Brings Problems

What With British,

Americans And Japanese

Scientific Influx Brings Problems To the N. Cooks

From a Special Correspondent

The march of science is no<

very popular in the Northern

Cooks at the moment, and thu

unpopularity has quite an inter

national flavour.

There are complaints from Penrhyn landowners that the Cook Islands’ Administration has servec them a raw deal in stationing troops on the atoll during the Christmas Island nuclear bomb tests last year.

And there has been comment on the fact that diving for shell ai.

Suwarrow will have to be suspendeo later this year while a Japanese scientific team observes the totaj eclipse of the sun on October 12 About the nuclear complaint, th* Penrhyn version of the story is tha; landowners were offered paymem for the use of land on which tin American and British military im. stallations were to be set up. Tht Penrhyn people however decided t« forego payment in favour of a deaf whereby they would become tht. owners of all buildings, equipment and supplies which might be lefi behind when the troops withdrew..

Buildings Seized

The troops eventually withdrew leaving certain buildings and ; large quantity of petroleum proc ducts in drums.

According to the Penrhyn report the buildings were prompt!;; seized by the Administration ana disposed of to selected people. Thr petroleum products were seized ana sold to ship-owners and other conr sumers. The Penrhyn Island Counr cil has had the matter under diss cussion in Rarotonga.

The Japanese astronomers wen originally supposed to have planner to make their eclipse observations from Pukapuka or Nassau, in thr Northern Cooks, together witd American astronomers, but it ha 3 now been announced officially thas the site will be Suwarrow atoll.

Japs Well Equipped

Permission has already been r© ceived by the New Zealand Govern ment.

The Japanese unit will be ven well equipped for a wide variety o

iientific observations and will live at Suwarrow aboard the 616n fishery training vessel Oshoro aru of Hokkaido University in id-September to set up equip ent.

Additional to the crew of the ssel there will be 17 men in the ientific party, representing four fferent Japanese scientific bodies, irgest group will be a seven-man am of the Tokyo Astronomical jservatory and Department of itronomy, University of Tokyo, aded by Dr. Z. Suemoto. A con lerable amount of equipment will involved. The duration of the [ipse at Suwarrow will occupy 2 mutes 44 seconds in all, with out 16 seconds of totality. The th of totality will extend only in narrow strip across the Pacific >m Peru to 158 degrees east longi le. Most, but not all, of the ob ■vations, will call for a clear sky.

Given Licence

tfuch of the scientific work will duplicated from the various ob- . vation sites —Suwarrow, Puka ka, Atafu, and Mopelia—in an leavour to insure that results will obtained from a location clear cloud cover at the critical time.

Meanwhile, Mr. D. C. Brown, of rotonga, has been given a licence again conduct shelling opera is at Suwarrow, because of the sing of Manihiki lagoon. ’he atoll has been uninhabited— ept for visits by passing yachts n—since Mr. Brown withdrew a ing team in November, 1956, er six months work there, during ich about 14 tons of shell was led. lowever, the present permit to ime operations contains a pro ) that the atoll must be evacu i while the Japanese astrono al team is stationed there. lr. Brown said in Auckland in Tuary that he had no idea why /as considered necessary for him withdraw his team during the anese visit, as there should be m for all.

Dangerous Conditions

he divers were to be taken to /arrow by ketch Taveuni as soon :hat vessel returns to the Cooks :r refit in Auckland, where she

ved in mid-February.

nwarrow is not popular with the :rs who say that all the good 1 appears to be in water below fathoms. The lagoon contains ;h weed, and visibility below is ier poor, making for rather gerous diving conditions, but the hty of shell obtained in 1956 reported to be generally good.