Model T at Crossroads

From Washington to the Central Pacific, the atom clans were gathering: physicists, chemists, seismologists, meteorologists, biologists, physicians, oceanographers. The chiefs of all three armed services--General Eisenhower, General Spaatz and Admiral Nimitz--were coming to their party. Ships of all types were loading in U.S. ports, or were already headed for the Marshall Islands, where Bikini, the chosen atoll, awaited Crossroads Day.

In New Mexico, last week, crack crews in green-marked B-29s competed for the honor of dropping the fourth atomic bomb. Their target runs were secret, lest sharp-eyed newsmen guess too much. Not so secret was the test flight of an ancient, radio-controlled B17. Guided by radio impulses from a jeep, the creaking, beaten-up bomber struggled into the air. Then a "mother plane" took its controls by radio, circled it round the field. Riding with its two hands-off pilots were two volunteers: a male and a female correspondent. The landing was rough, close to a crackup, but the Air Forces considered the test successful. On Crossroads Day, it announced, it would fly four unmanned B-17s into the radioactive cloud above the atomic explosion, attempt to collect great bagsful of cloud matter. All the "drones" were considered expendable, for the cloud's effect upon planes was still unknown.

Harried Headquarters. The goings-on in New Mexico were only a tiny part of the far-flung preparations. In Washington, mild-mannered L. A. Sawyer, technical director of Operation Crossroads, battled with a crushing schedule of planning and consultation. Many of his projects were still secret, and would remain so, but enough had been released about them to show the gigantic scope of the operation.

Two Nagasaki-type bombs (which forward-looking scientists and the Air Forces now call primitive "Model Ts") would be exploded at Bikini: one in the air, the other on the surface of the lagoon. So far, the plans concerned chiefly the first bomb, scheduled to be dropped about May 15. No one knew what changes of plans would seem prudent before the second bomb exploded. In any case, promised Vice Admiral W. H. P. Blandy, boss of Operation Crossroads, the test would not be rigged to favor the Army, the Navy or the bomb.

Before & After. First scientists to start work at Bikini will be 14 biologists, botanists, oceanographers (and two commercial fishermen, reportedly paid higher wages than the scientists). They sailed from Honolulu last week aboard the U.S.S. Bowditch, to catalogue plant and animal life on & near the atoll. After the explosions, they would make another expedition, to get a before-&-after picture. Years later, they would return to ravished Bikini, to chart the slow, painful process of repopulation.

Long before the Bowditch men finish their work, Seabees will build six 75-ft. steel towers on the little islands around Bikini to support 'batteries of cameras, radio-controlled and sheathed in lead against radiation. A legion of instruments will be exposed on the sand, built into concrete bunkers, or sunk in the lagoon. They will measure radiation, heat, shock and blast. Twenty sunken instruments will measure the waves, which might rise to a height of several hundred feet.

A few men, well protected, will watch the explosion from ten miles away. But most will be stationed twice as far off. Captain G. M. Lyon, Navy doctor, considers 20 miles perfect for safety and good observation. "People up close at Alamogordo," he said, "missed some of the show."

Captain Lyon, responsible for safety of personnel, hopes that no one will look directly at the explosion. Everybody privileged to watch, will have goggles with glass so opaque that it turns the midday sun into a pallid ghost. But the atom bomb's light can strike through it at 20 miles away, causing temporary blindness. The Captain's advice: face the other way, shut your eyes, cover your face with your arms. Then, an instant later, you may see something.

The great day itself will be chosen by Colonel B. G. Holzman, a meteorologist. For proper observation, there should be no overcast. But the Colonel's greatest worry will be the mighty cloud of radioactive gases and particles which will rise like a thunderhead above the explosion. From it may fall a deadly sprinkle, and the Colonel's job is to see that it falls on empty ocean.

Normally, radioactive particles from the cloud should not reach the sea for two or three hours. But the bomb's hot gases, rising rapidly, might whip up a genuine thunderstorm. Then the particles would all fall much sooner, in a deluge of deadly rain. Colonel Holzman hopes to pick a day when conditions are poor for an atom-brewed thunderstorm.

Rats on the Bridge. On that day, the ships in Bikini Lagoon will be manned by "guinea pig" crews: 200 goats, 200 pigs, 4,000 white rats. They will wait their fate in the same positions which a human crew would occupy in battle stations: rats in the turrets, on deck, in engine rooms, gun-tubs and bridges. The goats will be tethered among them. Some of the pigs, whose skin approximates human skin, will be dressed in standard Navy anti-flash suits and smeared with anti-flash lotion. A few will have new and secret protection. There will be no human volunteers, although one William Parker, 46, of Los Angeles had offered himself, and was calling for fellow self-sacrificers.

The Navy's medical section, commanded by Captain R. H. Draeger, hopes that none of the test animals will be killed outright. Said Draeger: "We want radiation sick animals, but not radiation-dead animals."* After the blast, the goats, pigs and rats will be collected and rushed to the U.S.S. Burleson, a transport equipped to house them. There, medics will study the effect upon them of the deadly gamma rays.

Zero Hour. A single B-29 will carry the Model-T bomb at Crossroads. More B-29s will fly above it, to drop instruments in parachutes. The "mother planes" will hover at a fairly safe distance, ready to shepherd their crewless "drones" into the radioactive cloud. At Zero minus 15 seconds, another ring of B-29s, each carrying at least 25 cameras, will turn and head for the target.

At Zero hour, when the bomb is dropped, a blast like a hundred hurricanes will whip the still lagoon. A pressure wave will strike across the Pacific, perhaps to be felt by sensitive instruments in San Francisco and Washington. An earth wave will shoot through the sea floor toward distant seismographs. What will happen to the ships in Bikini Lagoon, no one knows.

At Zero plus 30 minutes, if Admiral Blandy gives the order, two Mariner flying boats, equipped with Geiger counters to measure radioactivity, will roar across the lagoon, 40 feet above the water. If they report and if their report is favorable, a pair of helicopters will flutter down to take samples of the atom-stirred water. Then six small gunboats, also with Geiger counters, will approach the dread lagoon, sampling the water and reporting by radio. Next, a swarm of 20 launches, manned by raincoated scientists, will scoot like water bugs among the stricken ships. Finally, if all pioneers report that the coast is clear, the Navy's Bureau of Ships, its medical units, and its associated scientists will enter Bikini Lagoon to see what the Model-T bomb has done to the U.S. Navy.

* In Los Angeles, Hearst's Examiner was already rallying anti-vivisectionists to save the test animals.

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