Chuck Kuecker <ckuecker@ckent.org> Wrote:
> Dropped, no. Tested, at least one, at Trinity site in New Mexico. I believe
> it was the "Fat Man" prototype. Not sure they ever tested the Nagasaki
> design before it was dropped.
The fist nuclear explosion of was indeed at the Trinity site in New Mexico but it was
identical to the Nagasaki plutonium bomb (Fat Man), it used the complex but efficient
implosion design . The Hiroshima uranium 235 bomb (Little Boy or Thin man) was
never tested, it used the far simpler gun design so they were pretty sure it would
work even without a test. Actually the gun design was never used again on any bomb,
it's just too crude and inefficient and won't work at all with plutonium.
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat May 11 2002 - 17:44:21 MDT