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William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.

William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.
William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.
William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.
William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.
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William von Arx with his model of Rongelap Lagoon he made in a lab flume.
Still Image
08/01/1946
archives/Von Arx/mc24-19.tif
Date is approximate.
Part of folder labeled: "Survey of Physical Oceanography of Rongelap Lagoon."
Aug-Sept 1946.
Image Of the Day caption:
William von Arx was among dozens of WHOI scientists who studied the impacts of U.S. military nuclear weapons testing in 1946 at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. Two nuclear bombs were detonated, one in the atmosphere and another underwater. Von Arx made a model of neighboring Rongelap Atoll and used it to correctly predict where radioactive water from the bombs would concentrate in Rongelap Lagoon. In 2015, WHOI scientists Matt Charette and Ken Buesseler returned to Bikini and Enewetak Atolls to investigate the sources, flow, and extent of lingering radioactive contamination from the tests conducted between 1946 and 1958.
Caption from Oceanus magazine, Vol. 52, No. 2, pg. 35:
WHOI scientist Bill von Arx made a model of Rongelap Lagoon in a lab flume. He used it to correctly predict where radioactive water from a bomb test on neighboring Bikini Atoll would concentrate in the lagoon.
Caption from Down to the Sea for Science, pg. 69:
Bill von Arx was part of the Bikini Atoll group studying circulation inside the island's lagoon. Realizing that the bomb test was scheduled for a period of light winds, while the prior studies had been done under strong trade wind conditions, he returned to Woods Hole to make this model of Rongelap Lagoon using a flume left from war work on sand movement round mines. With it, he correctly predicted where in the lagoon the radioactive water would concentrate.
Photo courtesy of WHOI Archives
© Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Part of W. S. Von Arx Collection (MC-24)
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