Figure 1).
The dosimetric conclusions for the protracted
exposure are summarized in Table l.
Figure 1:
atoll.
Body burden history for Rongelap adults post return to their hone