Japanese Quake and tsunami

You know the story mate, loose lips sink ships !

 

Keep in mind that a lot of the pioneering work on nuclear physics before WW2 came out of Europe. The big names in physics in those days were Einstein, the Curies, Leo Szilard, and Enrico Fermi. A fair bit of the early work was done at Cavendish Laboratories in the UK during the early years of the war and when the US got involved and the Manhattan Project was started up a fair bit of the European talent, much of it Jewish refugees, came across the pond. The British were involved in the Manhattan Project from even before day 1 and a formal agreement covering full information sharing was in place for many years. When the Brits did start experimenting with their own nuclear weapons they tested them in Nevada.

Even today, the Trident missiles carried by British ballistic missile submarines are US manufactured and maintained. The MOD has claimed that the warheads were designed and built in the UK, but documents released by the US Dept of Energy (Which controls nuclear weapons in the US) seem to indicate that it was more a case of "Assembled in the UK from US components".

Had circumstances been different, the UK almost certainly could have developed an indigenous nuclear capability, but as things worked out they didn't have to.

An excellent source for information on this topic are "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" and "Dark Sun", both by Richard Rhodes. They detail the US (and by extension UK) nuclear program up through the late 1950s.

 

How are you Americans getting on the with Harrier jump jet. We sold them over to you years ago when we had finished with them for new stuff.

Im surprised you didnt buy our old Concorde of us, weve finished with that now too but it was still in good condition it is light years ahead of anything you ever had, maybe a bit to advanced for you.

I guess it was a bit of sour grapes when you banned it from landing in New york, it must have been embarrassing for you seeing as you did'nt even have a military jet that could catch the British passenger aircraft Concorde.

I cant say any more ole chap --official secrets act and all that you know.

 

As far as I know the UK certainly had their own home-grown nukes, but later abandoned developing their own designs in favour of US equipment, circa 1970's. The tests conducted in central Australia in the 1950's and 60's, as well as on islands off Western Australia attest to that. As for Nevada I wouldn't know, but google 'Maralinga" and 'Monte Bello Islands' and look for mushroom clouds !

 

There is information "leaking out" about the discarded nuclear bombs dumped in the sea by the USA after Nagasaki.

It has been revealed,-- obviously against CIA's pleaure,-- that when they had finished with the 10 bombs that they had for the WW11 attack on Japan they just dumped 8 of them.

These were 8 remaining bombs after 'little boy' and 'Fat man' ( I think those names are correct) and as transport was --troublesome they decided to just dump them in the sea.

Embarrassed by these dirty irresponsible deeds some one is now trying to find them as USA cringes in denial at the exploration.

I understand they were all but armed and if leak would be polluting this country, but is not near USA so it does'nt matter.

Any one hear more on this one?

 

I couldn't imagine that being correct. Why dispose of your state-of-the-art frontline weapon ? Does not make any sense. I do know thousands of tonnes of chemical weapons were dumped at sea by US forces after the war, that isn't disputed.

 

The "bomb" in those days was not fully understood. Unbelievably it was not known for sure that the atomic reaction would not accelerate and spread on through all matter in the whole world.

Nice to think your life was gambled with such a risk for the good of American supremacy.

The bombs I guess were too much trouble and very heavy resembling a WW11 sea mine but a bit bigger.

I have an old friend who was right up on the top floor of this bomb exploration in USA just before the war. He wont talk much about it but if I work at him I can --without him noticing.

He is of Dutch decent and is not very proud of his lifes work and as all inventors are extremely disappointed when his work is taken away and used for military purposes.

He is particularly knowledgeable on the H bomb.

I have a feeling I have spoken enough on this matter.

 

Nothing much changes in that department. Now we have the Large Hadron Collider being used to allegedly try to unlock the 'secrets' of matter, but feared by some physicists to run the risk of creating a black hole, with terminal consequences for all we hold dear. I cannot speak to the accuracy of that, but quite incredibly some scientists are now proclaiming the possibility that the device is being sabotaged by some unseen hand, after an exasperating unexplained series of hitches. One suggestion being mooted was that it was being manipulated from the future, which is way too much for this little observer to assimilate. Maybe mad scientists are not just the province of fiction.

 

That's true, the UK did build their first weapons from domestically produced components, however, the designs were pretty much carbon copies of the US Mark 3 and 4 devices which British designers had worked on during the war. The Brits also did independent development work on the jump from fission to fusion weapons (complete with a few fizzles).

As for US weapons after the Japanese Surrender, I highly doubt it. My understanding is that the components for one additional bomb existed in the US after Nagasaki, but that there simply was not yet enough fissile material in existence to build more. The Hanford B reactor didn't come on-line until September of 1944 and it took them until July to produce the first implosion weapon (the Trinity device) and the second one was used over Nagasaki. These were Plutonium implosion devices whereas the Hiroshima device was a uranium gun type device, of which only one was made.

The early weapons were assembled by hand and the nuclear components (physics package or "pit") were stored separately from the rest of the device and were inserted into the bomb shortly before it was loaded in the aircraft. Later devices starting with the mark IV design had the pit inserted into the weapons while the aircraft was in the air.

Even if additional weapons had existed there is absolutely no reason that they would have been dumped into the sea.

 

Frosty is trolling again....

But there have been some bombs lost in the ocean over the years, both by Americans and Russians.

http://www.genecurtis.com/LostNuclearBombs.htm

 

Only 3 nukes were built but more were under construction. None were dumped. Stop making your ignorance gleam like a colossal jewel. Have you ever heard of the SR-71? The Concorde was a stupid toy for rich people, was dirty and wasteful, unnecessary too.

http://www.strategic-air-command.com/aircraft/reconnaissance/sr71_blackbird.htm

 

Coal still widely used in the world market for power boys, and it is the whole world in which we live. Hydro-electric is pretty dam (punn) friendly but certainly not viable everywhere. Safe, and the emphasis is on safe, nuclear is the long term answer I suspect but with set-backs like Japan, it is once again hugely delayed.

-Tom

 

We should make it easier for Japan to get fossil fuels so they won't need nuclear in such a tectonically active zone.

 

if only that was said 70 years ago