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The Japanese light cruiser Sakawa was as badly damaged, or worse. The strongest ships which had taken crippling damage were the battleship Arkansas, the Jap battleship Nagato and the heavy cruiser Pensacola. Their upper works had been sheared off or twisted; it was doubtful that any men could have survived if the ships had been manned. Their guinea-pig complement of pigs, goats and rats would supply the evidence.
Only two ships had been sunk outright, both soft-shelled transports built on Maritime Commission hulls; the Gilliam and Carlisle. The destroyer Lamson turned on her beam ends and eventually sank. Another can, the Anderson, was in danger of following her. In all, some 30 vessels had suffered graduated damage.*
Aboard the lightly damaged battleship Pennsylvania (on the fringe of the fleet) tethered goats were at ease, munching hay the day after their exposure to atomic fission. Though they looked healthy enough to chew a belaying pin, the question was whether they would later die of radiation disease.
The test was over, and Vice Admiral William H. Blandy, the task force commander, rated a rousing "Well done." The contest of interpretation could begin. The larger test still loomed like a giant thunderhead: man could control the atom, but could he control himself in his use of the atom?
*Named for the former bombardier in its crew, Captain Dave Semple of Riverside, Calif., killed in a B-29 last March in New Mexico.
*Results would be announced in general terms as soon as readings of 10,000 instruments were collated, but for security reasons the Navy would not tell exactly where the bomb went off, the layout of target ships, the bomb-dropping technique, the pressures and heat generated by the blast, or the efficiency of the bomb.