The First Atomic Bomb Blast, 1945 The First Atomic Bomb Blast, 1945 Printer Friendly Version >>> The events that took place in a remote area of New Mexico during the predawn hours of July 16, 1945 forever changed the world. In the early morning darkness the incredible destructive powers of the atom were first unleashed and what had been merely theoretical became reality. The blast, .034 seconds after detonation The test was the culmination of three years' planning and development within the super secret Manhattan Project headed by General Leslie R. Groves. Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer directed the scientific team headquartered at Los Alamos, New Mexico. An isolated corner of the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range located 230 miles south of Los Alamos was selected for the test that was given the code-name "Trinity." Even before the bomb was tested, a second bomb was secretly dispatched to the Pacific for an attack on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Preparations for the test included the building of a steel tower that would suspend the bomb one hundred feet above ground.

Many were apprehensive - there were concerns that the blast might launch a cataclysmic reaction in the upper atmosphere leading to world destruction. Some feared the consequences of radio-active fallout on civilian populations surrounding the test site. Still others feared the test would be an outright dud. Observers were sent to surrounding towns to monitor the results of the blast and medical teams were kept on alert. Finally, the rains that had delayed the test for almost two weeks subsided and in the darkness of that July morning history was made. "We were reaching into the unknown and we did not know what might come of it." Two days after the blast, General Groves, head of the Manhattan Project, sent a Top Secret memorandum to Secretary of War Stimson detailing the events of that morning. Groves included the description of General Thomas Farrell who was in an observation hut close to the blast along with a hand-full of scientists and other personnel. We join General Farrell's account a few hours before the explosion: ADVERTISMENT "The scene inside the shelter was dramatic beyond words. In and around the shelter were some twenty-odd people concerned with last minute arrangements prior to firing the shot. Included were: Dr.

Oppenheimer, the Director who had borne the great scientific burden of developing the weapon from the raw materials made in Tennessee and Washington and a dozen of his key assistants - Dr. Kistiakowsky, who developed the highly special explosives; Dr. Bainbridge, who supervised all the detailed arrangements for the test; Dr. Hubbard, the weather expert, and several others. Besides these, there were a handful of soldiers, two or three Army officers and one Naval officer. The shelter was cluttered with a great variety of instruments and radios. For some hectic two hours preceding the blast, General Groves stayed with the Director, walking with him and steadying his tense excitement. Every time the Director would be about to explode because of some untoward happening, General Groves would take him off and walk with him in the rain, counseling with him and reassuring him that everything would be all right. At twenty minutes before zero hour, General Groves left for his station at the base camp, first because it provided a better observation point and second, because of our rule that he and I must not be together in situations where there is an element of danger, which existed at both points. General Leslie R. Groves (left) and Dr. J.

Robert Oppenhiemer Just after General Groves left, announcements began to be broadcast of the interval remaining before the blast. They were sent by radio to the other groups participating in and observing the test. As the time interval grew smaller and changed from minutes to seconds, the tension increased by leaps and bounds. Everyone in that room knew the awful potentialities of the thing that they thought was about to happen. The scientists felt that their figuring must be right and that the bomb had to go off but there was in everyone's mind a strong measure of doubt. The feeling of many could be expressed by ''Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief.' We were reaching into the unknown and we did not know what might come of it. It can be safely said that most of those present - Christian, Jew and Atheist - were praying and praying harder than they had ever prayed before. If the shot were successful, it was a justification of the several years of intensive effort of tens of thousands of people statesmen, scientists, engineers, manufacturers, soldiers, and many others in every walk of life. In that brief instant in the remote New Mexico desert the tremendous effort of the brains and brawn of all these people came suddenly and startlingly to the fullest fruition.

Dr. Oppenheimer, on whom had rested a very heavy burden, grew tenser as the last seconds ticked off. He scarce breathed. He held on to a post to steady himself. For the last few seconds, he stared directly ahead and then when the announcer shouted 'Now!' and there came this tremendous burst of light followed shortly thereafter by the deep growling roar of the explosion, his face relaxed into an expression of tremendous relief. Several of the observers standing back of the shelter to watch the lighting effects were knocked flat by the blast. The tension in the room let up and all started congratulating each other. Everyone sensed 'This is it!' No matter what might happen now all knew that the impossible scientific job had been done. Atomic fission would no longer be hidden in the cloisters of the theoretical The bomb is unloaded at the base of the tower. July 13, 1945 physicists' dreams. It was almost full grown at birth. It was a great new force to be used for good or for evil. There was a feeling in that shelter that those concerned with its nativity should dedicate their lives to the mission that it would always be used for good and never for evil. Dr.

Kistiakowsky, the impulsive Russian, [actually an American and a Harvard professor] threw his arms around Dr. Oppenheimer and embraced him with shouts of glee. Others were equally enthusiastic. All the pent-up emotions were released in those few minutes and all seemed to sense immediately that the explosion had far exceeded the most optimistic expectations and wildest hopes of the scientists. All seemed to feel that they had been present at the birth of a new age - The Age of Atomic Energy - and felt their profound responsibility to help in guiding into right channels the tremendous forces which had been unleashed for the first time in history. As to the present war, there was a feeling that no matter what else might happen, we now had the means to insure its speedy conclusion and save thousands of American lives." References: General Farrell's account appears in - Department of State, Foreign Relations for the United States Conference of Berlin (Potsdam) (1945); Lansing, Lamont, Day of Trinity (1965). How To Cite This Article: "The First Atomic Bomb Blast, 1945," EyeWitness to History, (2003).

A Science Odyssey: People and Discoveries: The first atomic bomb is detonated The first atomic bomb is detonated 1945 Photo: Atomic bomb test explosion in Alamagordo, New Mexico, July 16, 1945. AP/Wide World Photos In 1932, James Chadwick discovered the neutron , a small atomic particle with mass but no charge. This turned out to be an extremely useful tool for bombarding atomic nuclei. Two years later, Enrico Fermi bombarded uranium with neutrons, hoping that it would cause the uranium to emit a beta particle and become a new, artificial element above uranium in the periodic table. It seemed he had done this and in the process showed that slow-moving neutrons were more effective than high-energy neutrons for the task. Fermi won the Nobel Prize for his work in 1938. He was a committed antifascist and when he and his wife left Italy for the Nobel ceremony, it was for good. They settled in the United States. Meanwhile, Fermi's work had produced some puzzling results and physicists Otto Hahn, Fritz Strassmann, and Lise Meitner took it up in Germany.

They began to suspect that Fermi hadn't created a new element at all but might have actually split the uranium atom in two -- at that point a barely imaginable event. Before they could confirm this, Meitner -- who was an Austrian of Jewish descent -- had to flee the country when Germany annexed Austria in 1938. With the help of Niels Bohr , she got a position in Stockholm. From there, Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch proved that the uranium atom had been split. Hahn published the results in January 1939 and Meitner and Frisch published the explanation a month later, introducing the term "nuclear fission." Using Bohr's liquid drop model of the nucleus, they suggested that when split, both halves of the atom would have a positive charge and would repel each other with powerful force. The German government took little notice of the finding at first. But others felt the implications were immediately clear. Niels Bohr brought news of Meitner's discovery to the United States in 1939. Several scientists, realizing that fission could be used to build a devastating weapon, wrote to President Roosevelt to inform him.

He immediately set up a committee to research the matter. (Back in Germany, Hahn refused to do weapons research. He had worked on chemicals used as weapons in World War I. His advisers assured him it would bring a speedier end to the war, but he was horrified when he saw Russian soldiers who'd been gassed.) By the end of 1941, British studies had outlined the materials requirements for an atomic bomb and uranium research was going on at about 12 American universities. In 1942 Fermi's team at the University of Chicago created a sustained chain reaction of fission for the first time. Also during 1942, the Manhattan District of the Corps of Engineers was formed to construct three secret "cities" for major portions of atomic bomb development. At Oak Ridge, Tennessee, a nuclear reactor and plant for separating uranium 235 from natural uranium was built. In Hanford, Washington, three reactors were built to extract plutonium (another element with atoms that could be split) from a non-fissionable type of uranium. Finally a lab for the design and construction of the bomb was built at Los Alamos, New Mexico. The cost of these Manhattan Project installations was $2 billion. J.

Robert Oppenheimer was made director of the Los Alamos lab, and in 1943 he gathered about 200 of the best scientists in the field to live and work there. They designed two bombs, one using uranium (called "Little Boy") and one using plutonium ("Fat Man"). By early 1945, the plants at Oak Ridge and Hanford had produced enough raw material for testing. On July 13, 1945, at a site called Trinity 100 km northwest of Alamogordo, a plutonium bomb was assembled and brought to the top of a tower. The test was postponed by thunderstorms. On July 16, the bomb was detonated, producing an intense flash of light seen by observers in bunkers 10 km away and a fireball that expanded to 600 meters in two seconds. It grew to a height of more than 12 kilometers, boiling up in the shape of a mushroom. Forty seconds later, the blast of air from the bomb reached the observation bunkers, along with a long and deafening roar of sound.

The explosive power, equivalent to 18.6 kilotons of TNT, was almost four times larger than predicted. Some of the Los Alamos scientists had circulated a petition asking President Truman to give Japan a warning and a chance to surrender before using the bomb. Some signed, some didn't, but the project remained a secret until the end. Twenty-one days after the test, the B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped the uranium bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later the plutonium bomb was used to bomb Nagasaki. The two bombs killed approximately 150,000 people when they fell. Earlier in the year, intense bombing of Tokyo with conventional bombs had killed about 100,000 people without causing Japan to surrender, but on August 15, 1945, Japan officially surrendered, bringing an end to World War II. After the war, hydrogen bombs and other nuclear weapons continued to be developed by the United States and its former ally the Soviet Union. The competition between the ideologically different nations led to an "arms race" that shaped the postwar decades both economically and philosophically. Nuclear fission was also put to civilian use in power generators in several countries.

They made cheap electricity and were a source of radioisotopes for other types of research, but came with their share of problems and dangers. Reactors are still in use, but in many places have fallen out of favor as an energy source. Copyright notice: The photo above is copyright protected and is the property of the Associated Press. Any use without prior written permission from AP/Wide World Photos is prohibited. Any violation will be subject to legal action. The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded - Jul 16, 1945 - HISTORY.com The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded Share this: The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded Author The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded URL Publisher A+E Networks On this day in 1945, at 5:29:45 a.m., the Manhattan Project comes to an explosive end as the first atom bomb is successfully tested in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Plans for the creation of a uranium bomb by the Allies were established as early as 1939, when Italian emigre physicist Enrico Fermi met with U.S. Navy department officials at Columbia University to discuss the use of fissionable materials for military purposes.

That same year, Albert Einstein wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt supporting the theory that an uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction had great potential as a basis for a weapon of mass destruction. In February 1940, the federal government granted a total of $6,000 for research. But in early 1942, with the United States now at war with the Axis powers, and fear mounting that Germany was working on its own uranium bomb, the War Department took a more active interest, and limits on resources for the project were removed. Brigadier-General Leslie R. Groves, himself an engineer, was now in complete charge of a project to assemble the greatest minds in science and discover how to harness the power of the atom as a means of bringing the war to a decisive end. The Manhattan Project (so-called because of where the research began) would wind its way through many locations during the early period of theoretical exploration, most importantly, the University of Chicago, where Enrico Fermi successfully set off the first fission chain reaction. But the Project took final form in the desert of New Mexico, where, in 1943, Robert J.

Oppenheimer began directing Project Y at a laboratory at Los Alamos, along with such minds as Hans Bethe, Edward Teller, and Fermi. Here theory and practice came together, as the problems of achieving critical mass—a nuclear explosion—and the construction of a deliverable bomb were worked out. Finally, on the morning of July 16,in the New Mexico desert120 miles south of Santa Fe, the first atomic bomb was detonated. The scientists and a few dignitaries had removed themselves 10,000 yards away to observe as the first mushroom cloud of searing light stretched 40,000 feet into the air and generated the destructive power of 15,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT. The tower on which the bomb sat when detonated was vaporized. The question now became—on whom was the bomb to be dropped? Germany was the original target, but the Germans had already surrendered. The only belligerent remaining was Japan. A footnote: The original $6,000 budget for the Manhattan Project finally ballooned to a total cost of $2 billion.

Related Videos On This Day: US Detonates World’s First Atomic Bomb On This Day: US Detonates World’s First Atomic Bomb July 16, 2011 06:00 AM Trinity Test Successful In August 1939, Albert Einstein wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt advocating the exploration of nuclear fission and its potential use as a weapon . In his letter, Einstein stated that recent research made it increasingly possible “to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium, by which vast amounts of power … would be generated.” Roosevelt did not want to risk a German monopoly on such a weapon and approved uranium research in October 1939. This decision was the first among many that culminated in the Manhattan Project, America’s top-secret project to develop the atomic bomb. According to Time magazine, the project “had top priority on materiél and Army specialists.

But few, if any, of the 65,000 who at one time worked on materials, handled blueprints, and expedited the job, ever knew what ‘Manhattan Project’ was .” Less than three years after the project’s start, the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated on Alamogordo Air Base in New Mexico . “Hoisted atop a 150-foot tower, the plutonium device, or Gadget, detonated at precisely 5:30 a.m. over the New Mexico desert, releasing 18.6 kilotons of power, instantly vaporizing the tower and turning the surrounding asphalt into green sand,” describes the the U.S. Department of Energy. “Seconds after the explosion came an enormous blast, sending searing heat across the desert and knocking observers to the ground.” In a memorandum to the secretary of war , project leader Gen. Leslie Groves wrote that the detonation “was successful beyond the most optimistic expectations of anyone.” “As to the present war,” he continued, “there was a feeling that no matter what else might happen, we now had the means to insure its speedy conclusion and save thousands of American lives.

… The effects could well be called unprecedented, magnificent, beautiful, stupendous and terrifying. No man-made phenomenon of such tremendous power had ever occurred before.” Trinity Site - World's First Nuclear Explosion | Department of Energy Home » Operational Management » History » Manhattan Project » Signature Facilities » Trinity Site - World's First Nuclear Explosion Trinity Site - World's First Nuclear Explosion The world's first nuclear explosion occurred on July 16, 1945, when a plutonium implosion device was tested at a site located 210 miles south of Los Alamos on the barren plains of the Alamogordo Bombing Range, known as the Jornada del Muerto. Inspired by the poetry of John Donne, J. Robert Oppenheimer code-named the test Trinity. Hoisted atop a 150-foot tower, the plutonium device, or Gadget, detonated at precisely 5:30 a.m. over the New Mexico desert, releasing 18.6 kilotons of power, instantly vaporizing the tower and turning the surrounding asphalt and sand into green glass. Seconds after the explosion came an enormous blast, sending searing heat across the desert and knocking observers to the ground.

The success of the Trinity test meant that an atomic bomb using plutonium could be readied for use by the U.S. military. The Trinity Site is now part of the White Sands Missile Range and is owned by the Department of Defense. Ground zero is marked by an obelisk made of black lava rock, with an attached commemorative sign. A slightly depressed area several hundred yards across surrounds the monument, indicating where the blast scoured the ground. Only a few pieces of the green glass, trinitite, remain in a protected enclosure. Outside the fenced-in ground zero area lies Jumbo, the 214-ton steel container built to contain the plutonium if the 5,300 pounds of high explosives in the bomb detonated but no nuclear explosion resulted. Ultimately, Jumbo was not used. The restored McDonald ranch house, where the device's plutonium core was assembled, is located about two miles to the south. The remnants of the base camp where some 200 scientists, soldiers, and technicians took up temporary residence during the summer of 1945 is about ten miles southwest of ground zero. Remnants of the observation points 10,000 yards out are also still visible.

The Trinity site is currently opened to the public by the National Park Service twice a year. Tours are given by the Department of Defense on request. Here's a photo of the world's first atomic bomb - Business Insider Gadget, the world's first atomic bomb. US Department of Energy On July 16, 1945 at exactly 5:29:45 a.m., the world entered the unprecedented atomic age with the successful testing of the most powerful weapon known to man. Map of Trinity test site near Alamogordo, New Mexico. US Department of Energy "Gadget," the first atomic bomb, was born out of the Einstein-inspired Manhattan Project, and was detonated in the desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico. Overseeing the project was US Brigadier-General Leslie Groves and Los Alamos director and American physicist Robert Oppenheimer. Designed and launched under Oppenheimer's chosen codename "Trinity" — inspired by a poem by John Donne — the original $6,ooo program budget skyrocketed to a cool $2 billion after Einstein raised multiple concerns that the Nazi's were close to perfecting their own game-changing weapon.

Ahead of testing, crews built a steel 100-foot tall tower to launch Gadget and three observational bunkers for Manhattan Project researchers to safely watch from. The bunkers were built 10,000 yards around the steel tower, according to the Department of Energy. The day before testing, a team hoisted Gadget up the center of the tower and set it in position: Your browser does not support the video tag. YouTube/Amanda Macias/Business Insider And then, in the middle of the desert on the morning of July 16, America detonated the world's first atomic bomb. The explosion vaporized the steel tower, sent a massive shockwave across the desert sand, and produced a mushroom cloud soaring 40,000 feet into the air, according to the Department of Energy. Here's what scientists saw when Gadget was detonated: Your browser does not support the video tag.

YouTube/Amanda Macias/Business Insider Immediately after the blast, Oppenheimer reportedly exclaimed, "it worked!" In an interview about the decision to drop the bomb, Oppenheimer said at the moment of the explosion he thought of a line from the Hindu scripture Bhagavad-Gita, "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Norris Bradbury stands next to the partially assembled Gadget atop the test tower. Wikipedia On August 6, 1945 , the US dropped a 5-ton atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The blast killed 80,000 people immediately and leveled four square miles of the city. Three days later, the US dropped another bomb on Japan's Nagasaki, killing about 40,000 people instantly; thousands more would die of radiation poisoning. Eight days later, Japan informally surrendered to the Allied forces, effectively ending World War II.

Here is a full video of the first nuclear bomb test: United States conducts first test of the atomic bomb - Jul 16, 1945 - HISTORY.com United States conducts first test of the atomic bomb Share this: United States conducts first test of the atomic bomb Author United States conducts first test of the atomic bomb URL Publisher A+E Networks The United States conducts the first test of the atomic bomb at at the Trinity bomb site in central New Mexico. The terrifying new weapon would quickly become a focal point in the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. The official U.S. development of the atomic bomb began with the establishment of the Manhattan Project in August 1942. The project brought together scientists from the United States, Great Britain, and Canada to study the feasibility of building an atomic bomb capable of unimaginable destructive power. The project proceeded with no small degree of urgency, since the American government had been warned that Nazi Germany had also embarked on a program to develop an atomic weapon. By July 1945, a prototype weapon was ready for testing. Although Germany had surrendered months earlier, the war against Japan was still raging.

On July 16, the first atomic bomb was detonated in the desert near the Los Alamos research facility. Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, director of the project, watched the mushroom cloud rise into the New Mexico sky. “Now I am become death, destroyer of worlds,” he uttered, reciting a passage from an ancient Hindu text. News of the successful test was relayed to President Harry S. Truman, who was meeting with Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in Potsdam to discuss the postwar world. Observers at the meeting noted that the news “tremendously pepped up” the president, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill believed that Truman almost immediately adopted a more aggressive tone in dealing with Stalin. Truman and many other U.S. officials hoped that possession of the atomic bomb would be America’s trump card in dealing with the Soviets after the war. Use of the weapon against the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 demonstrated the destructive force of the atomic bomb. The American atomic monopoly did not last long, though. By 1949, the Soviets had developed their own atomic bomb, marking the beginning of the nuclear arms race.

Related Videos International Day Against Nuclear Tests, 29 August International Day Against Nuclear Tests 29 August On-site inspection experts stand near the collapse crater of an underground nuclear explosion at the Nevada National Security Site, USA. Photo: The Official CTBTO Photostream Ending Nuclear Testing The history of nuclear testing began early on the morning of 16 July 1945 at a desert test site in Alamogordo, New Mexico when the United States exploded its first atomic bomb. Designated as the Trinity Site, this initial test was the culmination of years of scientific research under the banner of the so-called “ Manhattan Project ”. In the five decades between that fateful day in 1945 and the opening for signature of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out all over the world. The United States conducted 1,032 tests between 1945 and 1992. The Soviet Union carried out 715 tests between 1949 and 1990. The United Kingdom carried out 45 tests between 1952 and 1991.

France carried out 210 tests between 1960 and 1996. China carried out 45 tests between 1964 and 1996. In the five decades between 1945 and 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out all over the world. After the CTBT was opened for signature in September 1996, about half a dozen nuclear tests have been conducted: India conducted two tests in 1998 (India had also conducted one so-called peaceful nuclear explosion in 1974.) Pakistan conducted two tests in 1998. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea announced that it had conducted a nuclear test in 2006. Types of Nuclear Tests Nuclear explosions have been detonated in all environments: above ground, underground and underwater. Bombs have been detonated on top of towers, onboard barges, suspended from balloons, on the earth's surface, underwater to depths of 600m, underground to depths of more than 2,400m and in horizontal tunnels.

Test bombs have been dropped by aircraft and fired by rockets up to 200 miles into the atmosphere. Atmospheric testing Atmospheric testing refers to explosions which take place in or above the atmosphere. All told, of the over 2,000 nuclear explosions detonated worldwide between 16 July 1945 (United States) and 29 July 1996 (China), 25 % or over 500 bombs were exploded in the atmosphere: over 200 by the United States, over 200 by the Soviet Union, about 20 by Britain, about 50 by France and over 20 by China. Signing of the Partial Test Ban Treaty, 5 August 1963. Secretary of State Dean Rusk signing for the United States; Foreign Minister Andre Gromyko, signing for the Soviet Union; and Lord Hume signing for the United Kingdom. Photo: CTBTO International concern over radioactive fallout resulting from atmospheric tests escalated in the mid 1950s. In March 1954, the United States tested its hydrogen bomb Castle Bravo in the Pacific’s Marshall Islands.

The Bravo test created the worst radiological disaster in the United States’ testing history. By accident, local civilians on the Marshall Islands, US servicemen stationed on Rongerik atoll, and the Japanese fishing trawler Lucky Dragon, were contaminated with the fallout. Nuclear weapon tests have been carried out in all environments: above ground, underground and underwater. Atmospheric testing was banned by the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty. Negotiations had largely responded to the international community’s grave concern over the radioactive fallout resulting from atmospheric tests. The United States, the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom became Parties to the Treaty; France and China did not. France conducted its last atmospheric test in 1974, China in 1980. CTBTO's infrasound IMS stations are used to detect nuclear explosions by monitoring low-frequency sound waves in the atmosphere. CTBTO Radionuclide IMS stations are designed to detect radioactive particles emanating from an atmospheric test. Underwater testing Underwater testing refers to explosions which take place underwater or close to the surface of the water. Relatively few underwater tests have been conducted.

The first underwater nuclear test — Operation Crossroads — was conducted by the United States in 1946 at its Pacific Proving Grounds in the Marshall Islands with the purpose of evaluating the effects of nuclear weapons used against naval vessels. Later, in 1955, the United States’ Operation Wigwam conducted a single underwater nuclear test at a depth of 600 m to determine the vulnerability of submarines to nuclear explosions. Underwater nuclear explosions close to the surface can disperse large amounts of radioactive water and steam, contaminating nearby ships, structures and individuals. Underwater nuclear testing was banned by the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty. The CTBTO's hydroacoustic IMS stations are those best suited to detect nuclear explosions underwater. Of the over 2,000 nuclear explosions detonated worldwide between 1945 and 1996, 25% or over 500 bombs were exploded in the atmosphere. Underground testing Radionuclide station 56, Peleduy, Russian Federation. Photo: CTBTO Underground testing means that nuclear explosions are detonated at varying depths under the surface of the earth. These comprised the majority (i.e.

about 75%) of all nuclear explosions detonated during the Cold War (1945–1989); that is, over 800 of all tests conducted by the United States and nearly 500 of all tests conducted by the Soviet Union. When the explosion is fully contained, underground nuclear testing emits negligible fallout compared to atmospheric testing. However, if underground nuclear tests "vent" to the surface, they can produce considerable radioactive debris. Underground testing is usually evident through seismic activity related to the yield of the nuclear device. Underground nuclear testing was banned by the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) that bans all nuclear explosions on Earth. 75% of all nuclear test explosions during the cold war were conducted underground. The CTBTO’s seismic IMS stations are used to detect nuclear explosions underground. The seismic data is combined with radionuclide data. Only the radionuclide technology can determine if an explosion is nuclear in origin; its stations and laboratories around the world monitor the presence of particulates and/or noble gases in the atmosphere.

For more details see Nuclear Testing Tally : A numeric breakdown of the number of atmospheric and underground nuclear tests conducted by each testing country for each year from 1945–2006. Nuclear Testing 1945–2009 The beginning of the nuclear era The United States launched the Nuclear Age in the pre-dawn hours of 16 July 1945 when it detonated a 20-kiloton atomic bomb code-named ”Trinity“ at Alamogordo, New Mexico. Under the umbrella of the “Manhattan Project”, the test’s original purpose had been to confirm that an implosion-type nuclear weapon design was feasible. It also gave United States’ scientists and the military an idea of what the actual size and effects of such nuclear explosions would be before using them in combat. While the Alamogordo test demonstrated many of the explosion's effects, it failed to provide a meaningful comprehension of radioactive nuclear fallout, which was not well understood by project scientists until years later.

The United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan towards the end of World War II: one an untested gun-type fission bomb called “Little Boy” on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945; another implosion-type bomb tested at Alamogordo for the first time a month earlier and called “Fat Man” on Nagasaki on 9 August. Together these two bombs killed some 220,000 Japanese citizens outright, with over 200,000 more dying subsequently from lethal radiation overdoses. From “hot war” to Cold War The first USSR nuclear test "Joe 1" at Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan, 29 August 1949. Photo: CTBTO No sooner was World War II brought to a close in August 1945 than an all-out technical-industrial nuclear weapons race ensued between the two newly emerging superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union. Between 1946 and 1949, the United States conducted an additional six tests. Then on 29 August 1949, the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb, “Joe 1”.

This test marked the beginning of the “Cold War” nuclear arms race between the two superpowers. With the Soviet Union's first atomic bomb test on 29 August 1949, the "cold war" nuclear arms race between the USSR and the United States was on. At the outset, neither the United States nor the Soviet Union had many nuclear weapons to spare so their nuclear testing was relatively limited. However, by the 1950s the United States had established a dedicated test site (Nevada Test Site) and was also using a site in the Marshall Islands (Pacific Proving Grounds) for extensive nuclear testing. The Soviet Union also began testing on a limited scale, primarily in Semipalatinsk in the Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan. Early tests were used primarily to ascertain the military effects of nuclear weapons and to test new weapon designs. Exacerbated tensions and an atmosphere of pervasive fear and suspicion catalyzed competition to build more powerful and sophisticated bombs. During the 1950s new hydrogen bomb designs were tested in the Pacific, as were new and improved fission weapon designs.

In 1954 India's Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru became the first statesmen to call for a "stand still" agreement on nuclear testing. The Castle Bravo test created the worst radiological disaster in the United States' testing history. Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands, 1 March 1954. Photo: CTBTO The United Kingdom became the third country to test nuclear weapons on 3 October 1952. Initially, the United Kingdom tested mainly in Australia and later on in the United States. From 1958 onwards its programme was closely coordinated with that of the United States through the UK-US Mutual Defense Agreement. The first hydrogen bomb On 1 November 1952 the United States became the first country to test a hydrogen bomb. The Castle Bravo test on 1 March 1954 yielded 15 megatons and was the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated by the United States. By accident, the inhabited atolls of Rongelap, Rongerik and Utirik were contaminated with radioactive fallout, as was the Japanese fishing trawler Lucky Dragon. The controversy over radioactive fallout from testing activities caused great international concern.

India’s Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was the first statesman to call for a “stand still” agreement on nuclear testing on 2 April, 1954. However, this did little to stop the extensive nuclear testing that characterized the following 35 years, not subsiding until the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s. From 1955 to 1989, the average number of nuclear tests conducted every year was 55. Nuclear testing peaked in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The year 1962 alone saw as many as 178 tests: 96 conducted by the United States and 79 by the Soviet Union. This was the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis when the Cold War threatened to become a nuclear war. The preceding year had seen the testing of the largest nuclear weapon ever exploded, the Soviet Union’s “Tsar Bomba” with an estimated yield of 50 megatons. It was tested at the Novaya Zemlya test site near the Arctic Circle.

France and China became nuclear weapon States in 1960 and 1964 respectively, with both nuclear programmes intended to provide credible nuclear deterrents. France initially tested in Algeria, and later on in the South Pacific. China conducted all its nuclear tests at Lop Nur in Xinjiang Province. The 1963 partial test ban treaty banned nuclear testing, including testing for peaceful purposes, in the atmosphere, underwater and in space... but not underground. The early 1960s also saw the introduction of the only testing limitation effort that had concrete effects on how testing was conducted during the Cold War. The 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty banned nuclear testing for military and for peaceful purposes, in the atmosphere, underwater and in space. The Treaty was important from an environmental point of view, curbing the radioactive fallout closely associated with atmospheric tests, but did little to prevent overall nuclear testing, which largely moved underground.

Burgeoning nuclear arsenals The world’s nuclear arsenals ballooned throughout the Cold War, from slightly more than 3,000 weapons in 1955 to over 37,000 weapons by 1965 (United States 31,000 and the Soviet Union 6,000), to 47,000 by 1975 (United States 27,000 and Soviet Union 20,000), and over 60,000 in the late 1980s (United States 23,000 and the Soviet Union 39,000). According to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Israel initiated a nuclear programme in the 1950s, and had completed the R&D phase of its nuclear weapon programme in 1966, although it has not, to public knowledge, tested such a weapon. Israel has adopted a so-called “nuclear ambiguity policy”, neither confirming nor denying its nuclear status. It is not a party to the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, and it has signed but not ratified the CTBT.

Officially, India became the sixth nation to develop nuclear weapons, conducting a nuclear test, declared as a peaceful nuclear explosion, in May 1974. In 1982, one additional nation, South Africa, acquired nuclear weapons, according to the Monterey Institute’s Center on Non-Proliferation Studies. To public knowledge, South Africa did not conduct any nuclear tests. Less than ten years later, with the anticipated transition to a majority-elected government, South Africa dismantled all of its nuclear weapons, the only nation to date that voluntarily relinquished the nuclear arms under its complete control. The dismantling was completed in 1991. The same year, South Africa acceded to the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear weapon State. It voted overwhelmingly to end apartheid on 18 March 1992. Underground nuclear testing was banned by the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, which bans all nuclear explosions on Earth. The world did not witness any significant decrease in nuclear testing activities and nuclear weapons acquisition among the nuclear weapon States until the early 1990s.

The total number of nuclear tests in the second half of the 1980s amounted to as many as 174. But warmer relations between the Soviet Union and the United States from the mid-1980s prepared the way, as did the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union, which was superseded by the Russian Federation. Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine who, together with Russia, had hosted the Soviet nuclear arsenal, became non-nuclear weapon States under the Non-proliferation Treaty. The USSR's main test site, Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, was closed in 1991. Moratoria on nuclear testing In 1990, the Soviet Union proposed a moratorium on nuclear testing that was agreed to by the United Kingdom and the United States. This created an opportunity to move ahead for those advocates who, for decades, had promoted a comprehensive ban on all nuclear testing.

Some six nuclear tests were conducted between 1998 and 2009: two by India and two by Pakistan in 1998 and one by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 2006 and another one by the DPRK in 2009. The Soviet Union’s last nuclear test took place on 24 October 1990; the United Kingdom’s on 26 November 1991 and the United States’ on 23 September 1992. France and China conducted their last tests in January and July 1996 respectively, before signing the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty on the day it opened for signature, 24 September 1996, together with the other three nuclear weapon States and 66 other countries. (For the status of signature and ratification of the Treaty today, please click here ). France closed and dismantled all its nuclear test sites in the 1990s — the only nuclear weapon State to date that has done so.

Breaking the de facto moratorium About six nuclear tests were conducted between 1998 and 2009: two by India and two by Pakistan in 1998 and one by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 2006 and another one by the DPRK in 2009, thus four times breaking the de facto moratorium that the CTBT had established. India conducted two underground nuclear tests, code-named “Shakti (Power) ‘98”, on 11 and 13 May 1998 at its Pokhran underground testing site. In contrast to India’s initial nuclear test in 1974, this time there were no claims that these were “peaceful tests”. On the contrary, government officials were quick to emphasize the military nature of the explosions. A scant two weeks later, Pakistan reacted, conducting two underground nuclear tests at its Ras Koh range. Both India and Pakistan immediately moved to announce unilateral moratoriums on nuclear testing and have conducted no nuclear tests since 1998. To read more about the 1998 tests conducted by India and Pakistan, see The Treaty: History .

The announced nuclear test by the DPRK on 9 October 2006 broke the eighth-year-long de facto moratorium and was against the letter and spirit of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Again on 9 October 2006, the announced nuclear test by the DPRK broke that eight-year-long de facto moratorium. It was met with near unanimous global expressions of concern. The UN Security Council strongly condemned the act as a clear threat to international peace and security. The Chairman and the Executive Secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), as well as States Signatories, expressed grave concern at the declared test and characterized the event as an action against the letter and the spirit of the CTBT. The DPRK tested a second time on 25 May 2009, an act that was once again met with worldwide condemnation. To read more about the announced nuclear test by the DPRK and the CTBTO findings in connection with this declared test, please click here: 2006 and 2009 .

See an approximate overview of all nuclear testing to date, as well as the CTBT status of the countries that have conducted nuclear tests. See also map . Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) The Treaty Central to the issue of the Day against Nuclear Tests is the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty which bans nuclear testing everywhere on planet — surface, atmosphere, underwater and underground. The Treaty takes on significance as it also aimsto obstruct the development of nuclear weapons: both the initial development of nuclear weapons as well as their substantial improvement (H-bomb) necessitate real nuclear testing. The CTBT makes it almost impossible for countries that do not yet have nuclear weapons to develop them. And it makes it almost impossible for countries that have nuclear weapons to develop new or more advanced weapons. It also helps prevent damage caused by nuclear testing to humans and the environment. History Between 1945 and 1996, when the CTBT opened for signature, over 2000 nuclear tests were conducted: by the United States (1000+) Soviet Union (700+), France (200+), United Kingdom and China (45 each).

Three countries have broken the de-facto moratorium and tested nuclear weapons since 1996: India and Pakistan in 1998 and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 2006. Many attempts were made during the Cold War to negotiate a comprehensive test ban, but it was only in the 1990s that the Treaty became a reality. The CTBT was negotiated in Geneva between 1994 and 1996. The Treaty has yet to enter into force All 44 States specifically listed in the Treaty — those with nuclear technology capabilities at the time of the final Treaty negotiations in 1996 — must sign and ratify before the CTBT can enter into force. Of these, nine are still missing: China, DPRK, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and the USA. DPRK, India and Pakistan have yet to sign the CTBT. Otherwise, 182 countries have signed, of which 153 have ratified the Treaty (as of May 2010 including three of the nuclear weapon States: France, Russian Federation and the United Kingdom).

The Treaty Organization Since the Treaty is not yet in force, the Organization is called the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Organization, or CTBTO. It was founded in 1996, with approximately 260 staff from most of the CTBT’s 182 Member States. It is headed by the Executive Secretary, Tibor Tóth (Hungary). The CTBTO’s main tasks are the promotion of the Treaty and the build-up of the verification regime so that it is operational when the Treaty enters into force. The budget is around US$120,000,000 or €82,000,000. Verification regime It is a unique and comprehensive system. At the heart of the verification regime is the International Monitoring System (IMS), which consists of 337 facilities located all over the world that constantly monitor the planet for signs of nuclear explosions. Around 80% of these facilities are already sending data to the International Data Centre at the CTBTO headquarters in Vienna. The IMS uses the following four state-of-the-art technologies: Seismic: Fifty primary and 120 auxiliary seismic stations monitor shockwaves in the Earth.

The mandate of the CTBTO is to detect nuclear explosions such as those announced by the DPRK in 2006 and 2009. To do so, it needs to find the needle in the haystack: the vast majority of shockwaves — many thousands every year — are caused by earthquakes whereas others are man-made explosions such as mine explosions. Hydroacoustic: Eleven hydrophone stations “listen” for sound waves in the oceans. Sound waves from explosions can travel extremely far underwater. Infrasound:Sixty stations on the surface can detect ultra-low frequency sound waves (inaudible to the humanear) that are emitted by large explosions. Radionuclide: Eighty stations measure the atmosphere for radioactive particles, 40 of them also pick up noble gas. Only these measurements can give a clear indication as to whether an explosion detected by the other methods was actually nuclear or not. They are supported by 16 radionuclide laboratories.

On-site-Inspection If the data from the IMS stations indicate that a nuclear test has taken place, a Member State can request for an on-site-inspection to be carried out to collect evidence that will allow the final assessment to be made regarding whether a nuclear explosion — a Treaty violation — has actually taken place. This will only be possible after the CTBT has entered into force. A large on-site inspection exercise was carried out in September 2008 in Kazakhstan. Civil and scientific applications The IMS data are provided to the CTBT Member States. They are used also for applications other than test-ban verification, such as for tsunami-warning (by proving timely data), research on the Earth’s core, monitoring of earthquakes and volcanoes; research on the oceans, climate change research and many other applications. 16 July 1945 - 'Trinity': world's first nuclear test: CTBTO Preparatory Commission 16 July 1945 - 'Trinity': world's first nuclear test The explosion after 0.025 seconds. On 16 July 1945, the ‘Trinity’ nuclear test plunged humanity into the so-called Atomic Age.

The first-ever nuclear bomb was detonated in New Mexico, at the Alamogordo Test Range. Nicknamed the “gadget”, the plutonium-based implosion-type device yielded 19 kilotons , creating a crater over 300 metres wide. No man-made phenomenon of such tremendous power had ever occurred before. The lighting effects beggared description. The whole country was lighted by a searing light with the intensity many times that of the midday sun. T.F. Farrell, brigadier general on the staff the Manhattan Project's military commander The test site after detonation: a crater of fused soil, also known as “Trinite” radiates from ground zero. U.S. efforts to develop nuclear weapons were driven by the fear that Nazi Germany would soon be able to do so. German chemist and Nobel Prize laureate Otto Hahn and his assistant Fritz Straßmann, helped by the Austrian-born physicist Lise Meitner, had produced the world’s first nuclear fission in late 1938. Following this discovery, Albert Einstein sent a letter to U.S. President Franklin D.

Roosevelt, warning him about the threat of a German nuclear weapons programme and urging the United States to speed up its own efforts. A single bomb of this type, carried by boat and exploded in a port, might well destroy the whole port with some of the surrounding territory. Letter from Albert Einstein to U.S. President Roosevelt in 1939 J. Robert Oppenheimer Germany had indeed conducted nuclear research, but only a handful of scientists were assigned to the task. Their efforts were largely unsuccessful and scaled down after 1942. The United States, by contrast, invested essentially unlimited manpower and industrial resources into the Manhattan Project , which started in 1942. Its headquarters was the newly established Los Alamos nuclear facility in New Mexico. Robert Oppenheimer led the group of 6,000 scientists at Los Alamos, and was the project’s scientific head. Now, I am become death, the destroyer of worlds, Oppenheimer cited Hindu Scribture, Bhagavad Gita under the impression of the Trinity explosion Hiroshima the day after. The overall level of radioactivity in the Earth's atmosphere increased to levels that even dwarfed the Chernobyl disaster (source: WDR-Quarks & Co).

Three weeks after the test, on 6 and 9 August 1945 , nuclear bombs – one of them based on the Trinity design - were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing tens of thousands civilians immediately and many more from radiation exposure later. Trinity was the first of over 2000 nuclear tests to be conducted worldwide, with over 1000 in the U.S. nuclear testing programme alone. The tests released vast amounts of radioactivity around the globe (see effects of nuclear testing ). They also spurred the proliferation of nuclear weapons hundreds of times more powerful than the earliest prototypes. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) bans all forms of nuclear testing. The United States was the first country to sign it when it opened for signature on 24 September 1996. Today, however, it is one of the eight countries that have still to ratify the CTBT before it can enter into force. The others are China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel and Pakistan. Nuclear Blasts in Mississippi | Mississippi History Now Location of nuclear tests site in Mississippi. Map courtesy the U.S. Department of Energy .

Henry G. Vermillion, office of information director, U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, indicates evacuation area for the 1964 nuclear test site. Moncrief Photograph Collection, Item #180, Mississippi Department of Archives and History . Some residents stabilize chimneys, porches, and outbuildings in anticipation of the blast. Moncrief Photograph Collection, Item #197, Mississippi Department of Archives and History . Crowds gather a distance from the Tatum Salt Dome nuclear test site on October 22, 1964. Moncrief Photograph Collection, Item #183, Mississippi Department of Archives and History . Horace Burge, who lived about two miles from the site, came home after the Salmon test to find shattered dishes, and a damaged fireplace and chimney. Moncrief Photograph Collection, Item #261, Mississippi Department of Archives and History . Nuclear Blasts in Mississippi Stephen Cresswell At 10:00 a.m. on October 22, 1964, the United States government detonated an underground nuclear device in Lamar County, in south Mississippi. Residents there felt three separate shocks, and watched as the soil rose and behaved like ocean waves.

Hunting dogs howled in terror, and two miles from the test site the blast shook pecans off the pecan trees. This nuclear test, and the one that followed two years later at the same Mississippi site, were the only nuclear explosions on U.S. soil east of the Rocky Mountain states. Atomic bombs were in the news in October 1964. Only one week before the Mississippi nuclear test, newspapers had reported that Communist China had detonated its first atomic bomb. For residents in Lamar County, however, no news story was watched more closely than the plans for nuclear testing in Mississippi. Background of Nuclear Testing The world’s first nuclear test came during World War II at Alamogordo, a remote location in the New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945. Three weeks after this successful test, the United States dropped two nuclear bombs on Japan, one over Hiroshima and one over Nagasaki, killing some 220,000 residents of those cities and leading to Japan’s surrender. President Harry S. Truman defended his decision to use nuclear bombs by saying that he hoped the bombs would convince Japan to surrender.

Ironically, after World War II was over, the United States became allied with its former World War II enemies, but became locked in a bitter Cold War with its former World War II ally, the Soviet Union. Four years after America’s first testing of a nuclear device, the Soviets tested their first bomb. In the coming years, the United States built some 70,000 nuclear warheads, and the Soviet Union vowed to build a similar number. By the time of the nuclear testing in Mississippi in 1964, Great Britain, France, and China had joined “the nuclear club.” As a part of the rivalry between Communist and non-Communist nations during the Cold War, nuclear experts developed new types of nuclear weapons, and insisted that it was necessary to test these new designs. Many citizens around the world, however, expressed concern that such testing would lead to medically harmful “fallout” — radioactive particles that would drift to earth and enter people’s bodies, potentially causing leukemia and other diseases. In 1963, the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union signed a Partial Test Ban Treaty, agreeing not to test nuclear devices in the atmosphere or under water.

The treaty did not address underground testing, because of disagreements and uncertainty over how to verify that nations were not testing weapons underground. Project Dribble A number of nuclear testing experts said it was not a good idea to prohibit underground testing, because some nations might cheat by secretly testing nuclear weapons underground. In most cases, seismographs (the device used to measure earthquakes) could detect underground nuclear tests. The United States wanted to know more about underground testing and how it could be detected, and designed Project Dribble, which included the two Mississippi detonations, to investigate the possibility that cheating nations could hide their underground tests in some way. Nuclear scientists investigated several potential test sites in Mississippi, but finally selected a site just north of Baxterville in Lamar County, about 28 miles southwest of Hattiesburg. Geologically, the area was called the Tatum Salt Dome, a vast supply of dense salt located about 1,000 feet below ground level. Salt domes deep beneath the surface of south central Mississippi are the dried remains of a sea that covered much of the state in the Mesozoic Era. The plan was to detonate one nuclear bomb about 2,700 feet down, in solid salt.

This would be the 1964 blast, code-named Project Salmon. It was believed Project Salmon would blast a huge cavity in the salt. Then the second blast, Project Sterling, would involve detonating a smaller nuclear bomb inside the cavity left in the salt by Project Salmon. Scientists believed that because the bomb would be detonated in a cavity rather than in solid rock, the shock waves would be muffled and the test might not be detectable by seismographs and other measuring devices. So in 1964 officials of the Atomic Energy Commission came to Mississippi and began preparing the Tatum Salt Dome site for Project Salmon. A hundred Lamar County residents found work at the site, primarily driving trucks and heavy equipment, or providing food for the project employees. The nuclear test was scheduled for September 22, 1964, but the wind direction was not right until October 22. On that date about 400 residents were evacuated from the area, and were paid $10 per adult and $5 per child for their inconvenience. The zone from which citizens were evacuated stretched five miles downwind of ground zero, and about half that distance in directions that were not downwind of the test.

Click here to see the Mississippi segment from the Peter Kuran film “Atomic Journeys.” (YouTube site accessed July 2008.) Most residents later reported that the shock of the explosion was much stronger than they had been led to believe. The editor of the Hattiesburg American , although almost thirty miles away, reported that he felt the newspaper building sway for nearly three minutes. At the test site, creeks ran black with silt-laden water, and by seven days after the blast, more than 400 nearby residents had filed damage claims with the government, reporting that their homes had been damaged or that their water wells had gone dry. Horace Burge lived about two miles from the site of the explosion, and returned home to his three-room house to discover considerable damage caused by the blast. The fireplace and chimney were badly damaged, and bricks littered his living room. Broken dishes and jars were all over his kitchen floor, and the shelves fell down inside his refrigerator and broke several glass containers. His electric stove was covered with ash and pieces of concrete. The pipes under his kitchen sink had burst, leading to flooding inside the house.

Within days, the United States government began reimbursing local residents for the damage done to their homes. After the blast, reporters from the Hattiesburg American interviewed many local residents who said they didn’t want this nuclear testing to be done in their neighborhoods, but who added that there was nothing they could do about it. In an editorial, the Hattiesburg American lectured its readers that such tests were necessary for the future security of the United States. After seismic analysis, the government scientists reported that Project Salmon had been a success, with the bomb delivering the same force as 5,000 tons of TNT. The Project Salmon blast was about one-third as powerful as the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. The bomb blasted a void in the salt as predicted, a spherical cavity that was about 110 feet in diameter. The Project Sterling blast, on December 3, 1966, was considerably weaker than the blast two years earlier, as it was intended to be. Instead of the force of 5,000 tons of TNT that Project Salmon had developed, Project Sterling’s bomb had the force of 350 tons of TNT.

Observers two miles away from the blast reported they barely felt a bump. Like Project Salmon, Project Sterling was labeled a success. Because it was detonated in a cavity in the salt, its force, as measured by seismographs, was about 100 times weaker than would have been expected with the same sized bomb placed in solid rock or salt. Thus U.S. government officials reported that Mississippi’s two nuclear blasts, as a part of Project Dribble, helped prove that in fact the seismic effect of a nuclear blast could be greatly reduced if such a blast were set off in a large cave. This suggested it might be possible for a nation to cheat on a future nuclear test ban by hiding a nuclear test. It also helped teach atomic scientists how to detect and measure such hidden blasts. Though Mississippi’s part in nuclear testing was over by 1966, the Tatum Salt Dome site did see two additional tests by the Atomic Energy Commission as a part of Project Miracle Play. Project Miracle Play was similar to Project Dribble in that it too was designed to detect underground testing, but this time the two blasts were conventional bombs instead of nuclear.

Mississippi’s two explosions in Project Miracle Play in 1969 and 1970 were fueled by a mixture of oxygen and methane. After the 1960s Since the 1960s, much has changed. The United States has reduced its nuclear stockpile considerably, to about 10,000 warheads, and Britain and France have also reduced their stockpiles. The Cold War has ended, and few nations remain Communist. The former Soviet Union split apart, and the nation of Russia inherited the nuclear warheads that formerly belonged to the Soviet Union. These Russian nuclear stockpiles are considerably smaller than those during the height of the Cold War. The United States has not tested a nuclear weapon since 1992, and the other major nations of the world have also gone years without nuclear testing, or planning any nuclear tests for the future. On the other hand, the United States expresses concern that nations such as Iran might soon develop and test nuclear weapons, or that a terrorist group might turn to nuclear warfare, including possibly a conventional bomb that would spread radioactive material.

Further, North Korea claims to have detonated a nuclear bomb in 2006, though some claim this small explosion was not really a successful nuclear test. And, in July 2008, the International Atomic Energy Agency reported that North Korea had shut down its nuclear weapons-making nuclear reactor. Aside from the possibility that the enemies of the United States might obtain nuclear weapons, many citizens express concern that even if new nations, or groups, do not develop nuclear weapons, the world will always be in danger of nuclear explosions because 36,000 atomic bombs still exist. Health and safety at Tatum Salt Dome With any nuclear test there is the danger of health problems developing among the people and other living things near the test site. At the Mississippi nuclear test site, one fear in 1964 was that these underground explosions would “blow out” during the tests, sending dirt, gasses, and radioactive material high into the air. Government officials said this was unlikely, pointing out that the 2,700-foot shaft had been filled with gravel and an enormous concrete plug. After the 1964 blast, scientists reassured Mississippians by reporting that all radiation had been contained underground.

They said the soil, water, and air in the area was not made radioactive. Unfortunately, the site did become contaminated after the blast. Two months after the 1964 test, nuclear researchers drilled a hole down into the void left by the blast in order to lower instruments into the cavity. In drilling the hole, the drill bit brought radioactive soil and water up to the surface. The same thing happened in 1966. Several times the U.S. government came in to attempt to clean up the Tatum Salt Dome site. In 1972, buildings at the site were bulldozed and sent to the government’s Nevada Test Site, where considerable radioactive material was already in storage. Most of the other radioactive material at the Tatum Salt Dome site (primarily soil, rock, and water) were put back down into the test cavity, where it remains today in solid or sludge form. Some of the radioactive liquids were injected into “Aquifer Number 5,” a vein of salty water located about 2,500 feet underground at the Tatum Salt Dome site. U.S.

government officials erected a large stone monument at the site, with a brass plaque warning future generations not to drill or dig in the vicinity of this test site. Some Lamar County residents complained of lingering health effects in the decades after the blast. Some argued that the number of cancer deaths in the Tatum Salt Dome area is higher than national averages. Federal officials maintain that there is no health risk associated with living near the Tatum Salt Dome site, but the government did pay at least one former Mississippi employee of Project Dribble for unspecified health damages. Around 2000, the government built a water pipeline to help residents near the Tatum Salt Dome get drinking water from far away from the test site, in hopes of calming residents’ fears about their drinking water. On to the future Most Lamar County residents have already forgotten Mississippi’s two nuclear explosions, and younger citizens of Mississippi typically have never heard of Project Dribble. The debate about the future of nuclear weapons, though, will continue.

Many people will argue that nuclear weapons are an important part of a diversified defense strategy for the nations that possess them, while others believe that nuclear weapons make the world a very unsafe place, with the potential to wreak tremendous harm to the environment and to end human society as we know it. Stephen Cresswell, Ph.D., is professor of history at West Virginia Wesleyan College and the author of an earlier Mississippi History Now article, “Was Mississippi a Part of Progressivism?” He is the author of Rednecks, Redeemers, and Race: Mississippi after Reconstruction, 1877-1917, a book in the Mississippi Historical Society’s Mississippi Heritage Series .

Question: The world’s first nuclear bomb was detonated in 1945 in which US state?
Answer: New Mexico