Topic: NuclearFallout

First International Day Against Nuclear Tests and Marshall Islands Nuke Legacy

Today, Sunday, August 29, 2010, marks the first observance of the International Day against Nuclear Tests. The Day is meant to galvanize the efforts of the United Nations, Member States, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, academic institutions, youth networks and media in informing, educating and advocating the necessity of banning nuclear tests to achieve a safer world.

MORE:

• UN: International Day Against Nuclear Tests - In the five decades between 1945 and 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out all over the world.
• General Overview of the Effects of Nuclear Testing - The main man-made contribution to the exposure of the world's population [to radiation] has come from the testing of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere.
• VIDEO: International Day Against Nuclear Testing, CTBTO -The history of nuclear testing from 1945 onwards and the need for the Treaty (CTBT) that bans all nuclear explosions to enter into force.

RESPONSES Regarding CTBTO Statement:

• Bikini flora and fauna? - Bikini Atoll Liaison speaks to error in CTBTO spokesperson's statement
• Reply from CTBTO Spokesperson - Dr. Annika Thunborg, to Bikini Atoll Liaison, clarifies statement

Science & Technology Review: Return to Rongelap

LIVERMORE scientists are at the forefront of an extensive 30-year effort to return the native population of Rongelap Atoll in the Marshall Islands to their home island. The population was displaced to a neighboring atoll following radioactive fallout from a U.S. nuclear test detonated in 1954 on Bikini Atoll, approximately 112 kilometers west of Rongelap. In 1957, the U.S. government resettled the islanders back on Rongelap. However, in 1985, they relocated to Mejetto Island on Kwajalein Atoll because of the community’s concerns about lingering radioactive contamination and its potential health effects.

• Research Highlights: Return to Rongelap

Bikini Atoll in Marshall Islands Chosen as World Heritage Site

Today the Bikini Atoll Nuclear Test Site was inscribed on the World Heritage List.

The Bikini Atoll was the site of atomic weapons testing during the period predating Cold War. Between 1946 and 1954, 67 nuclear tests were carried out in the Marshall Islands, 23 of them in Bikini. This equates 7000 times the force of the Hiroshima bomb.

Projected Lifetime Cancer Risks from Exposure to Regional Radioactive Fallout in the Marshall Islands

Radioactive fallout from nuclear test detonations during 1946–1958 at Bikini and Enewetak Atolls in the Marshall Islands (MI) exposed populations living elsewhere in the MI archipelago.

A comprehensive analysis, presented in seven companion papers, has produced estimates of tissue specific radiation absorbed dose to MI residents at all historically inhabited atolls from internal (ingested) and external irradiation resulting from exposure to radioactive fallout, by calendar year, and by age of the population at time of exposure.

• PAPER: Projected Lifetime Cancer Risks from Exposure to Regional Radioactive Fallout in the Marshall Islands — Charles E. Land, André Bouville, Iulian Apostoaei, and Steven L. Simon, Health Physics, August 2010

NCI Dose Estimation and Predicted Cancer Risk for Residents of the Marshall Islands Exposed to Radioactive Fallout from U.S. Nuclear Weapons Testing at Bikini and Enewetak

Between 1946 and 1958 the United States tested 66 nuclear weapons on or near Bikini and Enewetak atolls, which had previously been evacuated. Populations living elsewhere in the Marshall Islands archipelago were exposed to measurable levels of radioactive fallout from 20 of these tests.

In this carefully considered analysis, National Cancer Institute (NCI) experts estimate that as much as 1.6% of all cancers among those residents of the Marshall Islands alive between 1948 and 1970 might be attributable to radiation exposures resulting from nuclear testing fallout. Due to uncertainly inherent to these analyses, the authors calculated a 90% confidence interval of 0.4% to 3.6%.

Why did the NCI investigate this exposure?

Marshall Islanders Ask US Congress to "Right the Wrongs"

The House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific and the Global Environment, chaired by Eni F.H. Faleomavaega (D-AS), heard testimony from representatives of the Marshall Islands on the on-going impact of U.S. nuclear testing in the Islands during the Cold War. The medical treatment of the Marshallese people, the Nuclear Claims Tribunal, and resettlement were issues discussed at Thursdays's afternoon hearing. Statements from four of the eleven Marshall Islands witnesses follow:

MAY 20, 2010 HEARING:

• Statement of Minister Jack Ading on Behalf of the Enewetak People
• Statement of Jonathan M. Weisgall on Behalf of the Peoples of Bikini, Enewetak, Rongelap and Utrok
• Testimony of Neal A. Palafox, MD, MPH
• Written Testimony of Bill Graham Public Advocate (retired), Marshall Islands Nuclear Claims Tribunal

VIEW:

• SUBCOMMITTEE OVERSIGHT WEBCAST of May 20, 2010 (realplayer)

Testimony on Marshall Islands Supplemental Nuclear Compensation Act: RMI Minister of Foreign Affairs John Silk

Mr. Chairman, Distinguished Members of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, Ladies and Gentlemen:

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. His Excellency President Jurelang Zedkaia once again takes this opportunity to personally thank you Chairman Bingaman for introducing S. 2941, the Republic of the Marshall Islands Supplemental Nuclear Compensation Act of 2010, and for convening this hearing so that we may present our views on this most important and historic legislation.

I would also like to take this opportunity to recognize other members of our delegation present here today, and to thank them for their presence and contributions.

• SENATE ENERGY WEBCAST PAGE, May 19, 2010

Presidential Panel Urges US to Further Compensate Marshall Islands for Nuke Legacy

The U.S. has not met its obligation to provide for ongoing health needs of the people of the Republic of the Marshall Islands resulting from radiation exposures they received during U.S. nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific from 1946–1958, according to U.S. government panel report published online this week.

The annual report of the President's Cancer Panel, "Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk," pointed to the toxic legacy of military operations in the United States and beyond its borders, including chemical and radiation contamination.

In the Marshall Islands, the total yield of the 67 nuclear tests conducted by the U.S. during the Cold War era, was "equal to 7,200 Hiroshima bombs, or the equivalent of 1.6 Hiroshima bombs per day for 12 years."

Bikinian's Appeal Nuke Case Review before U.S. Supreme Court Denied

The Supreme Court refused on Monday to hear any new cases, including the petition of the people of Bikini Atoll and Enewetak Atoll to review the lower court rejection of appeals to their case. No reason for denying review of that or any other case turned aside Monday was given.

On Petition for a Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit:

• CERTIORARI DENIED: Supreme Court Denial to Hear Bikini Case
• REPLY BRIEF FOR THE PETITIONERS: People of Bikini, March 16, 2010
• BRIEF FOR THE UNITED STATES IN OPPOSITION: March 5, 2010
• DOCKET PAGE, 09-499, 09-498: People of Bikini, Petitioner v.United States, Supreme Court

Marshallese "Remember Elders" on 64th Anniversary of U.S. Nuke Testing in Islands

Bikinians who reside in the United States have not forgotten their homeland. In communities across the U.S. mainland, and Hawaii, they held ceremonies to commemorate 64th anniversary of the U.S. nuclear testing program that took place in their homeland. Although the official day is March 1, many Bikinian communities held ceremonies on the following weekend to accommodate all the events. Marshallese and friends in the States were invited to Springdale, Arkansas where one of the largest event was sponsored by the Bikinian community residing in the area.

BRAVO's 56th Birthday and its Radioactive Legacy

Glenn Alcalay, a former Peace Corps volunteer on Utrik in the Marshall Islands, now an adjunct professor of anthropology at Montclair State University in New Jersey, has studied the impact of U.S. Cold War nuclear testing in the Marshall Islands. In the following article, he relates the story of the BRAVO H-bomb test and its aftermath:

John Anjain, then-mayor of Rongelap Atoll in the Marshall Islands, told me in 1981 how a man working with the Atomic Energy Commission in February 1954 stuck out the tip of his index finger - about a half-inch - and said, "John, your life is about that long."

Marshall Islands ratifies Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty

The Marshall Islands has ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), becoming the 151st country to do so.

The ratification of the CTBT by the Marshall Islands is highly symbolic. A total of 67 atmospheric nuclear tests were conducted by the United States at the Bikini and Enewetak Atolls between 1946 and 1958.

Investigative Documentary on BNL's Marshall Islands Nuke Connection Makes Impact

The Brookhaven National Lab's (BNL) 43-year study of Marshallese exposed during US nuke testing is detailed in the Newsday series, Fallout: The legacy of Brookhaven Lab's mission in the Marshall Islands. In the following account, written at request of Harvard University's Nieman Foundation for Journalism and showcased on its website, reporter Thomas Maier describes how the three-year multi-media project developed and what impact it is making today:

For a long time, I’ve wanted to produce a newspaper investigative project with an accompanying full-fledged video documentary – a marriage of traditional hard-hitting reporting with narrative-style television journalism. The story of Brookhaven National Lab’s troubled history in the Marshall Islands – told in a nine-part 32-minute documentary and a 5,000-word Sunday magazine piece with on-line sidebars – provided a challenge to do just that.

Series on Fallout Legacy in Marshall Islands Elicits Brookhaven Lab Response

Fifty years ago, Marshallese, exposed to the radioactive fallout during U.S. nuclear testing, were called "savages" in a Cold War documentary.

The 1954 BRAVO blast, which was a thousand times stronger than the bomb to Hiroshima, contaminated Rongelap. Rongelap mayor John Anjain and six other men were brought to Argonne Lab in Chicago and filmed during health tests.

"Guinea pigs" is the term Marshallese use themselves. They believe they were "unwitting subjects" in a long-running research effort designed to study the impact of radiation at the expense of their health. The U.S. performed 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands from 1946-58.

People of Bikini: Sixty-three Years After First Bomb

AUDIO: Marshallese Liaison Pays Visit to Springdale - Interview of Bikini's Jack Niedenthal during the NWA Marshallese May Day

AUDIO: Islanders Migrating To Arkansas - NPR report on Marshallese community in Springdale, Ark

Council meets with DOE in Majuro - Budget cut means drastic changes for Bikini people

Meetings in Washington, DC - KBE Mayor Alson Kelen and Trust Liaison Jack Niedenthal for legal meetings and talks with Congressional reps.

The world's debt to Bikini - application to UNESCO to make Bikini a world heritage site to ensure that humanity will remember for all time the devastation unleashed and sacrifice of the Bikinians who once lived there.

FLASHBACK:

• 60 Years of Remembering: The First of Sixty-Seven Nuke Tests in Marshall Islands
• NUCLEAR FALLOUT: July 1, 1946 - Then and 59 years later