PREFACE The work reported here may be said with some precision to have had its inception in September, 1975 with an agreement between the Energy Research and Development Administration (ERDA) and the Defense Nuclear Agency (DNA), committing ERDA to provide technical support to DNA in the cleanup of Enewetak. But in truth the effort had become an inevitable moral obligation of the United States many years earlier, in 1947, when the People of Enewetak were persuaded to leave their homeland to make way for our nation's atmospheric nuclear test activities. It might be said to have begun in April 1972 when Ambassador Franklin Haydn Williams and High Commissioner Edward E. Johnston promised the return of Enewetak to the administration of the Trust Territory. Or it might be said to have begun at Enewetak on May 20th, 1972, on the occasion of the first visit of the Enewetak leadership to their home atoll after 26 years away. On that latter occasion, Enewetak Magistrate Smith Gideon closed a four-day conference by saying to the United States officials, "We know that your people are going to help in cleaning up the place and preparing for our return to our home islands." It was five years later that the mobilization for the cleanup occurred, and work began in earnest to prepare for the return. The intervening time had been used in surveying, establishing criteria, obtaining Congressional authorization and funding, planning, acquiring resources and developing equipment and techniques. Radiological support to the cleanup was assigned as a mission to the ERDA Nevada Operations Office, which formed a project team known as the Enewetak Radiological Support Project (ERSP). For the most part, this is the report of that Project from its first authorization on February 23, 1977, to the completion of the cleanup. At this writing the ERSP remains in being on at least an informal basis, and will until this report goes to press. A few brief words about the role of the ERSP are in order. The key word in the Project name is support. The Project Manager and his several Deputies did not direct the atoll cleanup action. They recommended, advised and assisted Department of Defense officials in carrying out the Congress! mandate for the cleanup. The Project takes full responsibility for its advice and recommendations, but often the decisions of the Director, DNA, the Commander, Field Command or the Commanderof the Joint Task Group necessarily took into account overriding considerations of a non-technical nature. In these cases it was the responsibility of the ERSP Manager to define and articulate alternatives and their likely consequences and then to fully support the decisions and actions of the DOD. Another function which the ERSP did not perform was the establishment of criteria and standards. These were given to us in guidance received from AEC, ERDA, and later, DOE Headquarters. The ERSP management team interpreted these criteria and standards in terms suitable for direction of the field effort. A special note of acknowledgement is due Bert Friesen, who served as Editor and a major contributor to this volume. The other members of the ERSP team are acknowledged and credited as appropriate elsewhere in this report. I feel confident that I speak for all of them in observing that it has been a rare privilege and a stimulating challenge to be a part of so unique a project of such high importance to so deserving a group of people. We wish the People of Enewetak health, prosperity, happiness and peace in their ancestral home. Roger Ray, Project Manager Enewetak Radiological Support Project Nevada Operations Office