 Rokko:
A child of Bravo
Fifty years after the
fallout, the Marshall Islands Journal looks back at the
largest American hydrogen bomb test and its continuing
legacy in RMI.
A
timeline of tragedy.
Rokko
Langinbelik’s story.
Senator
Ismael John on ‘Mike’.
Events
for Nuclear Survivors’ Day.
What happened when
 1946
March: US Navy evacuates 167 Bikinians to Rongerik, 125
miles to the east, to make way for the first post World War
II nuclear weapons tests.
July: Operation Crossroads is launched with “Able” and
“Baker” nuclear tests at Bikini. Both are Hiroshima-size
atomic tests. “Baker”, an underwater test, contaminates and
sinks target fleet of World War II ships in Bikini’s lagoon.
1947 December: Enewetak
Atoll is selected for the second series of US nuclear tests,
and the Enewetak people are quickly moved to Ujelang Atoll.
1948 March: On the verge of
starvation, the Bikinians are taken off Rongerik and moved
to Kwajalein, where they stay for six months until they’re
moved to Kili Island.
1952 November: Operation
Ivy opens at Enewetak and includes Mike, the first test of a
hydrogen device, that vaporizes one island and is estimated
at 750 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb.
1954 January: Preparations
commence at Bikini Atoll for Operation Castle, to test a
series of megaton range weapons, including America’s first
deliverable hydrogen bomb.
February 28: At 6pm on the
eve of the Bravo test, weather reports indicate that
atmospheric “conditions were getting less favorable.” At
midnight, just seven hours from the shot, the weather
reports say that winds at 20,000 feet “were headed for
Rongelap to the east.”
March 1: Bikini’s weather
outlook down-graded to “unfavorable” and Joint Task Force 7
directs several ships to move 20 miles to the south to
remove them from the expected fallout zone. Despite weather
reports showing that winds are blowing in the direction of
inhabited islands, the 15 megaton Bravo test is detonated at
Bikini. Within hours a gritty, white ash envelops islanders
on Rongelap and Ailinginae Atolls. A few hours later,
American weathermen are exposed to the snowstorm of fallout
on Rongerik, and still later the people of Utrik and other
islands experience the fallout “mist”. Those exposed
experience nausea, vomiting and itching skin and eyes.
March 3: Rongelap islanders
are evacuated 48 hours later, and Utrik is evacuated 72
hours after Bravo. Both groups are taken to Kwajalein. Skin
burns on the heavily exposed people begin to develop, and
later their hair falls out. The US Atomic Energy Commission
tells the media that Bravo was a “routine atomic test”, and
that some Americans and Marshallese were “unexpectedly
exposed to some radioactivity. There were no burns. All were
reported well.”
March 7: Project 4.1 —
“Study of Response of Human Beings Exposed to Significant
Beta and Gamma Radiation due to Fallout from High Yield
Weapons” — establishes a secret medical group to monitor and
evaluate the Rongelap and Utrik people.
April: A Project 4.1 memo
recommends that the exposed Rongelap people should have “no
exposure for (the) rest of (their) natural lives.”
April 29: A Department of
Defense report states that the “only other populated atoll
which received fallout of any consequence at all was Ailuk …
It was calculated that a dose ... would reach approximately
20 roentgens. Balancing the effort required to move the 400
inhabitants against the fact that such a dose would not be a
medical problem it was decided not to evacuate the atoll.”
May: Utrik Islanders
allowed to return home because, according to US officials,
“Their island was only slightly contaminated and considered
safe for habitation.”
1957 July: Rongelap is
declared safe for rehabitation “in spite of slight lingering
radiation.” The Rongelap people, who have been living
temporarily in Ejit Island, Majuro, return to Rongelap.
1958 May–August: Operation
Hardtack begins at Enewetak and Bikini, with 32 tests,
including several hydrogen bombs. The last nuclear
detonation in the Marshall Islands takes place on August 18,
bringing to 67 the total of nuclear weapons tested.
1963 The first thyroid
tumors begin appearing among Rongelap people exposed to the
Bravo test in 1954.
1969 October: Bikini Atoll
is declared safe for habitation by US officials. “There’s
virtually no radiation left and we can find no discernible
effect on either plant or animal life,” says the AEC.
1972 October: Because it is
not satisfied with information provided by the AEC, the
Bikini Council votes not to return to Bikini as a community
but says it will not prevent individuals from returning.
Several Bikini families move back to Bikini into newly built
homes.
1973 AEC draft report, not
publicly released, concludes that Bravo fallout may have
contaminated as many as 18 atolls and islands, including
Kwajalein and Majuro.
1976 The people of Utrik,
whose original exposure in 1954 of 14 rads of radiation was
less than one-twelfth that of Rongelap, suddenly show a
higher rate of thyroid cancer than the Rongelap people.
 1977
May: A nuclear cleanup at Enewetak Atoll begins. About 700
US Army personnel carry out the cleanup’s first phase, which
includes scraping 100,000 cubic yards of radioactive soil
and debris and dumping it in a bomb crater on Runit Island
that is sealed with cement.
1978 May: Interior
Department officials describe 75 percent increase in
radioactive cesium found in the Bikini people as
“incredible”. Plans are announced to move the people within
90 days.
September: The 139 people living on Bikini Atoll are
evacuated.
US provides $6 million trust fund for the Bikini people.
1980 March: The US Defense
Nuclear Agency announces that the Enewetak nuclear cleanup
is completed. The estimated cost of the cleanup and
rehabilitation was $218 million. Enewetak Islanders begin
returning home to the southern islands in the atoll.
1982 US provides $20
million trust fund for Bikini.
1983 Compact of Free
Association is approved in a plebiscite by about 60 percent
of Marshall Islands voters. The Compact includes a Section
177 trust fund of $150 million that is to provide $270
million in compensation payments over the 15 year life of
the Compact (Bikini $75 million; Enewetak $48; Rongelap $37
million; Utrik $22 million; Nuclear Claims Tribunal $45
million; $2 million annually for medical care for the “four
atolls”; $3 million for a nationwide radiological survey;
etc).
1988 US provides additional
funding for Bikini trust fund of $90 million paid over five
years.
1991 August: The Nuclear
Claims Tribunal’s personal injury compensation program
becomes effective with the approval of regulations
establishing a list of 25 compensable medical conditions.
The first awards were made and initial payments were issued
in the amount of 20% of the net award.
October: Annual pro rata payments were made by the Tribunal
on all personal injury awards in the amount of 5%, bringing
the cumulative total paid on each award to 25%. Initial
payments on awards made during the subsequent year was also
25%.
1992 October: Annual pro
rata payments made by the Tribunal on all personal injury
awards in the amount of 8%, bringing the cumulative total
paid on each award to 33%. Initial payment level on awards
over the subsequent year was 33%.
l993 October: Annual pro
rata payments made by the Tribunal on all personal injury
awards in the amount of 7%, bringing the cumulative total
paid on each award to 40%.
1994 January 25: Based
primarily on studies of Japanese atomic bomb survivors by
the Radiation Effects Research Foundation in Hiroshima and
on findings reported by the US National Academy of Sciences
Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation ,
the Tribunal adds unexplained hyperparathyroidism and tumors
of the parathyroid gland to its list of compensable medical
conditions.
October: Annual pro rata payments made by the Tribunal on
all personal injury awards in the amount of 10%, bringing
the cumulative total paid on each award to 50%.
US Congress provides $45
million resettlement fund for Rongelap.
1995 October: The US
Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments issues its
final report, including observations and recommendations on
the Marshall Islands. The report recommends that at least
two more atolls, Ailuk and Likiep, be included in a medical
program, and that the Department of Energy’s program “be
reviewed to determine if it is appropriate to add to the
program populations of other atolls to the south and east of
the (Bravo) blast whose inhabitants may have received
exposures sufficient to cause excess thyroid abnormalities.”
Annual pro rata payments
made by the Tribunal on all personal injury awards in the
amount of 5%, bringing the cumulative total paid on each
award to 55%.
1996 March 5: Based on
various scientific and medical reports, the Nuclear Claims
Tribunal amends its list of compensable medical conditions
to include seven additional cancers.
October: Annual pro rata
payments made by the Tribunal on all personal injury awards
in the amount of 2%, bringing the cumulative total paid on
each award to 57%. Initial payment for new awards made
beginning October 1, 1996 established at 25% of each award.
1997 October: Annual
payments on personal injury awards made before October 1996
issued by the Tribunal in the amount of 2%, bringing the
cumulative total paid on each award to 59%. For awards made
between October 1996 and September 1997, annual payments in
the amount of 5% were issued, bringing the cumulative total
paid on those awards to 30%.
1998 May 21: The Tribunal
issues a Statement of Determination proposing to amend its
regulations to make cancer of the bone a compensable medical
condition, increasing the list of conditions to 35.
October: Annual payments on personal injury awards made
before October 1996 issued by the Tribunal in the amount of
2%, bringing the cumulative total paid on each award to 61%.
For awards made beginning in October 1996 annual payments
issued to bring the cumulative total paid on those awards to
40%.
December: The Tribunal
adopts a radiation protection standard based on the
“policies and criteria” set by the US Environmental
Protection Agency in 1997. That standard, a maximum of 15
millirem per year above background level, applies in cases
before the Tribunal to determine the need for and cost of
radiological rehabilitation of any atoll.
1999 October: Annual
payments on personal injury awards made before October 1996
issued by the Tribunal in the amount of 2%, bringing the
cumulative total paid on each award to 63%. For awards made
beginning in October 1996, annual payments were issued to
bring the cumulative total paid on those awards to 45%.
2000 April 13: The Tribunal
issues a Memorandum of Decision and Order in the class
action property damage claim of the People of Enewetak,
awarding a net total of $324,949,311 in compensation. That
amount included $199,154,811 for past and future loss of use
of Enewetak, $91,710,000 for cleanup and rehabilitation of
the atoll, and $34,084,500 for hardships suffered during the
relocation to Ujelang.
May 5: Tribunal issues an
Order amending its April 13 award to Enewetak to include an
additional $16.1 million as the cost to restore the soil and
revegetate the 558 acres of the atoll subject to soil
removal as part of the radiological cleanup. This action
brings the total net damages awarded to $341,049,311.
August 3: Tribunal awards
pre-judgment interest to the People of Enewetak from the
date of the loss of use calculation in January 1997 to the
date of its decision to award compensation in April. The
effect of that Order is to increase the net total of the
Enewetak property damage award to $385,894,500.
September 11: RMI Changed
Circumstances Petition presented to US Congress.
October: Annual payments on
personal injury awards made before October 1996 were issued
by the Tribunal in the amount of 3%, bringing the cumulative
total paid on each award to 66%. For awards made beginning
in October 1996, annual payments made bring the cumulative
total paid on those awards to 50%.
2001 March 5: The Tribunal
issues a ruling in the class action property damage claim of
the People of Bikini, awarding a net total of $563,315,500
in compensation. That amount includes $278 million for past
and future loss of use of Bikini, $251.5 million to restore
the atoll to a safe and productive state, and $33,815,500
for hardships suffered by the people as a result of their
relocation.
October: The Tribunal
issues a Statement of Determination noting that the 15th
anniversary of the effective date of the Compact of Free
Association and the Section 177 Agreement marked the end of
the distribution regime under which a set amount of $3.25
million had been allocated for payment of awards. The
Tribunal says that the pro-rated approach “had the unjust
result of stretching payment out over a period of years so
that many have passed away before receiving full payment.”
To address the injustice, the Tribunal pays 50% of the
unpaid balance of each personal injury award. This is more
than $15 million, bringing the cumulative amount paid to
between 62.5% and 83% of each award.
2002 February: The Tribunal
issues the first compensation payments on the awards made
for property damage in Enewetak and Bikini. The initial
payments represented 0.25% of each award, amounting to about
$1.1m for Enewetak and $1.5m for Bikini.
October: Annual payments on
personal injury awards are issued by the Tribunal in amounts
ranging from 4% to 25%, bringing the cumulative total paid
on each award to between 75% and 87%.
2003 January 31: The
Tribunal amends its regulations to add autoimmune
thyroiditis to the list of compensable medical conditions.
February: The Tribunal
approves second payments on the awards made for property
damage in Enewetak and Bikini. Those payments represent
one-eighth of one percent of each award, amounting to about
$570,000 for Enewetak and $787,000 for Bikini.
May 5: The Tribunal issues
an Order reducing initial payments of personal injury awards
from 50% to 25%.
October: Annual payments on
personal injury awards were issued by the Tribunal in
amounts ranging from 2% to 35%, bringing the cumulative
total paid on each award to between 60% and 89%.
2004 January: US funding
for 177 Health Plan ends.
Why should we have to beg?
By GIFF JOHNSON
Fifty years after America
tested its most powerful hydrogen bomb at Bikini Atoll, many
Marshall Islanders watch in anger as the world’s most
powerful nation lavishes billions of dollars on Iraq and
Afghanistan but has halted funding for a medical program for
nuclear test victims and is dragging its feet on a request
for $2 billion in compensation.
“Why should we have to beg
the United States to get funding for our medical problems
that are directly related to their nuclear bombs they tested
on us?” asks Rongelap Islander Lijon Eknilang, who was eight
years old when radioactive fallout rained down on her
unsuspecting island village in 1954.
Eknilang, like many of the 86 Rongelap Islanders exposed to
massive levels of radiation from the March 1, 1954 Bravo
hydrogen bomb test, has had surgery for thyroid cancer and
breast cancer, and says she is also suffering from liver
problems.
In their haste to show the
Russians that America had a deliverable H-bomb, United
States officials ignored warnings that winds were blowing
toward inhabited islands and detonated Bravo, irrevocably
affecting thousands of Marshall Islanders with a radioactive
legacy that 50 years on has not been put to rest.
March 1 is now marked as a
national holiday in the Marshall Islands, and known globally
as “Bikini Day”. The day of the fallout is a bittersweet
memory for nuclear test victims now that they have received
some nuclear test compensation but who largely believe that
America is now turning its back on people whose health and
land it damaged with a total of 67 nuclear weapons tests.
“ The
United States promised us that as soon as it was finished at
Bikini, it would return us safely to our home islands,” said
Bikini Senator Tomaki Juda, who was four years old when the
US Navy evacuated Bikini Islanders in 1946 for the first
post-World War II nuclear weapons tests. “We’re still
waiting for that promise.”
The four atolls
acknowledged by the U.S. government as “exposed” — Bikini,
Enewetak, Rongelap and Utrik — have received a portion of
the $270 million compensation package in the first Compact,
and in the case of Bikini and Rongelap, additional nuclear
clean up funding. But according to a ruling by the US-funded
Nuclear Claims Tribunal, this is but a fraction of the
hardship, loss of use and nuclear cleanup compensation these
islands deserve.
The Tribunal has already
awarded Bikini and Enewetak an additional $1 billion; claims
for Rongelap and Utrik are pending and are expected to add
close to another billion dollars to the compensation price
tag. Meanwhile, the US gave the Tribunal only $45 million,
to satisfy both personal injury claims — already in excess
of $70 million — and the land damage claims.
Since September 2000, the
Marshall Islands has had a petition before the US Congress
asking for $2 billion more in compensation. The Congress
asked the Bush Administration in March 2002 to review the
nuclear test compensation petition, but two years later,
there is still no response from the Administration.
Despite the contamination
of the test sites and downwind islands, islanders are
determined to go home — it it’s safe.
In a country with only 72
square miles of land on 1,200 scattered islands, land is
precious. “If you don’t have land, you are nothing,” says
Juda. The Bikinians still live in exile nearly 60 years
since moving, Enewetak Islanders can only live on the
southern half of their atoll because the northern islands
are still too ‘hot’, and Rongelap Islanders have lived in
exile since 1985, when, fearful of continuing radiation
exposure, they organized a self-evacuation with the aid of
the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior.
Utrik Islanders, the
farthest from the Bravo test fallout and who in the Cold War
days of the 1950s were said to have received a ‘low-level’
exposure, are now demanding a clean up fund for their
islands. They had the misfortune to have been returned home
within three months of the Bravo test and, say independent
scientists hired recently by Utrik Islanders to assess the
safety of these islands, the people who had not been there
during the Bravo test but who moved back later actually
received a higher radiation dose from continuously living in
and eating food from a still-radioactive environment.
Rongelap Islanders were just 100 miles from Bikini and
within a few hours of the Bravo test were standing ankle
deep in fallout ash. “The whole island was covered with the
powder, all the leaves on the trees, our water catchments,”
recalls Rokko Langinbelik, a Rongelap Councilwoman who was
12 years old in 1954.
“The ash that fell on us
really itched and burned our skin. My skin was blistered and
later half my hair fell out.”
Rongelap and Utrik
islanders were finally evacuated two-to-three days after
Bravo, beginning an ordeal that has seen both populations
experience astronomically high rates of thyroid tumors and
cancers, and many other health problems.
Today, Rongelap Islanders
may be the closest to going home as a US-funded resettlement
program is expected to begin building houses on Rongelap
later this year, following preliminary construction work
over the past several years to establish basic
infrastructure on the abandoned island, including an
airfield, dock and a power plant.
But test victims say the
American obligation to these islands cannot just suddenly
end. “I would love to return to my home island,” says
Eknilang. “If they said it is safe, I will go home. But they
(the US) need to take care of my sickness until I die.”
Juda and other islanders
see an irony in the US government’s promise of tens of
billions of dollars for Iraq and Afghanistan, but the
apparent unwillingness of the US government to resolve the
problem that its nuclear tests caused. US officials, when
asked about Marshall Islanders’ demands for more
compensation, say emphatically that the $270 million in the
first Compact was a “full and final” settlement.
“President Bush has told
the entire world that the damage in Iraq and Afghanistan is
a US responsibility,” says Juda. “What’s difference between
Bikini and Iraq?”
“I’m just hoping that those
who caused this realize the hardship that they caused us,”
says Eknilang. “They hurt us, and now they don’t want to
take care of us.”
The recent cut off of $2
million in annual US funding for a comprehensive health care
program for the people from the four nuclear test-affected
atolls has incensed islanders.
“March 1 is a sad day not
only for Bikinians but for all Marshallese affected (by the
bomb),” says Juda. “We didn’t understand that these H-bombs
would bring a big sorrow to us. When older people think
about what these bombs did to our islands it brings tears to
their eyes.
“We spent years waiting to
return home. Then, in the early 1970s the Americans told us
it was safe, so some of us returned. But they had to be
evacuated a short time later (because of high radiation
levels). It broke our heart.”
This, Juda says, is why the
Bikinians will not return home until they receive a
“guarantee” from the US that Bikini is safe.
“America is number one in
education, in rich people and” — Juda pauses for emphasis —
“in lies.
“It is trying to run away
from its promise to us. That’s why many people are angry
with the United States.”
Fallout results in loss of
hair, itchy skin and extreme nausea
Rokko’s tragic tale of Bravo
Rokko Langinbelik, now a
Councilwoman for Rongelap, was 12 years old when the Bravo
test was exploded at Bikini in 1954. Rongelap is 100 miles
from Bikini.
“It was about six in the
morning,” she recalled.
“We were in the cook house
preparing breakfast when I heard a big bang. It was so
strong that it knocked shut the windows of our thatched cook
house.
“After breakfast, we headed off to school where everyone was
talking about it. None of us had ever seen such brightness
before and such a loud noise.
“At about lunch time we went to Jabwan Island. We were
gathering ‘iu’ (baby coconuts) and drinking coconuts to take
back home. About this time the powder from the sky started
to fall. It was like ashes from a fire. The powder fell
everywhere.
“By the time we got back to
Rongelap, the whole island was covered with the powder — all
the leaves on the trees, our water catchment.
“The elders finally told us
that a bomb had gone off and that was what the noise and
bright light was.
“Later that day a US plane
with Oscar deBrum, a pilot and four other guys came to
observe our water. They didn’t say anything, they just
observed and went back.
“The powder was itchy on
our skins. That night we all couldn’t sleep because it was
so itchy. The following day we were all nauseous. Everyone
was puking.
“The ashes that had fallen
on us really itched and burned our skin. My skin was
blistered, (and later) half of my hair fell out.
“On the morning of the
second day another plane came to the island and took the old
people and the pregnant women.
“Later that day a boat
arrived and the told us that we all had to go on it. I was
worried, scared and confused. They told us not to take
anything. None of us wanted to go.
 “As
we loaded the ship they washed us down with water. Then they
used this small machine (Geiger counter) that they ran over
our bodies and after they would give us soap to wash up
again then they would check us again. I went through this
routine about three times before they would let me go.
“We were like animals, it
was no different from herding pigs into a gate.
“When we got to Kwajalein we were put in military barracks.
During the days they would take us to the lagoon to swim.
“They had a schedule, the
women swam in the morning and the men in the afternoon. We
had to wash up with this special soap.
“We had to soak in the
lagoon from about 9 am to around 11 am. The doctors were
there to observe us. We would wash with the soap then they
would check us again with the small machine then they would
send us back into the water with more soap.
“Then they would extract (a
small amount) of blood almost every day from the tips of my
fingers. They also cut samples of our skin. They cut samples
from by neck, my foot and arms. This process lasted about
three months.
“Never once did they explain why and for what reason they
were doing these things. All they would say after each test
was, ‘Oh, very good.’
“After three months they
sent us to Ejit, Majuro. Once we got here doctors from
Brookhaven National Laboratory started to perform physical
exams about three to four times in one year. I stayed on
Ejit from 1954 to 1957.
“I remember people used to
tell their kids not to play with us because they might
‘catch’ what we had. We were so homesick for Rongelap.
Finally one day Jack Tobin, an anthropologist who worked for
the Trust Territory government, came to Ejit and told us
‘the island is safe so you can all return.’
“I was so happy to hear this, none of us questioned it. Why
should we? They’re the government — I didn’t think they
would lie. There was no reason for them to lie.
“We left for Rongelap
within two weeks of hearing the great news. This was about
the summer of 1957. Once we reached home, we were so happy.
Each family got a new home.
“(But not long after this)
people started to get sick. More people were getting
cancers, thyroid problems. My father had thyroid problems
and in the end he died of stomach cancer.”
‘Mike
leaves its terrible toll on Enewetak Atoll
By GIFF JOHNSON
 Enewetak
Senator Ismael John thinks that the problem with all the
attention on the 50th anniversary of the Bravo test is that
it leads people to believe that there was only one test that
did damage in the Marshall Islands.
Enewetak — though it had the first test of a hydrogen device
and more nuclear weapons tests than at Bikini — has lived in
the shadow of the visibility that Bikini has gained over the
years, largely as a result of the severe consequences of the
Bravo test.
While radiation concerns —
the residue of nuclear waste in the Runit Island tomb, the
need for cleanup on the northern islands that were not
included in the late 1970s cleanup — are high on John’s
mind, he also told the Journal of a little known story of
the “Mike” hydrogen blast in 1952.
Mike was the US’s first test of a hydrogen device in late
1952. It wasn’t a “bomb”, as scientists hadn’t worked out
how to compress the technology into a deliverable unit. The
Mike device was the size of a building.
But its destructive power
was about 750 times that of the Hiroshima bomb that leveled
the city at the end of World War II.
By the time the Mike test
dates rolled around, in late 1952, the Enewetak population
had been living on tiny Ujelang, the western-most atoll in
the Marshall Islands, for five years.
One day Navy officials
showed up in a vessel at Ujelang, disembarked and told the
people they were temporarily evacuating. “The Navy just came
and said we needed to move from Ujelang because of the
Enewetak test,” said John, who was 20 years old at the time.
The Navy gave them about
two days to prepare food, loaded up the entire community on
the Navy vessel and sailed out to the open ocean. And there
they sat for three months.
Islanders had no idea where
they were because they couldn’t see any islands during the
three months at sea. “It was really difficult for us,” he
said. People were constantly sick and vomitting from living
on the boat for so long, he said.
Then one day they were
returned to Ujelang and the Navy sailed off.
Fifty seven years and 43
nuclear tests later, John says the US should:
• Remove and take away all
of the radioactive material in the Runit dome and clean the
lagoon.
• Continue the nuclear
cleanup of the northern islands that were not touched in the
US Army’s 1977-1980 cleanup program.
He doesn’t believe that the
compensation approved — but not yet paid — by the Nuclear
Claims Tribunal is fair. It isn’t fair that Bikini is
receiving more when “the US used my islands for 43 bombs,
but only 23 at Bikini,” he said.
John said he won’t stop fighting for compensation and
cleanup. But he’s not optimistic that the problems can be
resolved. “No settlement will make Enewetak the way it was,”
he said. “I cannot blame my government. It’s not their
fault. I blame the US. They’re the ones that did all the
damage to the people of Enewetak.”
Events planned for Nuclear Day
Nuclear survivors, together
with local and national governments, are spearheading four
days of activities to mark the 50th anniversary of the Bravo
hydrogen bomb test at Bikini.
The events are expected to
kick off on Friday this week with a 9 am welcome at the Long
Island Hotel to be followed by a showing of the
award-winning film on Bravo, “Half Life”. This will be
followed by testimonies of survivors.
A number of international
visitors are expected to be in Majuro later this week for
the event, and workshops are set for Friday afternoon to
share with them.
On Saturday morning, time is set aside for international
media representatives to interview survivors at Melele Room
at the Marshall Islands Resort.
While this is happening, a
special charter flight is scheduled to take VIPs and
survivors out for an air tour of Enewetak, Bikini, Rongelap,
and Utrik.
Monday, March 1 — which is
a national holiday for Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day —
will kick off with a parade of floats on the theme “Bwidej
eo mour eo” (Our land is our life).
After everyone gathers at
the Weather Station and marches across to the Nitijela, the
national anthem will be sung, followed by a moment of
silence to remember the people and islands damaged by Bravo.
Among speakers at the event
outside the Nitijela will be survivor and Rongelap
Councilwoman Rokko Langinbelik, President Kessai Note,
visiting nuclear survivors, including one of the Japanese
fishermen who was on the fishing vessel “Lucky Dragon” that
was also exposed to high level fallout from Bravo, and
others.
Exposed Marshallese say
they want to be called “survivors” rather than “victims”
because the survivor label has a more positive conotation —
they say that the survivor term fits with the Biblical
reference, “God helps those who help themselves.” |
