Page 25 - CAMPAIGN Summer 2021

On Thursday, a government spokesman said the cloud had been last reported 100 miles off the north-west coast of Western Australia. NEXT DAY BROUGHT RADIOACTIVE RAINFALL (GEIGER COUNT 2,000) TO KURIDALA, QUEENSLAND.
This fallout presumably travelled either 1,600 miles from Monte Bello - or 2,800 miles from Bikini Atoll, the site of the American H-bomb blast on May 21.
THE LESSONS
lt's obvious that nuclear scientists still have a lot to learn about high altitude weather formations - and that clouds can travel thousands of miles without losing a high concentration of radioactivity. An atomic bomb, said to be the size of the one dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, will be exploded in a few
months at Maralinga - only 43 miles from the Transcontinental railway, and 550 miles from Adelaide.
A TERRIBLE RESPONSIBILITY RESTS ON THE AUTHORITIES CONCERNED TO MAKE SURE THE "CHARGED" CLOUDS DO NOT STRAY.”
In 1967, the West Australian Drilling Company abandoned their idea of exploring for oil on Trimouille Island. They were met with radioactive rats as big as cats, which scientists confirmed were very aggressive.
Returning to Mrs Taylor, the idyllic eco-system that she described was ripped apart in 1956 with the arrival of the Commonwealth forces from the UK, Australia and New Zealand for Operation Mosaic.
The article ends, “Although it may be many years before Mrs Taylor can spend a holiday there again, she is the only woman who has ever explored the islands. The spirit of adventure is ingrained in her.”
I wouldn’t have thought that Mrs Taylor ever returned to the Montebello Islands to holiday again after Operations Hurricane and Mosaic. Recent scientific research has found that sea life still contains low levels of radionuclides from these atomic tests.
Elevated traces of plutonium still exist in marine-to-terrestrial ecotopes at the islands, and visits to the islands are restricted due to levels of radiation.
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CAMPAIGN SUMMER 2021