U.S. NAVY TESTS DEFENCES –

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25741, 1 March 1949, Page 5

U.S. NAVY TESTS DEFENCES -

SIMULATED ATOMIC ATTACK “VERY SUCCESSFUL BUT NOT A CATASTROPHE” (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 8.30 p.m.) SAN JUAN (Puerto Rico), Feb. 27. A United States Navy Neptune today dropped a make-believe atom bomb over a task force comprising over 100 warships. The referees later announced that the aircraft-carrier Franklin D. Roosevelt was put out of action temporarily, and one escorting destroyer was declared sunk. “A few other” ships of the task force suffered minor damage, but continued in action. One of the referees, Admiral William Blandy, Commander of the Atlantic Fleet, who led the Bikini atom bomb test task force in 1946, described the attack as “very successful, but not a catastrophe.” He said it showed that a carrier task force could not be stopped by the explosion of one atom bomb if it were on its The flare dropped from the Neptune exploded several hundred feet above and about 1500 yards astern of the Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Navy contended that it could dispose its ships so that even if an aircraft carrying an atom bomb fought its way through a- fighter screen the fleet’s maximum loss would be only one ship.