A Film Documentary: After the Sea Caught Fire

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AFTER THE SEA CAUGHT FIRE Los Angeles , California 90025 in association with MOSES, EPSTEIN and WISEMAN, Inc.

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It appeared a s though the sea had caught fire. A great huge fire rose up into the sky and a noise was heard that was louder than any thunder. -- Chief Johannes of Eneweta k AFTER THE SEA CAUGHT FIRE is the story of a n isolated Pacific a t o l l called Enewetak, its ecology, and the people whose culture I s rooted on it. Each has been altered by its contact with the West. After thirty years away from home while their atoll was used a s a nuclear proving ground, the Enewetakese are now returning. Our film will capture the drama of their homecoming, and use t h a t drama to illuminate how the Enewetakans rebuild their culture , and readapt to their rich , yet immutably transformed environment.

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take them away: l i that h e ship came .3 A man told us: "You cannot protest or fight. You a r e like the rabbit fish wriggling onithe end of a spear. You can struggle a l l you want, but there's nothing you c a n do to change this." Chief Johannes and his people left the Pacific atoll of Enewetak -- quietly -- in December of 1947. They were taken by the United S t a t e s Navy to Ujelang, another atoll about 125 mfles away. Over the next ten years, forty-three nuclear devices would be detonated a t Enewetak -- a s part of the. United States weapons development program. Enewetak atoll -- a ring of islands in which Enewetak is the largest -- w a s first inhabited by the descendants of canoe voyagers who had chanced on it 1,000 years ago. The people of the atoll lived undisturbed until the early 16th century -- when a Spanish explorer briefly visited the atoll. Spain ruled the island until 1886. Then the Germans came and signed a n agreement with Chief Piter. They traded with the islanders for almost thirty years: foodstuffs and tradeyoods for Enewetakese copra. N o Germans settled on the islands; only a n occasional missionary lingered long enough to baptize the "natives. " In 1914 the Japanese wrested control of the islands from t h e Germans, But the islands were too isolated, too far from the normal trade routes, too barren to support extensive plantations. For the next quarter-century, the Japanese maintained the sarr.e desultory trade relations a s the Germans had -- and the same lack of contact with the Enawetakans. The industrial revolution and t h e mercantile explosion that had reshaped the world had barely touched Enewetak atoll or its people. But by 1939, the nature of modem warfare had changed a s well. And Enewe'ak island, just large enough to sccommodate a n airfield, became a key 'building block in the battle plans of the Japanese. They finally settled on the atoll, and rebuilt it into a fortress. The Enewetakans were confined to two smaller

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On F'ebruary 1 7 , 1 9 4 4 , the United S t a t e s began its campaign to drive the Japanese off the atoll. Admiral Nimitz, in a report to the Commander-inChief, U.S. Fleet, indicated that ...the usual procedures in island campaigns were followed. The islands were subjected to heavy gun and bomb attack,I which was continuous from t h e time of the arrival of the Task Force until troops landed on the island. For a period of two hotlrs immediately before the landing of troops , each island was subjected to concentrated destructive fire. Landings were made on all these islands from the lagoon beaches, in each case with two battalions abreast. Six-and-a-half days later, the atoll was secured. More than 3,400 Japanese and 348 Americans died during the battle. Enewetak's 142 inhabitants were prohibited by the Americans from returning to the atoll's main island -- their home. Almost all the coconut trees had been leveled; other vegetation had been burned off. (the a t o l l ' s second largest island) had been seriously damaged. Rusting ships dotted the lagoon. Concrete bunkers were left t o crumble on the According to Chief Johannes , Enewetak and Enjebi i Ene'wetak is tiny by Western standards. Forty-two islands circle its twentyfive mile diameter lagoon. But taken together, their dry land area totals only two-and-one-quarter square miles -- most of it coral s a n d , most of it uninhabitable. There a r e no mountains or valleys on Enewetak. On the average, islands in the atoll reach only ten feet above sei; level. The ecology has been jarred by its contact with Western science and warfare, but not overturned. Many of the coconut palms have grown back. World War I1 bunkers and the remnants of the proving ground facilities'are covered with morning glories. The lagoon and the a t o l l ' s water-filled A-Bomb craters tcam with plant and animal life. Thousands of s p e c i e s of mollusk have been catalogued, including a giant clam that c a n weigh over 4 0 0 pounds and measure over three feet in length. Over two hundred species and varieties of corals are found there , and hundreds of crustacean species, including crabs, shrimps and lobsters. Atleast seven hundred species of fish frequent the lagoon. ! Since 1954, over 800 scientists at the Mid-Pacific Marine Laboratory on Enewetak have catalogued and examined the atoll's rich plant and animal life. Enewetsk h a s been called the most studied atoll in the world. ;

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Anthropologists estimate that the population of the atoll could once have been a s high a s 1000, Typhoons are uncommon a t Enewetak, but not unknown. Over its 1000-year history, o q as ional storms washed over the islands and stripped them of vegetation. Many people drowned. Without island during the 18th century recorded c'ontact with a "tribe" numbering less than eighty. more died of starvation. One of t?e few Westerners who reached the Enewetakese legend claims that the.peopLe were always of that atoll. Atthe northwest tip of the Marshall Islands, and more than 2750 miles west of Honolulu, they remained isolated -- and insulated -- from the rest of the world, They created their own small society, with its own gods and songs. Their culture w a s deeply rooted in the place where it had grown. The Enewetakans sing I love the way my atoll is, There where Iwas born. .. I will never stay away from it, For that is my true home and ancestral land, My heritage forever. Every Enewetakese family has a special place on the atoll, inherited from its ancestors. Their lives were infused with this sense of place, of continuity. And they were inextricably bound up within its ecology. They took their food from it; they lived in delicate balance with it. The lagoon was x ore than literelly a t the cent-: Df a complex tcosystern of which the Enewetakans were but one link. Chief Johannes told the United - 2 - States Senate in 1975 That land, that atoll, is part of us and we are part of it in a way which is difficult to describe. ...Enewetak atoll is the only place which is our:.. In 1947 the Cold War w a s heating up. Europe was exhausted and not y e t a b l e to defend itself. Nationalist China was on the verge of collapse. Our monopoly on "the bomb!' was soon due to run out. Under t h e s e conditions, it is not surprising t h a t the United States attempted to maintain continued superiority in nuclear weapons. But nuclear weapons ~

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development meant nuclear testing, and the Atomic Energy Commission noted that " t e s t s should be held overseas until it could be established more definitely that continental detonations would not endanger t h e public health and safety. I' Enewetak was chosen a s the test site. Paradoxically, it was the same isolation that had once insulated Enewetak from Western culture that now finally thrust it into direct contact with t h e m o s t elemental forces in Western technology. The area downwind from Enewetak was uninhabited for atleast 500 miles. And, according to a December 1947 A.E.C. press release, "Enewetak has the fewest number of inhabitants t o be cared for." Ujelang was to be their new home. Much smaller, much l e s s bountiful than Enewetak, this atoll held no attraction for the Enewetakans . One of them wrote a song. On the day of the twenty-first, a l l of the people came t o this atoll. I . But we do not worry for it is the will of the Lord. W e are very sad. We miss the islands from But we d o not worry for it is the will of the Lord. 1which we are separated. A t Enewetak, a city of 1 0 , 0 0 0 w a s built. Airfields, bunkers, research laboratories and barracks were crammed onto the atoll's two-and-one-quarter On October 31, 1952, "Mike" was detonated on an Enewotakese islaEd named Elugelab. The world's first hydrogen bomb -- over ten megatons -- vaporized t h e island and left a crater over a mile wide and three hundred feet deep. i

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Chief Johannes remembers the day vividly. We were told to look in the direction of Enewetak. Those of us who did will never forge; what they saw. First, a bright flash rising up from the’water; then it appeared a s though the sea had caught fire. A great, huge fire rose up into the sky and a noise was heard that was louder than any thunder.. ..What we s a w caused us to worry about what w a s happening on our atoll, but we were told that we could not go there to see. Instead, we continued Thirty years of waiting ends on May 1, 1977. Forty million dollars will be s p e n t by the United States government to clean up the islands, and to remove the remnants of the now brush-covered test facilities. The I Enewetakese people will be coming home.

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The f i l m we propose is about $hat homecoming. It will focus on the Enewetakans' efforts to renew the bonds between themselves and their environment, and to pick up the thread of their thousa'nd-year history. This is a story of regeneration. Eut it is a s much about the atoll ecology itself a s it is about the people who are returning to it. In telling this scientific side of our story we enjoy a unique opportunity to explore first-hand how Enewetak's face has changed and its plants and animals have evolved. Ron Nolan, noted marine biologist and world authority on reef biosystems , will guide our exploration. We will dive with him in water-filled bomb c m t e r s -- some of them more than three miles across and three hundred feet deep -- to examine the plant and animal life that now thrives there. He will show u s how Enewetak Atoll has adapted after t e n years of nuclear testing and a devastating war. Dr. Nolan is also important t o the human side of our story. Readily accepted by the Enewetakans, he is a t home with their society. Y e t a t the same'time, he himself is a Western scientist. In many ways, h e i s a n ambassador between cultures. His is a uniquely penetrating perspective from which to view the Enewetakese homecoming. Atthe core of our documentary will b e the Enewetakese people themselves. Even after their abrupt and traumatic collision with the West, they remain a quietly poetic people. Their attachment to their homeland i s unshakeable; of t h e s e people -- and the simple drama of their homecoming -- will bind our story together, give it depth and energy. By observing how they Once again learn much abeut human nature, and about nature itself. . . . already they have written a song to commemmorate their return. The spirit close t h e circle that joins them to their atoll and their heritage, we w i l l i, With t h i s dual focus -- nature and human nature -- AFTER THE SEA CAUGHT FIRE cannot serve a s a platform for any political ideology. Perhaps we will find in AFTER THE SEA CAUGHT FIRE a metaphor for other issues. Perhaps it d o e s represent the most jarring clash between man and nature; These are issues which must for t h e moment remain open, because out'Uirn Is to tell the "story of h e w e t a k " in terms understood by those who know the story best -- the Enewetakans themselves. perhaps it is somehow symbolic of our loss of innocence in the nuclear age. I

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HARTLEBEN/STOLL PRODUCTIONS is a moticn picture production company that draws together profess ionals-with nearly four decades of experience in the f i l m industry. AFTER THE SEA CAUGHT FIRE is the first documentary project undertaken by H/S since Dale Hartleben received the 1976 Academy Award for Best Feature Length Documentaly honoring the MAN WHO SKIED DOWN H i s partners, Jerry Hartleben and Otto Stoll, have won gold medals a t the Edinburgh and Atlanta Film Festivals - More important than awards are the hundreds of clients who have chosen these filmmakers to produce commercials, industrials , educatlonal ?r?dmotivational films. They include Getty Oil, Whittaker Corporation, Southern California Edison, Amour-Dial , Eaton International, and the National ' League of Women Voters.

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Director of Photography 'The Man Who Skied Down Journey to t h e Outer Limits (NGS) Go For It George Harrison Tour Director of Underwater Photography Andrea Doria (Peter Gimbel) f Journey to the Outer Limits The Eiger Sanction Ascent on Mount Everest (CBS)