Al Gettier, Enewetak Atoll (1978-79) Glimmers of Light

Introducing a series of narrative articles about the Atomic Cleanup Veterans of Enewetak Atoll.

The following are first-hand accounts told by comparatively few survivors of the Enewetak Atoll Atomic Debris Cleanup Mission, Marshall Islands; a mission that took place from 1977-1980. Their stories appear as told to T-M Fitzgerald(published author, veteran, veteran advocate) because theirs are tales needing to be known.

Read - H.R. 5980: Mark Takai Atomic Veterans Healthcare Parity Act.

Introduction: “Where in the World is Enewetak?”

Enewetak is just one of many atolls and islands in the Pacific Ocean’s Marshall Island chain. Located about 2,365 nautical miles SW of Hawaii (just north of the equator), the Marshall Islands were once a major testing ground for nuclear weapons post WWII. This island chain is also home to the project called Cactus Dome, a 350’- wide blast crater located at the northern end of Runit Island that has become known as the ‘Nuclear Trashcan of the Pacific.’

Between 1948-58, forty-three nuclear weapons were detonated over Enewetak and its sister islands. Among these tests were ‘Ivy Mike’ and ‘Castle Bravo’ (a device 1000X as powerful as the bomb ‘Little Boy’ which was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan post Pearl Harbor.)

In 1977, a coalition of United States military forces and civilian support teams were sanctioned to ‘clean’ the islands of residual radioactive fallout. Men, many who were mere teenagers back in the day, were tasked with cleaning the contaminated fallout from the nuclear testing that occurred throughout the previous three decades. Keep in mind, that as recent as 2012, the United Nations reported that the cumulative effects from all that nuclear testing had effectively caused near-irreversible environmental contamination. There was a problem beginning in 1977 and currently, effects from that exposure have begun to manifest, taking toll on many surviving Enewetak vets and contractors today. Four decades later, survivors are telling their stories because the world needs to know.

Personal story by Al Gettier

Branch: Army MOS: 1st Lt 21B Combat Engineer Location: Lojwa Year: 1978-1979

Quote: “I think it’s disgusting how our own government has treated all these men, young men who had faith in the government they were serving that they were doing the right thing for the right reason and now, they’re the ones suffering the consequences.”

“I am but one of a few of the survivors of the 1977-1980 Enewetak Atoll Atomic Debris Cleanup Mission that took place in the Marshall Islands.

A major focus of this group has been to help one another with information and moral support during some of the challenging times we’ve encountered following our time in service at Enewetak.

A secondary focus/goal is to urge Congress to change current law and recognize Cold War Era soldiers and contractors of the Enewetak Cleanup Mission as “veterans and workers who participated in radiation-risk activities during active service.”

By obtaining their second goal, individuals experiencing health complications resulting from radiation exposure at Enewetak Atoll will be eligible to apply for funds that have previously been set-aside for other Atomic Veterans who have already been recognized and acknowledged for their service."

“I knew very little about the Marshall Islands before I went. Actually, I’d been afforded the opportunity to go on two different occasions. The first time I was offered the job, I’d been attending grad school. The following year, the Enewetak assignment came up again and I was told I was going. I didn’t have a choice in the matter that time.”

“I was the executive officer on Runit. The only protective gear I ever used was a painter’s mask and the yellow boots. Some of the troops wore the full banana suits. They were generally the ones working in the super high dust areas. While I was there, we were making the slurry to pump into the crater. Guys driving the trucks or the ones running the screening systems were the ones wearing the banana suits. Guys exposed to the lower concentrations/levels were the ones who wore the forced air suits with their own filtration system. Basically, it was the operators and guys pushing soil who wore that set up. The guys who were putting the key wall up around the crater just wore masks and boots.”

“I never suspected anything was wrong until I found my way onto the Enewetak Atomic Cleanup Veterans site on Facebook and started treading about so many of the problems that a number of the guys have had. I haven’t experienced such problems but then, I wasn’t actually out in the dirt doing things.”

“There are a number of stories I could tell. I was a double-major in college at the time: engineering and computer-science. So there we were, building the wall around the dome. We were told not to worry about the details, just build it. So we were like, ‘Okay. No big deal’ and did what we were told to do. As we were getting close to completion, some General did a fly-over the construction site and informed us that the dome wasn’t round. He said he wasn’t going to have that and we had to fix it. So we were going to have to survey the site.”

“There’s a specific way to survey a circle and given the logistics of our workspace on that island, there was no way we could do it. We had to come up with some new geometry to get the measurement. Once we did that, we figured out that there were kinks in the wall. We had to pull them out and fix them using the new survey technique that we had come up with. Once we did that, we thought we’d fixed it. We didn’t. It was still sort of goose egg shaped. We made a decision that once we got through all the slabs we were using, we had to make it round. The DOE guys let me use their computer and we redesigned the dome and concrete slabs. I created a program that reconfigured every slab so that we could get the cap rounded by the time we used all the 20 X 20 slabs. I printed that information out and placed it in binders. That was the end of my tour by that point and HQ wanted to verify the contents of that book. I don’t think the plans ever left the island though and I really believed that I’d made a difference and was proud of that.”

“The guy who took over for me, his name was Scott Mansfield. I’ve tried locating him but just can’t seem to find him.”

“There used to be a concrete bunker on Runit by Cactus crater. It was a heavy bunker built to monitor former atomic blasts. So there we were, two lieutenants tasked with blowing this thing up. On blast days, we only kept necessary personnel out there and let everyone else have off. We didn’t know how to calculate the amount of explosives we needed to use but it worked out that we thought we needed about half a ton of C4 to blow this one bunker. We got about ½-mile away and blew that thing up. People were diving under vehicles and one guy who was standing on a jeep taking pictures said he heard pieces whizzing past him. I mean to say, we all took cover. Thankfully, nobody got hurt but there were fist-size chunks of bunker all over that island.”

“We’d find unexploded mines not only in the ground but the ocean would also yield mines that would just wash up on shore. SOP indicated that we were supposed to call Air Force EOD guys to blow stuff in place. One time, we found some stuff, called them out and they were supposed to blow this stuff up so we could finish our work. They came out, set up the blast and hit the switch. Nothing happened. You may not know this, but if a blast doesn’t take, you’re supposed to wait a pre-determined amount of time before you go back in. Long story short, on this particular occasion, the DOD guys forgot the blasting caps. So we had to wait before we went back. We got up to the pile and saw that here were no caps. EOD was never called again. We took over blasting.”

“I think it’s disgusting how our own government has treated all these men, young men who had faith in the government they were serving that they were doing the right thing for the right reason and now, they’re the ones suffering the consequences.”

"The primary focus for this group is to urge Congress to change legislation and recognize soldiers of this seemingly forgotten cleanup mission as “veterans who participated in radiation-risk activities during active service.”

Follow our cause: Atomic Veterans of Enewetak Atoll