Operation Ivy
US Atomic Veterans
Roy Romo
Roy Romo sent email about his duty at Operation Ivy.
To: Keith Whittle pdxavets@aracnet.com
From: Roy Romo roromo@sbcglobal.net
Subject: Operation Ivy
Date: Feb 2, 2007
Ahoy Keith,
This is to report that John Swanson who was on the USS Lipan ATF-85 during Operation Ivy in Nov 1952, passed away February 4, 2007. John Norden Swanson was the Yeoman and I was the Storekeeper and we shared the same office for 2 1/2 years on the Lipan. He participated in Operation Ivy. He died of cancer. He was my closest friend along with Rodney Keith Hansen.
Roy Romo
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2002
Subject: Operation Ivy
From: roromo@sbcglobal.net
To: Keith Whittle pdxavets@aracnet.com
"MIKE" The First Hydrogen Bomb - Operation Ivy
It was to be a secret operation...so secret that extensive background
checks were completed on every crew member and a crew member whose
father was born in Russia was replaced. On the ship, it was a secret
but waiters on shore remarked, "Oh, you guys are going to the hydrogen
bomb test at Eniwetok." It was the end of secrecy but the beginning of
the Thermonuclear Age.
The USS Lipan ATF-85 arrived at Eniwetok in the Marshall Islands in
mid - October, 1952. The secret operation began with the first
thermonuclear detonation on Nov. 1, 1952. The hydrogen bomb was
assigned the name "Mike" ("M" for megaton). The site used for the blast
was the small island of Elugelab with the USS Lipan standing by 21-26
nautical miles from the surface blast. "Mike" had a yield of 10.4
million tons of TNT.
On board was electronic equipment and several scientists who would be
conducting tests and measuring the actual crater left by the bomb. The
crew of 70 was told to assemble in the mess hall. All port holes were
closed. When asked what would happen when the bomb went off, a
scientist said it could cause a reaction in the atmosphere. When asked
what that meant, he said it meant "to start praying." At that time,
the Captain used the intercom for a short prayer. The count down
followed.
Ten seconds passed before outside viewing was granted. The blast
cloud itself was an awesome and beautiful sight. The
burnt-orange-colored mushroom created by the rising sun left a life long
memory. More than 2 minutes later, the shock wave reached the USS
Lipan. "Mike" created a fireball 3 miles wide with a core temperature
of more than 100,000,000 degrees farenheit...hotter even than the sun.
The mushroom cloud rose 57,000 feet in 1 1/2 minutes and topped out in 5
minutes at 135,000 feet (the top of the stratosphere) with a stem 8
miles across. At that point, one of the scientists remarked, "well, it
looks like the cloud has quit growing. I think we are safe now."
The cloud eventually spread 100 miles wide with a stem 30 miles
across and 80,000,000 tons of soil were lifted into the air by the
blast. "Mike" was more powerful than all the combined explosives used
previously in the two world wars...roughly 750 times as powerful as the
bomb dropped on Hiroshima. As the cloud boiled and the shock wave faded
in the distance, silent thanks were given that "Mike" was not the
effort of some rogue nation.
When the USS Lipan reached the point where the island had once
stood, the island had been completely vaporized. Soundings were taken
at the site to measure the bomb's crater. This was done by dropping and
detonating cannisters of explosives and measuring the soundings to
define the scope of the crater. It measured a little over a mile in
width and 164 feet in depth. "Total annihilation" stretched three
miles. Total destruction" stretched to seven miles.
The USS Lipan was anchored in and around "ground zero" for a week.
The ship had no laundry so most of the crew wore denim shorts and tee
shirts as "uniform of the day". No protective clothing was issued or
worn by the crew. In addition, evaporators were the sole means of
converting the sea water to drinking water. That sea water was over
ground zero; consequently, radiation measured greatest around those
evaporators which produced potable water for the crew of the USS Lipan.
We went out again for another test. This time it was an atomic bomb
with the highest yield pure fission ever exploded. It was code named
"King". This particular bomb was dropped from a B-36 bomber a little
over 1400 feet above the island of Runit. This blast had a yield of a
mere 500,000 tons of TNT. And again we went over ground zero to measure
the much smaller crater.
The USS Lipan spent more than three months in the Marshall Islands as
part of Joint Task Force 132. After the tests, the Navy ordered the
Lipan to tow a water barge to Guam in the Mariana Islands. Upon arrival
in Guam, yard tugs would normally come out and take the water barge for
mooring., However, they heard of the radioactivity aboard the Lipan and
refused to come near until a threat was made to cut the barge loose and
let the tide take it in.
The Lipan then returned to Pearl Harbor. Again the ship was shunned
because of possible radioactivity. Dock number one was assigned...a
dock so far out that it was, in reality, still out at sea. Yard
people, dressed like aliens in all-enveloping white monitoring
clothing, came aboard with Geiger Counters. Two months after the blast,
their instruments gauged the Lipan too radioactive. It was required to
anchor a couple of miles out at sea and wash down all exposed areas
hourly for two weeks, until the radioactivity level was acceptable.
Binoculars revealed the life on the beach. Paradise was in sight but
radioactive sailors
were not acceptable in paradise. Home remained the USS Lipan...205 feet
long and just 38 feet wide...imprisoned by radioactivity from the first
Hydrogen Bomb blast at Eniwetok. As in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's
Ancient Mariner, there was a tale to be told but people were afraid to
come near enough to hear it.
Roy Romo
San Antonio, Texas
Email: roromo@sbcglobal.net
Keith Whittle
June 14, 2001
update April 2, 2002
update Sept 30, 2003
[ Operation Ivy ]