How a 3rd Nuke destined for Japan killed American Scientists here in the US.

[Averageman]

http://extragoodshit.phlap.net/wp-co...cientists.html

President Harry S. Truman knew that one bomb would not be enough to force Japan to surrender, so he ordered two. What many don’t know is that there was a third bomb in reserve, just in case.

This third bomb had not been assembled yet, but its plutonium core—the heart of the bomb—was ready, and kept at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. When it became clear a third bomb would not be necessary, nuclear scientists at Los Alamos were delirious with excitement. Here there was in their hands, the rarest of the rare material—a 6.2 kg core of pure plutonium. They probed and prod the shinny metallic sphere and subjected it to countless experiments, until two sloppy scientists nearly blew up the laboratory and ruined it for every one. Both of them were dead within days, and the core acquired the nickname “demon core”.

[Firefly]

We should have tested it on Moscow just saying

[Diamondback]

We should have tested it on Moscow just saying

If we could get it there with sufficient surprise to keep Stalin from spider-holing... the Moscow subway system was actually designed as a bunker system first and mass transit second.

[Dr. Bullseye]

The Americans invented nothing. All atomic bombs came from Germany. Germany tested two uranium bombs in 1944. They sent bomb material to Japan which they tested in North Korea. The US captured a uranium bomb at one site and two plutonium bombs at another. If this bomb in question was not German, it was a copy of a German bomb and you see what happened as these scientists had no idea of what they were doing. There are tons of documentation on the German bomb in a book by Dr. Rainer Karlsch and more in books but Friedrich Georg and Thomas Mahner, Edgar Meyer and an Italian government witness to an atomic test, Luigi Romersa. It is in German language.

[jbjh]

The Americans invented nothing. All atomic bombs came from Germany. Germany tested two uranium bombs in 1944. They sent bomb material to Japan which they tested in North Korea. The US captured a uranium bomb at one site and two plutonium bombs at another. If this bomb in question was not German, it was a copy of a German bomb and you see what happened as these scientists had no idea of what they were doing. There are tons of documentation on the German bomb in a book by Dr. Rainer Karlsch and more in books but Friedrich Georg and Thomas Mahner, Edgar Meyer and an Italian government witness to an atomic test, Luigi Romersa. It is in German language.

Can you please post a link?


Sent from 80ms in the future

[jbjh]

http://extragoodshit.phlap.net/wp-co...cientists.html

President Harry S. Truman knew that one bomb would not be enough to force Japan to surrender, so he ordered two. What many don’t know is that there was a third bomb in reserve, just in case.

This third bomb had not been assembled yet, but its plutonium core—the heart of the bomb—was ready, and kept at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. When it became clear a third bomb would not be necessary, nuclear scientists at Los Alamos were delirious with excitement. Here there was in their hands, the rarest of the rare material—a 6.2 kg core of pure plutonium. They probed and prod the shinny metallic sphere and subjected it to countless experiments, until two sloppy scientists nearly blew up the laboratory and ruined it for every one. Both of them were dead within days, and the core acquired the nickname “demon core”.

Harry Dahglian! IIRC, this wasn’t the first time he had grabbed at a core to keep it from going super critical.

And then Slotkin was killed by the same core a year later.

Lots of safety changes after these two incidents, and we also gained a lot of knowledge about radiation exposure and poisoning, and lethality radius.


Sent from 80ms in the future

[chuckman]

The Americans invented nothing. All atomic bombs came from Germany. Germany tested two uranium bombs in 1944. They sent bomb material to Japan which they tested in North Korea. The US captured a uranium bomb at one site and two plutonium bombs at another. If this bomb in question was not German, it was a copy of a German bomb and you see what happened as these scientists had no idea of what they were doing. There are tons of documentation on the German bomb in a book by Dr. Rainer Karlsch and more in books but Friedrich Georg and Thomas Mahner, Edgar Meyer and an Italian government witness to an atomic test, Luigi Romersa. It is in German language.

US physicists were working on nuclear fission in the late 30s. While I definitely see a "nuclear race" and parallel development based on multiple sources, it's a bit disingenuous to pin all success to the Germans.

[Diamondback]

US physicists were working on nuclear fission in the late 30s. While I definitely see a "nuclear race" and parallel development based on multiple sources, it's a bit disingenuous to pin all success to the Germans.

And many of our top nuke guys were Germans and Italians fleeing Hitler and Mussolini, IIRC. Japan was scary close and had some of the world's best cyclotrons, and despite Mac lobbying for them to be relocated for Allied scientists to use the order came down to destroy them all.

Nightmare, imagine nuclear kamikazes... IIRC they even had an "Atomic Blossom" designed based on the Yokosuka MXY7 just waiting for a warhead to plug in.

[Alex V]

This guy has good videos on many nuclear and radiological disasters.

Here is the one on the "demon core"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE8F...ainlyDifficult

[Averageman]

We should have tested it on Moscow just saying

I said that to my Dad one time around 1978, I might as well have pulled the pin and rolled a grenade in to the Living room. It got that heated that quick.