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Book The Atomic Times  My H Bomb Year at the Pacific Proving Ground

Download or read book The Atomic Times My H Bomb Year at the Pacific Proving Ground written by Michael Harris and published by Word International. This book was released on 2019-05-05 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Catch-22 with radiation. Area 51 meets Dr. Strangelove. Except it really happened. The Atomic Times is the absolutely insane, incredibly f*cked-up, but true, eyewitness story of what happened in 1956 on a tiny island in the South Pacific when over 1600 young soldiers (including me) were turned into atomic guinea pigs by the US Army. We were sent there to “observe” this nuclear test series, called Operation Redwing. Wearing only T-shirts and shorts and without any other protective gear while Army brass and nuclear scientists wore Hazmat suits, we were exposed to radiation and fallout. Operation Redwing, the biggest and baddest of America's atmospheric nuclear weapons test series, mixed saber rattling with mad science, while overlooking the cataclysmic human, geopolitical and ecological effects. But mostly, it just messed with guys' heads. Major Maxwell, who put Safety First, Second and Third. Except when he didn't. Berko, the wise-cracking Brooklyn Dodgers fan forced to cope with the H-bomb and his mother's cookies. Tony, who thought military spit and polish plus uncompromising willpower made him an exception. Carl Duncan, who clung to his girlfriend's photos and a dangerous secret. Major Vanish, who did just that. In THE ATOMIC TIMES, Michael Harris welcomes readers into the U.S. Army's nuclear family where the F-words were Fallout and Fireball. In a distinctive narrative voice, Harris describes his H-bomb year with unforgettable imagery and insight into the ways isolation and isotopes change men for better—and for worse. A New York Times bestseller and a Pulitzer Prize nominee, THE ATOMIC TIMES was originally published in hardcover by Random House. "A gripping memoir leavened by humor, loyalty and pride of accomplishment. A tribute to the resilience, courage and patriotism of the American soldier." —Henry Kissinger "Harris' frank and disturbing descriptions of the criminally irresponsible proceedings on Eniwetok, and the physical and mental pain he and others endured, constitute shocking additions to atomic history. Amazingly enough, given his ordeal, Harris remains healthy." --Booklist "An entertaining read in the bloodline of Catch-22, Harris achieves the oddest of victories: a funny, optimistic story about the H-bomb. Harris uses a chatty, dead-pan voice that highlights the horrifying absurdity of life on the island: the use of Geiger counters to monitor scrambled eggs' radiation level, three-eyed fish swimming in the lagoon, corroded, permanently open windows that fail to keep out the radioactive fall-out and men whose toenails glow in the dark." --Publisher's Weekly From the author: Three-eyed fish swimming in the lagoon. Men whose toenails glow in the dark. Operation Redwing where the F words were Fallout and Fireball. In 1956, I was an army draftee sent to the Marshall Islands to watch 17 H-bomb tests. An "observer," the Army called it. In plain English: a human guinea pig. I knew at the time that the experience could make a fascinating book, and I wrote a novel based on it while I was still there. The problem was that Eniwetok was a security post. There were signs everywhere impressing on us that the work going on (I mopped floors, typed, filed requisitions and wrote movie reviews for the island newspaper “All the news that fits we print”) was Top Secret. “What you do here, what you see here, what you hear here, when you leave here leave it here.” I was afraid they would confiscate the manuscript if they found it but a buddy who left Eniwetok before I did concealed the pages in his luggage. When he got back to the States, he mailed those pages to my father so I had what turned out to be a very rough draft. What was wrong with the book? Let me count the ways. I didn’t know how to write action, plot and character. I did know how to leave out everything interesting that was happening around me. Back in the States after my discharge, I thought about writing Version #2 but for ten years, I had nightmares about the H-bomb almost every night. I survived the radiation (unlike some of my friends), but the memories were also a formidable foe. I tried to forget and more or less succeeded. My perspective gradually changed over the years and I began to remember what I had tried to forget: We were told we had to wear high density goggles during the tests to avoid losing our sight but the shipment of goggles never arrived—the requisition was cancelled to make room for new furniture for the colonel's house. We were told we had to stand with our backs to the blast—again to prevent blindness. But the first H-bomb ever dropped from a plane missed its target, and the detonation took place in front of us and our unprotected eyes. Servicemen were sent to Ground Zero wearing only shorts and sneakers and worked side by side with scientists dressed in RadSafe suits. The exposed military men developed severe radiation burns and many died. The big breakthrough came when enough years had passed and I had overcome the anger and the self-pity resulting from the knowledge that I and the men who served with me had been used as guinea pigs in a recklessly dangerous and potentially deadly experiment. At last I had the perspective to understand my nuclear year in its many dimensions and capture the tragedy and the black humor that came along with 17 H-bomb explosions. In addition, certain significant external realities had changed. Top Secret documents about Operation Redwing had been declassified. I learned new details about the test known as Tewa: the fallout lasted for three days and the radiation levels exceeded 3.9 Roentgens, the MPE (Maximum Permissible Exposure). Three ships were rushed to Eniwetok to evacuate personnel but were ordered back after the military raised the MPE to 7. That, they reasoned, ensured everyone's safety. I made contact with other atomic veterans who told me about their own experiences and in some cases sent me copies of letters written to their families during the tests. As we talked, we also laughed: about officers who claimed Eniwetok was a one year paid vacation; about the officer who guarded the political purity of the daily island newspaper by deleting "pinko propaganda," including a speech by President Eisenhower. By now, Ruth knew the material almost as well as I did and provided crucial perspective and detailed editing expertise. At last, I was able to pull all the strands together. After 50 years, I was able write the book I had wanted to in the beginning. Having struggled to write a memoir for so long and having been asked for advice by others contemplating writing a memoir, I can pass along a bit of what I learned along the way. Make sure you have enough distance from the experience to have perspective on what happened. Exposure to radiation and the resulting reactions—anger, terror, incredulity—produce powerful emotions that take time to process. Figure out how to use (or keep away) from your own intense feelings. In the case of the H-Bomb tests, anger and self-pity were emotions to stay away from. So was the hope of somehow getting “revenge.” Sometimes the unexpected works. For me, finding humor in a tragic situation— the abject military incompetence in planning and executing the H-Bomb tests—freed my memory and allowed me to write about horrific experiences. Figure out (most likely by trial and error) how much or how little of yourself you want to reveal. Keywords: memoir, veterans, H-bomb, US Army, black humor, dark humor, military memoir, nuclear bombs, radiation, fission, fusion, fallout, danger, suspense, atomic bombs, hydrogen bombs, H-bomb, South Pacific, Eniwetok, Marshall Islands

Book Making Weapons Talking Peace

Download or read book Making Weapons Talking Peace written by Herbert F. York and published by . This book was released on 1987-12-13 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author, a distinguished physicist and nuclear weapons developer, has participated at almost every stage of the development of nuclear and thermonuclear weapons, their delivery systems, and the efforts at arms control. This book chronicles York's involvement, beginning with his work on the Hiroshima bomb and ending with his service as Jimmy Carter's negotiator at the Comprehensive Test Ban talks in Geneva. His odyssey from Hiroshima to Geneva has been a journey from the conviction that military might and national security were synonymous to the understanding that technology alone will never generate peace and survival. York also provides vignettes of leading participants in the development of the nuclear weapons dilemma. ISBN 0-465-04338-0: $22.95.

Book Scientists and the Development of Nuclear Weapons

Download or read book Scientists and the Development of Nuclear Weapons written by Lawrence Badash and published by Humanities Press International. This book was released on 1995 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Here the development of nuclear weapons is viewed from the perspective of the scientist. From the discovery of fission to the Manhattan Project, to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the arms race and early steps toward arms control, this book provides a context for developments in the period 1939-1963. It discusses the scientists' technical contributions, the novelty of working for the government on a secret project, political lobbying, the private anguish over the morality of creating weapons of mass destruction while being subject to public adoration as the wizards who produced the bomb, and finally the rapid descent for some into the shattering category of security risk during the McCarthy period. Lawrence Badash traces the course of this tumultuous and apocalyptic period with scientific clarity and sympathetic understanding.

Book Nuclear Test Cover Up in 1958

Download or read book Nuclear Test Cover Up in 1958 written by John P. Haase and published by . This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 76 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This story begins with the experiences of a 12 year old boy growing up in the 40's and 50's when life was a lot simpler with very little TV and no electronic devices other than for the kitchen. His teenage experiences reveal some of the everyday happenings that shaped his life and those of a close group of friends. It expands and includes his Navy experiences which comprise of being exposed to and witnessing 23 Atomic Bomb blasts and its ongoing long term after affects. It continues with his ongoing fight against a "conspiracy and cover-up" of all Nuclear Bomb test results and his declining health.

Book United States Nuclear Tests

Download or read book United States Nuclear Tests written by and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This document lists chronologically and alphabetically by name all nuclear tests and simultaneous detonations conducted by the United States from July 1945 through September 1992. Two nuclear weapons that the United States exploded over Japan ending World War II are not listed. These detonations were not "tests" in the sense that they were conducted to prove that the weapon would work as designed (as was the first test near Alamogordo, New Mexico on July 16, 1945), or to advance nuclear weapon design, or to determine weapons effects, or to verify weapon safety as were the more than one thousand tests that have taken place since June 30,1946. The nuclear weapon (nicknamed "Little Boy") dropped August 6,1945 from a United States Army Air Force B-29 bomber (the Enola Gay) and detonated over Hiroshima, Japan had an energy yield equivalent to that of 15,000 tons of TNT. The nuclear weapon (virtually identical to "Fat Man") exploded in a similar fashion August 9, 1945 over Nagaski, Japan had a yield of 21,000 tons of TNT. Both detonations were intended to end World War II as quickly as possible. Data on United States tests were obtained from, and verified by, the U.S. Department of Energy's three weapons laboratories -- Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California; and Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico; and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. Additionally, data were obtained from public announcements issued by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and its successors, the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration, and the U.S. Department of Energy, respectively.

Book Atomic Bomb

    Book Details:
  • Author : Bruce Cameron Reed
  • Publisher : Iop Concise Physics
  • Release : 2015
  • ISBN : 9781627059909
  • Pages : 0 pages

Download or read book Atomic Bomb written by Bruce Cameron Reed and published by Iop Concise Physics. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume, prepared by an acknowledged expert on the Manhattan Project, gives a concise, fast-paced account of all major aspects of the project at a level accessible to an undergraduate college or advanced high-school student familiar with some basic concepts of energy, atomic structure, and isotopes. The text describes the underlying scientific discoveries that made nuclear weapons possible, how the project was organized, the daunting challenges faced and overcome in obtaining fissile uranium and plutonium, and in designing workable bombs, the dramatic Trinity test carried out in the desert of southern New Mexico in July 1945, and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Book Technical Aspects of Detection and Inspection Controls of a Nuclear Weapons Test Ban

Download or read book Technical Aspects of Detection and Inspection Controls of a Nuclear Weapons Test Ban written by United States. Congress. Joint Committee on Atomic Energy and published by . This book was released on 1960 with total page 486 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Catalog of Copyright Entries  Third Series

Download or read book Catalog of Copyright Entries Third Series written by Library of Congress. Copyright Office and published by Copyright Office, Library of Congress. This book was released on 1975 with total page 1760 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Atomic Bomb History  Declassified Account of Return to Nuclear Weapons Testing by U S  After Test Moratorium 1958 1961   The Only Detailed

Download or read book Atomic Bomb History Declassified Account of Return to Nuclear Weapons Testing by U S After Test Moratorium 1958 1961 The Only Detailed written by U. S. Military and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2019-03-06 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This unusually important and authoritative history report provides the only official account of major aspects of the American atomic bomb testing program, with technical and political insights into nuclear tests conducted after the test moratorium ended in 1961. The author, Dr. Bill Ogle, a scientist and manager, played a central role in the United States nuclear test program from the first explosion at Alamogordo in 1945 through the time of his death in May 1984. During the critical periods just before and following the moratorium he served as Scientific Deputy to the Military Commanders of the Joint Task Forces that were created to carry out U.S. tests in the Pacific. As Test Division Leader at Los Alamos, he was responsible also for a major part of the underground test program in Nevada.On August 22, 1958, President Eisenhower announced that the United States was ready to begin test ban negotiations on October 31, and to suspend nuclear weapons tests on that date for one year while the negotiations proceeded. The suspension might continue from year to year depending on progress in other areas. A week later Premier Khrushchev agreed to the same date for negotiations, but not to a moratorium. In fact, Soviet testing, in abeyance since March, resumed on September 20 with two very large explosions, and continued until November 3. In compliance with the President's statement, no U.S. tests were conducted after October 30. No further tests then were performed by either nation until the Soviets burst forth with an astonishing 45 shots in 65 days beginning on September 1, 1961. Of these, 14 were above a megaton, and one yielded 63 megatons -- the largest bomb ever fired by any nation. The Soviet program gave every evidence of careful and deliberate preparation.Following the 1958 test suspension, the United States dismantled most of the complex infrastructure required for its own nuclear test programs, both in Nevada and in the Pacific. Almost three years later when President Kennedy found it essential to United States interests to resume testing in response to the Soviet testing, the experience for America's testing community was technically agonizing, operationally painful, and economically very costly. The atmospheric component of test resumption had especially high political obstacles and costs. In this book, which was eight years in preparation, Ogle has provided a detailed description of the events of that period. The book does not argue for or against nuclear testing underground or in the atmosphere. Rather, it presents a comprehensive account of the major difficulties that attended U.S. test resumption in both of those environments after a period of total cessation. Dr. Ogle's book is unique in several respects. It is the only detailed account by an "insider" of United States nuclear testing. The earlier development of testing methods and weapons technology is presented as necessary background for the reader. The author, in addition to accumulating and knowledgeably screening a vast collection of original documents from the period, personally interviewed more than 70 key political, technical, and operational professionals who participated in the events described in the main part of the book. The collection of data and interviews on which this book is based will be preserved intact in the archives of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Since many of the original sources are no longer available, this archival material is unique and irreplaceable.CHAPTER I - Premoratorium Internal Readiness Activities * CHAPTER II - Test Moratorium, 1958-1961 * CHAPTER III - Return To Testing - Nevada * CHAPTER IV - Return To Atmospheric Testing - Pacific

Book Birthplace of the Atomic Bomb

Download or read book Birthplace of the Atomic Bomb written by William S. Loring and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2019-03-08 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It was not Robert Oppenheimer who built the bomb--it was engineers, chemists and young physicists in their twenties, many not yet having earned a degree. The first atomic bomb was originally conceived as a backup device, a weapon not then currently achievable. The remote Trinity Site--the birthplace of the bomb--was used as a test range for U.S. bombers before the first nuclear device was secretly detonated. After the blast, locals speculated that the flash and rumble were caused by colliding B-29s, while Manhattan Project officials nervously measured high levels of offsite radiation. Drawing on original documents, many recently declassified, the author sheds new light on a pivotal moment in history--now approaching its 75th anniversary--told from the point of view of the men who inaugurated the Atomic Age in the New Mexico desert.

Book The Atom Bomb

    Book Details:
  • Author : Tamra B. Orr
  • Publisher : The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc
  • Release : 2004-12-15
  • ISBN : 9781404202924
  • Pages : 72 pages

Download or read book The Atom Bomb written by Tamra B. Orr and published by The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. This book was released on 2004-12-15 with total page 72 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discusses the scientific discovery of the properties of atoms, uranium, radium, and atomic fission, and how political and military leaders used this knowledge to create an atom bomb.

Book Technical Aspects of Detection and Inspection Controls of a Nuclear Weapons Test Ban

Download or read book Technical Aspects of Detection and Inspection Controls of a Nuclear Weapons Test Ban written by United States. Congress. Joint Committee on Atomic Energy. Special Subcommittee on Radiation and published by . This book was released on 1960 with total page 986 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Silencing the Bomb

    Book Details:
  • Author : Lynn R. Sykes
  • Publisher : Columbia University Press
  • Release : 2017-12-12
  • ISBN : 0231544197
  • Pages : 427 pages

Download or read book Silencing the Bomb written by Lynn R. Sykes and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-12-12 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In December 2016, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists moved their iconic “Doomsday Clock” thirty seconds forward to two and a half minutes to midnight, the latest it has been set since 1952, the year of the first United States hydrogen bomb test. But a group of scientists—geologists, engineers, and physicists—has been fighting to turn back the clock. Since the dawn of the Cold War, they have advocated a halt to nuclear testing, their work culminating in the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which still awaits ratification from China, Iran, North Korea—and the United States. The backbone of the treaty is every nation’s ability to independently monitor the nuclear activity of the others. The noted seismologist Lynn R. Sykes, one of the central figures in the development of the science and technology used in monitoring, has dedicated his career to halting nuclear testing. In Silencing the Bomb, he tells the inside story behind scientists’ quest for disarmament. Called upon time and again to testify before Congress and to inform the public, Sykes and his colleagues were, for much of the Cold War, among the only people on earth able to say with certainty when and where a bomb was tested and how large it was. Methods of measuring earthquakes, researchers realized, could also detect underground nuclear explosions. When politicians on both sides of the Iron Curtain attempted to sidestep disarmament or test ban treaties, Sykes was able to deploy the nascent science of plate tectonics to reveal the truth. Seismologists’ discoveries helped bring about treaties limiting nuclear testing, but it was their activism that played a key role in the effort for peace. Full of intrigue, international politics, and hard science used for the global good, Silencing the Bomb is a timely and necessary chronicle of one scientist’s efforts to keep the clock from striking midnight.

Book Bombs in the Backyard

Download or read book Bombs in the Backyard written by A. Constandina Titus and published by University of Nevada Press. This book was released on 2016-04-15 with total page 379 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On January 27, 1951, the first atomic weapon was detonated over a section of desert known as Frenchman Flat in southern Nevada, providing dramatic evidence of the Nevada Test Site's beginnings. Fifty years later, author A. Costandina Titus reviews contemporary nuclear policy issues concerning the continued viability of that site for weapons testing. Titus has updated her now-classic study of atomic testing with fifteen years of political and cultural history, from the mid-1980s Reagan-Gorbachev nuclear standoff to the authorization of the Nevada Test Site Research Center, a Desert Research Institute facility scheduled to open in 2001. In this second edition of Bombs in the Backyard, Titus deftly covers the post-Cold War transformation of American atomic policy as well as our overarching cultural interest in all matters atomic, making this a must-read for anyone interested in atomic policy and politics.

Book Dialogue in Medicine and Theology

Download or read book Dialogue in Medicine and Theology written by Dale White and published by . This book was released on 1968 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book The Soviet Nuclear Weapons Program

Download or read book The Soviet Nuclear Weapons Program written by Charles River Editors and published by . This book was released on 2019-08-06 with total page 76 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Includes pictures *Includes a bibliography for further reading Tens of millions died during World War II as the warring powers raced to create the best fighter planes, tanks, and guns, and eventually that race extended to bombs which carried enough power to destroy civilization itself. While the war raged in Europe and the Pacific, a dream team of Nobel Laureates was working on the Manhattan Project, a program kept so secret that Vice President Harry Truman didn't know about it until he took the presidency after FDR's death in April 1945. The Manhattan Project would ultimately yield the "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" bombs that released more than 100 Terajoules of energy at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but weeks earlier, on July 16, 1945, the first detonation of a nuclear device took place in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The first bomb was nicknamed the "gadget," to avoid espionage attempts to discover that it was, indeed, a bomb. In some sense, the device detonated in July was not really a "bomb" anyway; it was not a deployable device, though it was a detonatable one. With this success, word reached President Truman, who was then attending the Potsdam Conference, and while there, he presented the news to Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. Stalin feigned surprise; in an ironic twist of fate, espionage missions had revealed American nuclear research to the Soviets before it had even reached Vice President Truman. The attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, along with the Cold War-era tests and their accompanying mushroom clouds, would demonstrate the true power and terror of nuclear weapons, but in the late 1930s these bombs were only vaguely being thought through, particularly after the successful first experiment to split the atom by a German scientist. Despite the fact the Nazis' quest for a nuclear weapon began in earnest in 1939, no one really had a handle on how important nuclear weapons would prove to war and geopolitics, so the Germans were hesitant to expend resources on it. Moreover, they were hampered by the fact their policies had compelled Jewish scientists like Liz Meitner and Albert Einstein to flee before the war. For their part, Stalin's regime had been working on a nuclear weapons program since 1942, relying greatly upon successful Soviet espionage to help lead the way. With intelligence sources connected to the Manhattan Project, Stalin was able to keep abreast of the Allies' progress toward creating an atomic bomb, so that by 1945, the Soviets already had a working blueprint of America's first atomic bombs. On August 29, 1949, the Soviets successfully tested an atomic bomb, and with that, the Soviet Union became the second nation after the U.S. to develop and possess nuclear weapons. The nuclear age itself was still in its infancy, but within a few short years the advent of nuclear war loomed over the world and the prospect of a malign dictatorship possessing nuclear superiority kept Western leaders awake at night. The Soviet Nuclear Weapons Program: The History and Legacy of the USSR's Efforts to Build the Atomic Bomb examines the Soviets' race to reach the ultimate goal during and after World War II, and how they went about their objectives. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about Nazi Germany's nuclear weapons program like never before.