After this second fallout episode, the task force decided ta
the attempt to reenter Bikini Lagoon that day.
abandon
The major units
nd those
vessels with TG 7.1 and TG 7.5 personnel aboard were sent west
Enewetak
to offload these people and to prepare for a return to Bikini a
the be-
ginning of operations afloat there.
south of
The USS Belle Grove remaine
Bikini to reenter the following day if possible.
The cloud-tracking aircraft Wilson 2 had begun its flight 2
Ours after
detonation and had been scheduled to fly for 3 hours in a racetrack course
50 nmi (93 km) west of Bikini to warn if the fallout was headed
$estward.
It was then to fly eastward searching for the cloud in a sector
Wounded by
the bearings 55° to 85° through the burst point.
at the Air Operations Control
of Bikini for 6 hours.
Owing to some
(AOC) Center, Wilson 2 was held to
donfusion
[the west
A portion of its flight path is shown in
Figure 62
along with the reconstructed fallout at approximately this time.
In its
entire flight, Wilson 2 recorded only one radiation reading of a
icance, and this was at 1550, 150 nmi
zero.
(278 km)
signif-
at a 60° bearing fom ground
The aircraft flew at 10,000 feet (3.05 km) throughout its
Flight.
At 1553, the P2V aircraft dispatched to replace the transient] shipping
Search P2V aircraft that had been forced to return because of confamination picked up the desired heading to continue the sweep centeredjon the
65° bearing.
In attempting to pick up the heading slightly earlidgr, the
P2V had encountered radiation at 160 nmi (296 km) bearing 85° from
the
burst point.
search
This had forced the P2V to swing east to pick up thd@
vector farther out from ground zero.
This plane, based at Kwajaldin, was
coming from the south toward the 65° bearing when it encountered
the radi-
ation.
et; 305
These flights were flown at a much lower altitude (1,000
meters) than the Wilson flights.
The remainder of the flight was apparently uneventful until th
Sighted the USS Patapsco on a course of 30° (Reference 16).
plane
The P V con-
tacted the Patapsco advising an "easterly" course so as to avoid t e 65°
bearing.
The Patapsco accepted this advice, leaving a course that would
218