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Before and After

March 30, 2015

In 1946, some 40 WHOI staff participated in work to study the effects of a nuclear blast and subsequent radiation on the ocean and marine life. From left, Arnold Clarke, Ruthann Wyrick, Charlotte Vail, and Bobby Atwood prepare sampling bottles for shipment to Bikini Atoll prior to Operation Crossroads, in which two bombs were detonated, one in the atmosphere and one underwater. Today, WHOI chemist Ken Buesseler is studying the impacts and spread of radiation from Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant and recently visited Bikini Atoll to gather samples to better understand the ocean’s background radiation.(Photo courtesy of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Archives)