The Nuclear Flask Train Crash Test
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 21, 2024
Nuclear reactors in power stations use fissile radioactive isotopes to produce heat, which powers turbines to generate electricity. When the...
Showing posts with the label Nuclear
The Nuclear Test That Vaporized an Island
Kaushik Patowary
Apr 16, 2024
On November 1, 1952, the U.S. detonated the world’s first hydrogen bomb, codenamed “Mike”, as part of Operation Ivy. It was the first full t...
The Building That Gave Its Residents Leukemia
Kaushik Patowary
Nov 1, 2023
Building number 7 on Gvardeytsiv Kantemirovtsiv street (now known as Mariyi Pryimachenko Street) in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, was the most recent...
The Radiological Incident in Ciudad Juárez
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 5, 2023
One of the worst radiation accident in North America took place in the city of Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, in 1984. Although the incident is rela...
The 1967 Experiment That Proved Anyone Can Design a Nuclear Weapon
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 17, 2023
On 16 October 1964, China detonated a 22-kiloton nuclear weapon device at the Lop Nur test site, becoming the fifth nuclear power state in t...
Douglas Crofut: Suicide by Radiation
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 6, 2023
On January 22, 1981, a 38-year-old industrial radiographer named Douglas Crofut was admitted to a hospital in Okmulgee, Oklahoma, the United...
The Calutron Girls Who Helped Built The Atomic Bomb
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 17, 2022
The Manhattan project that developed and built the world’s first atomic weapon employed some 130,000 people, of which only a small number of...
Natural Gas Extraction by Nuclear Explosion
Kaushik Patowary
May 12, 2022
In the late 1950s, the United States of America launched a new kind of nuclear program called Project Plowshare aimed at finding ways to bet...
The 100 Ton TNT Test
Kaushik Patowary
Oct 28, 2021
By the spring of 1945, the United States had completed building the world’s first nuclear device, nicknamed The Gadget . It was an implosion...
Zwentendorf, The Nuclear Power Plant That Was Never Turned On
Kaushik Patowary
Apr 6, 2021
The Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant, located on the bank of the Danube River, about 20 miles northwest of Vienna, is Austria’s only nuclear ...
Guarapari’s Radioactive Beaches
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 17, 2021
About 50 km south of Vitória, the state capital of EspÃrito Santo, in southeastern Brazil, lies the coastal town of Guarapari, a popular tou...
The Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 1, 2021
The 1950s were exciting times. There was much enthusiasm and optimism around the use of atomic energy, which was seen as the solution to all...
The Huron King Nuclear Test
Kaushik Patowary
Oct 6, 2020
The Nevada Test Site in Nye County, Nevada, about 65 miles northwest of the city of Las Vegas, is scattered with relics from the United Stat...
The Uranium Cubes From a Nazi Nuclear Reactor
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 31, 2020
In the summer of 2013, Physicist Timothy Koeth of University of Maryland received an unexpected gift from one of his friends. It was a small...
Turning Night Into Day: Nuclear Explosions in Space
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 23, 2020
On August 1, 1958, a few minutes before midnight, an intense flash of white light tore across the night sky illuminating everything it touch...
That Time When The US Almost Blew Up North Carolina
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 18, 2020
During the 1950s and 60s, the United States suffered a string of mishaps with nuclear weapons. From lost nukes to accidentally dropping bomb...
Cosmos 954: The Nuke That Fell From Space
Kaushik Patowary
May 1, 2020
What goes up must eventually come down, including satellites that are currently orbiting the earth. After their work is done, they will be...
Where is Ground Zero in Nagasaki?
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 24, 2020
On the morning of August 9, 1945, six B29 bombers took off from Mariana Islands, located more than 2,100 kilometers north of Tokyo. One of t...
Anatoli Bugorski: The Man Who Stuck His Head Inside a Particle Accelerator
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 14, 2020
Out of all places to stick your head into, a particle accelerator would rank among the worst. Yet, on that fateful day of 13 July 1978, thir...
The Radiological Incident in Lia, Georgia
Kaushik Patowary
Jan 10, 2020
On a cold December day in 2001, three men took their truck and drove 50 kilometers east from their village Lia in order to collect firewood....
