Film badges were issued to everyone who was stationed on Christmas and Johnston islands
and all Navy ships directly
involved with the tests.
Persons on remote islands monitoring
for radiation or conducting experiments were not badged.
DOMINIC, over 25,000 were badged.
possible exposure was recorded.
Of the over 28,000 participants in
Badges were issued for extended periods to ensure that all
Because all but one of the shots were airbursts, there was little or no fallout problem
and no residual radiation area around the surface zero.
Although SWORDFISH, the underwater
shot, produced no fallout it did create a short-lived radioactive base surge and a pool of
radioactive water around the detonation.
The base surge dissipated in less than an hour, and
the pool dissipated after a few days.
In general, film badge readings were low.
Only 842 (3 percent) of the 25,399 badged
participants had an exposure greater than 0.5 roentgens (R).
Of these, 56 exposures were
over 3.0 R: 2 Army, 4 Navy and Navy civilians, 49 Air Force, and 1 other civilian.
established JTF 8 Maximum Permissible Exposure (MPE) was 3.0 R.
The
The two Army men with over 3.0 R exposure served with the unit that decontaminated the
aircraft involved in cloud sampling and as such were authorized an MPE of 20.0 R.
All the Air
Force personnel over 3.0 R were associated with cloud sampling (crew, maintenance, sample
removal, or decontamination) and were also authorized an MPE of 20.0 R before the operation
started.
The highest total exposure recorded in this group was 17.682 R; this was also the
highest for the entire operation.
There were 19 other Air Force exposures over 10.0 R.
The Navy personnel recording over 3.0 R were on USS Sioux (ATF-75), which was involved in
collecting samples of weapon debris from the radioactive pool of
underwater SWORDFISH shot.
This group was allowed an MPE of 7.0 R.
water
created
by
the
Evidence exists that many of the badges worn by personnel during DOMINIC were defectively
sealed and recorded density changes due to moisture,
radiation.
light, and heat in addition to nuclear
A 1979-1980 reevaluation of 1,349 DOMINIC I film badges showed that 45 percent
exhibited some damage related to light, heat, and age due to defective wax seals.
Environmental damage was observed on 98 percent of the badges, which had a developed density
equivalent of over 0.4 R (gamma).
These findings show, for example, that one-third of the
higher USS Princeton (LPH-5) exposures should actually read zero.’ The lack of any known
activity during DOMINIC I that would result in exposures over 3.0 R except for Sioux and the
high correlation between environmental damage and high dose readings-indicate most of these
readings are higher than the exposure actually received.
Nevertheless,
all personnel have
been assigned the recorded exposure reading in records maintained by the Navy.
on
One of the Thor rockets being launched at Johnston Island with a nuclear payload burned
the launch pad.
The high explosives in the nuclear warhead detonated spreading alpha
contamination around the launch complex.
It took several weeks to decontaminate and rebuild
the launch complex.
Stringent personnel safety measures were enforced during the cleanup.
No one received significant contamination from this accident.