In his autobiography Beale recounted an anecdote from his media trip to Maralinga in June 1956. (Beale’s autobiography noted this trip took place in July 1956 to the Woomera weapons test range, rather than Maralinga, but since the second Mosaic test occurred on 19 June 1956, the same day that journalists arrived at Maralinga, it seems likely this was one of the several inaccuracies in his autobiographical account.) Maralinga was being highlighted at the time in media publicity and Mosaic was played down. While the papers reported on Mosaic, they were not at Mt Potter to witness it, as they had been for Hurricane. At Maralinga, visiting media representatives were alerted to allegations of what they believed were unacceptably high levels of radiation heading to the mainland from Monte Bello following G2. A rumour swept through the dining room during the evening meal, leading to a mass exodus of the editors and journalists to call their offices. The rumour suggested that a miner in the Pilbara town of Marble Bar (roughly 1000 kilometres to the northwest of Maralinga, but close to the coastline near the Monte Bello Islands) had detected significant radiation on his Geiger counters. This mobilised the journalists and gave Beale some uncomfortable hours as he attempted to kill the rumour and restore order to the restive media contingent. Given the poor state of communications to the Monte Bello site, this took some time.
Beale, after finally receiving the reassuring words he needed from the AWTSC chair Leslie Martin, who was at Monte Bello, issued a dramatic media statement at midnight saying that most of the radioactive fallout had been deposited in the sea, although some was drifting at very high altitude and posed no risk. His later account stated:
I learnt again from this that newspaper editors may be gracious guests, but when it comes to a sensational news story they are newsmen first and foremost. Nevertheless they co-operated in an awkward situation, and faithfully kept their word to me by damping the story down as far as they could.
That media representatives damped down the story to assist Beale is a revealing comment. It probably speaks to the kind of relationship Beale had developed with the media and the closeness to official sources that was maintained by media practitioners at the time. One story published by the Sydney Sun was headlined ‘Threat to 3 towns’. It began, ‘All Australia is anxiously watching a radio-active cloud – result of the atomic blast on the Monte Bello islands on Tuesday’. Beale was quoted citing Martin: ‘Prof. Martin… has reported to me that conditions of firing were ideal and there was absolutely no danger to the mainland. The path of the cloud was followed by plane, and last night the cloud was over the sea, 100 miles off the north-west coast’.
The story also quoted the deputy prime minister Arthur Fadden, who defended Beale and the scientists over the incident in the face of attacks from the leader of the Opposition Doc Evatt. In federal parliament Evatt indicated that the ‘dogmatic statements and assurances given over and over again by the Minister for Supply’ were insufficient to meet public concern. Fadden assured parliament there would be a full inquiry into the incident. In the end, there was not.
The Age in Melbourne applauded Beale, saying he ‘acted promptly to allay misgivings about the cloud drift. Within a few minutes of the Marble Bar reports of heavy radioactive fall-out he readily stated all he knew, and made contact with scientists, whose assurances were soon forthcoming’. The Melbourne Herald had some advice for Beale and his colleagues after the Mosaic incident:
There is a simple way in which the authorities controlling atomic weapon tests can keep the public informed and reassured about their checks on the risk in radio-activity after an explosion. Publication of regular reports by the safety committee, giving the measure of fall-out and the position of the atomic cloud, would prevent needless worry.
As Maralinga was about to begin operations, and people throughout mainland Australia were likely to be affected, this was reasonable advice. However, it was not heeded to the degree warranted by the danger of the tests.
After G2, the British were finished with Monte Bello and departed, leaving an unholy mess in a place that was effectively out of sight, out of mind. While the islands were still subject to the Defence (Special Undertakings) Act, no-one policed its exclusionary provisions. Many ‘salvagers’ on boats defied the warning signs and visited Trimouille and Alpha islands, intent on taking away the huge quantity of scrap metal and other waste that was left lying around the sand dunes. They did so at their own risk.
Both Monte Bello and Emu Field have faded into the background. Certainly they did not experience the same levels of plutonium contamination as Maralinga, which has become shorthand for all British nuclear tests in Australia. This obscures the fact that the nuclear weapons tested at Monte Bello and Emu showed that the British could play the nuclear arms game with the superpowers, even though they were a few years behind.
Both pre-Maralinga sites were important in the history of the British nuclear tests. The British gained much knowledge and established their atomic club credentials, at a high cost to the local people and the environment. The British, still hostage to the McMahon Act, used Monte Bello and Emu Field as staging posts. Now they had a new site, negotiated as an indefinite arrangement. The AWRE was Maralinga-bound, with high hopes that their bomb would pass its final tests and fulfil Penney’s aspirations when he designed it. Soon Britain would have an operational atomic weapon that rivalled those of the US and the USSR.
4
Mushroom clouds at Maralinga
It will be the Los Alamos of the British Commonwealth.
It is marvellous how fickle the public mind is in these matters and, no matter what the project is, provided it can be pushed ahead without anything untoward happening, the people’s minds soon become inured, and they accept it as one of the ordinary happenings of life.
I had thought Woomera to be rather desolate – it was Piccadilly Circus compared to Maralinga.
In the mid-1950s, as the Cold War intensified, nuclear bombs became the weapons of choice. Britain, committed to building its atomic arsenal, had already established its credentials in Australia. Australia at that time was preoccupied with preparing for the Melbourne Olympic Games in November 1956, a moment of great national pride and considerable distraction for a sporting nation. Meanwhile, in secret but with the confidence that came from the success of their Australian test program to date, the British were full of plans. A ‘permanent’ site was the next logical step, but the significant logistical difficulties ruled Emu out. Supply Minister Howard Beale told Menzies, ‘Emu Field seems to be out of the question, mainly through shortage of water and difficulty of access’. A search had begun even before the Totem series in October 1953. William Penney wanted a remote location that would be suitable for both airburst tests, of atomic devices dropped from an aircraft, and ground tests, of devices detonated on or near the ground.