QUALITATIVE DISTRIBUTION OF RADIONUCLIDES AT RONGELAP ATOLL?
E.
E.
Held
Laboratory of Radiation Biology
University of Washington
In March 1958 a radioecological study of Rongelap Atoll
was instituted at the request of the United States Atomic
Energy Commission,
Division of
Biology and Medicine.
This
report will be concerned with generalizations regarding the
distribution of radioisotopes at the atoll in the fall of 1959,
some five years after contamination with radioactive fallout.
Rongelap Atoll was accidentally contaminated on March 1,
1954,
with radioactive fallout from a thermonuclear device
detonated at Bikini Atoll some 80 miles to the west.
dose rates at Rongelap on D+ 1
(detonation + 1 day)
Gamma
ranged
from 3.5 r/hr at the southern islets of the atoll to 35 r/hr
at the northern islets
(Dunning,
residing on Rongelap Island,
1957).
Eighty-two natives
in the south,
did not return until June 1957.
were evacuated and
At that time the returning
lpitle in Program for the First Symposium on Radioecology is
"Qualitative differences in radioisotopes present in plankton,
lagoon bottom, and land plants."