Aninsitustudy of the effects of ionizing radiation on the strength of the Raman and photoluminescence signal of high OH, low OH, and fluoride core fibers has been performed with 514.5 nm laser excitation. The fibers were irradiated with a60Co source at a constant dose rate of 560 rads/h. The high OH fiber displayed a much slower decay of the fiber Raman intensity than the other two fibers during irradiation. The fluoride fiber exhibited the quickest decline in Raman signal with the intensity dropping by a factor of 1000 in less than 20 min. The Raman intensity of the low OH silica fiber recovered to greater than 90% of its pre‐irradiation value after a post‐irradiation photoanneal with 488 nm laser light. The silica fibers displayed an increase in intensity of a broad photoluminescence feature centered at 650 nm. However the fiber photoluminescence intensity remained much weaker than the Raman intensity throughout the irradiations. ©1995 American Institute of Physics.