Operation Dominic 1962
US Atomic Veterans
Dave France
Dave France sent email about his duty at Operation Dominic
Date: Sun, 16 Apr 2006
From: email withheld by request
To: Keith
Subject: Operation Dominic
I was a Marine in the flight deck crew on the USS Princeton during Operation Dominic I, in the summer and fall of 1962. Many interesting and sad stories on your website. Here are some insights that I've not seen mentioned.
After the launch pad explosion in spring of '62, the contaminated soil was simply bulldozed into the lagoon. The Princeton was anchored in the lagoon for three months, and made fresh water from the water of the lagoon. We bathed in it, drank it, cooked with it, and even went swimming in it. We were told that the AEC had provided funds for an enhanced diet as compensation for our hardship duty station (no family/girls). We were fed a luxurious diet that included lots of Lobster, Prawns, and Shrimp. In retrospect this was obviously to provide us with plenty of dietary Iodine, in an attempt to block the uptake by our thyroid glands of Radioactive Iodine that had to be present in the Lagoon water.
During our long stay at anchor in the Johnston Island lagoon, we were served "irradiated milk" in funny pyramid shaped cartons with the words "tetra-pack" on the bottom. This milk had been sterilized by exposure to radioactive material as a means of preserving it without need for refrigeration. We were also informed that the irradiated milk was experimental and was Not FDA approved (yet) for sale in the USA. In retrospect it would appear that we were also test animals for big money nuclear industrialists.
We had a "Geiger Counter" on the flight deck for checking returning aircraft and personnel. The Geiger Counter showed a steady "background radiation" level of 0.5 Milli-Roentgens per hour (mR/hr). Approximately 5 times the normal earth background radiation level. After the rocket shot that went off course and was destroyed, raining plutonium over a wide area, the background radiation level jumped to more than 1.0 mR/hr and took several weeks to subside. A picture of the Geiger Counter we used is found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:CDV700.jpg
0.5 Milli-Roentgens/hr times 24 hours = 12 mR per day. Times 90 days gives us a cumulative exposure of 1080 Milli-Roentgens, or 1.08 rem. This is 567% higher than the "0.190 rem" assigned by the gov. bright sparks who did a "dose reconstruction", 20 years later. AND it does not take into consideration the massive "impulse burst" of radiation that passed right through the ship, (and probably the earth itself), at the moment of each detonation.
Each rocket shot carried a nose cone which housed telemetry instrumentation. After each shot the highly radioactive nose cone was retrieved by helicopter off the Princeton, and dropped down a chute to an underground storage cavern on the island. When the nose cone hit the water it would deploy a large floating ring attached to the nose cone by a very long cable. A Marine helicopter crewman would lie on his stomach on the floor of a Marine UH-34D helicopter and give directions to the pilot as they attempted to snag the ring, with a large weighted hook connected by a long cable to the cargo hook on the bottom of the aircraft. There was word that two or three of the helicopter crewmen's dosimeter readings were so high that they were flown back to the states. There were no names mentioned and no further news of them. We were advised not to talk about it. If true, and given what we now know of the governments cover up of the contamination of Hiroshima/Nagasaki clean-up personnel, they were simply reminded of their security agreement penalties, then immediately discharged and sent home to die. This is haw the government dealt with US military personnel who suffered "radiation poisoning" during clean-up operations at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We had each signed a security agreement that forbid us to speak about anything seen or heard at Johnston Island, for the next 20 years. The penalty for violating the agreement was a $20,000. fine (4 years average wages in 1962), and/or 20 years in prison..! There have been published reports of some who dared to speak being visited by government suits with guns and given death threats. We will never know how many died in silence before that time period ran out. In retrospect the 20 year oath of silence served only to protect the government and the big money nuclear power industrialists from litigation, and to conceal from public view the tragic human legacy of atomic bomb testing. We were an expendable asset.
I was just a kid in the summer of 62, barely 19. Most of the Princeton's crew of '62 have met their final roll call and their stories will never be heard. In the late '70s when Operation Dominic was declassified, the gov. set up a hot line and asked survivors to call in. The line was continuously busy. When, after two or three months, I managed to connect to a human at the other end, I asked the lady how many veterans had called in and if they had health problems. She said: "Sir, I'm sad to say that most of the callers are widows". That was my epiphany.
Unaware of the tragic personal legacies of Operation Dominic, that were to follow, we enjoyed many good times aboard the Princeton, in those early days. We got to see the "Far East" when it was still FAR, and still exotic. Nothing ever smelled as enchanting and wonderful, as the sweet aroma of mahogany forests and tropical flowers carried on the sea breeze approaching Subic Bay, after weeks at sea. The first sip of an ice cold San Miguel beer, after a long sea passage, is an experience that defies words. It was a good life. A very good life. For many of us it was the best of times. We didn't know, in those early days, that we'd been sacrificed in the interest of national security. That awareness would come later. Looking back it's easy to connect the dots, and it's easy to see that the government had, with complete prescience, taken every possible measure to assure that we would never be able to hold them accountable.
I'm not angry. I'm grateful for the good years and the memories. The wonder and excitement of being a young Marine, off to see the world.
I'll close here with a brief excerpt from Joseph Conrad's , narrative tale: "Youth".
"I have seen the mysterious shores, the still water, the lands of brown nations, where a stealthy nemesis lies in wait, pursues, overtakes so many of the conquering race, who are proud of their wisdom, of their knowledge, of their strength. But for me all the East is contained in that vision of my youth. It is all in that moment when I opened my young eyes on it. I came upon it from a tussle with the sea -- and I was young -- and I saw it looking at me. And this is all that is left of it! Only a moment; a moment of strength, of romance, of glamor -- of youth! . . . A flick of sunshine upon a strange shore, the time to remember, the time for a sigh, and -- good-by! -- Night -- Good-by . . .!"
Marlow drank.
"Ah! The good old time -- the good old time. Youth and the sea. Glamor and the sea! The good, strong sea, the salt, bitter sea, that could whisper to you and roar at you and knock your breath out of you."
He drank again.
"By all that's wonderful, it is the sea, I believe, the sea itself -- or is it youth alone? Who can tell? But you here -- you all had something out of life: money, love -- whatever one gets on shore -- and, tell me, wasn't that the best time, that time when we were young at sea; young and had nothing, on the sea that gives nothing, except hard knocks -- and sometimes a chance to feel your strength -- that only -- what you all regret?"
And we all nodded at him: the man of finance, the man of accounts, the man of law, we all nodded at him over the polished table that like a still sheet of brown water reflected our faces, lined, wrinkled; our faces marked by toil, by deceptions, by success, by love; our weary eyes looking still, looking always, looking anxiously for something out of life, that while it is expected is already gone -- has passed unseen, in a sigh, in a flash -- together with the youth, with the strength, with the romance of illusions.
Best wishes to all,
Dave France
V-1 Div. USS Princeton LPH-5, July'61 - Dec'63
Keith Whittle
April 17, 2006
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