After a long day collecting soil and water samples, Air Force officials weren't saying whether the missing "Tybee bomb" had been found or whether they had gotten a bum tip.

Scientists need to analyze the samples first, and that may take some time, Air Force Lt. Col. Frank Smolinsky said. Once that's done, though, officials should be able to say definitively whether the bomb is there or not, he said.

The 7,600-pound Mark 15 nuclear weapon was lost in 1958 when an Air Force bomber collided with a fighter on a training mission. The government searched for the bomb for two months without any luck.

Just before sunrise Thursday, at about high tide, a team of scientists in four boats wound through the marshland near Savannah, hoping to solve the 46-year-old mystery.

The flotilla sped into Wassau Sound toward a football-field sized area between Little Tybee and Wassau islands.

On board one boat was a top Defense Department official, Dr. Billy Mullins, associate director of the Air Force's nuclear and counter-proliferation office.

"Our goal is to have a definitive report on claims of radiation in this area: Is it there and what it is," Mullins told reporters in a separate boat. "If it's the Mark-15, that's one thing. If not, where does this (radiation) come from?"

Standing next to him was Derek Duke, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who made international headlines this summer when he told The Post and Courier that his group had pinpointed a place where he thought the bomb might be resting.

Duke said his group had recorded unusually high radiation readings in the area and that the location matched the place where the bomber's crew said the weapon had been dropped.

"But even though I've done all the readings and all the calculations, there's no sure bet here," he said.

Technicians worked throughout the day collecting readings and samples. Divers worked in water 10 to 15 feet deep in an area that also was the site of the Olympic sailing events in 1996.

"Their sole effort was to scoop up samples in the seabed," Smolinsky said. "They weren't doing anything intrusive, and there was no danger in any contact of the bomb. Safety was paramount in what we did today." No other boats were in the area. "They had no distractions."

He described the team's efforts as "very thorough" and "very successful," and said the Air Force has a "high amount of certainty" that it will be able to confirm whether the bomb is there.

"It's just too early to give an answer about what may have been found."

He said the Air Force would issue a formal report of its findings soon, but he didn't know when that might happen.

Air Force officials have stressed that the bomb wasn't armed, that it didn't contain a plutonium capsule required for a nuclear detonation, and therefore poses no threat to the public.

Citing a declassified memo that said the bomb was armed, Duke and others are concerned that the plutonium capsule might have been in the bomb.

The Air Force has said the memo was wrong. Officials, however, have acknowledged that the bomb contains highly enriched uranium and several hundred pounds of conventional explosives.

Despite his past differences with the Air Force, Duke said he was impressed with their response Thursday. "They were incredibly professional and serious people about this business," he said. "They came for solid reasons, not just for me. They know this weapon was lost in this area."

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