Weapons Testing facts

While investigating facts about Weapons Testing Area and Weapons Testing Jobs, I found out little known, but curios details like:

Kodak discovered the US was testing atomic weapons due to problems appearing on their consumer film. Kodak was worried about their product and profits ultimately striking a deal with the US Government in order to get schedules and maps of future tests in exchange for Kodak's silence.

how is weapons grade plutonium made?

John Wayne likely died from cancer caused by radiation poisoning. 90 other cast and crew also developed cancers after shooting The Conqueror downwind from recent US government nuclear weapons tests.

What is the current global policy on testing nuclear weapons?

In my opinion, it is useful to put together a list of the most interesting details from trusted sources that I've come across answering what is testing of nuclear weapons. Here are 50 of the best facts about Weapons Testing Area Worlds Biggest Crossword and Weapons Testing Site Crossword I managed to collect.

what are the environmental effects of using testing nuclear weapons?

John Wayne died of stomach cancer, which is highly suggested to have been caused by filming downwind of a nuclear weapons test. Wayne refused to believe the fallout caused his cancer and instead attributed it to his smoking. However, 90 others from the movie also developed cancer after.
France has done more nuclear weapons testing than the UK, China, Pakistan, India and North Korea combined
During the 1950s, the U.S. military tested nuclear weapons so close to Las Vegas, that you could clearly see the mushroom clouds from downtown Hotels. This became a temporary tourist attraction.
During testing of The Legend of Zelda in 1986, the testers complained that the game was too confusing and that they kept getting lost. As a result of this, Shigeru Miyamoto decided to make the game even harder by starting off the player without a weapon.
The core of the first nuclear weapon was driven to the test range in the back seat of a scientist's car.
The United States tested nuclear weapons in Micronesia and used their population as live guinea pigs to study the effects of long-term radiation exposure.
Bikini Bottom lies below Bikini Atoll, a small island where the US did nuclear weapons testing. Hence the talking sponges and metal canisters for buildings.
The dating system "BP" (before present/before physics) starts in 1950, because nuclear weapons testing changed the carbon isotopes in the atmosphere, making dating after that time unreliable.
One of the weapons America would have used in the planned invasion of Japan was Little David, a 36" (914mm) mortar used to test aerial bombs. Converted into a mobile siege gun, it fired 3650 lb (1.6k kg) shells at a range of 6 miles, and would have been the largest calibre gun ever fielded.
In the mid-1950s, the US government secretly tested chemical weapons on the citizens of St Louis.

weapons testing facts — What is weapons testing?

Why countries try to limit the testing of nuclear weapons?

You can easily fact check why testing of nuclear weapons by examining the linked well-known sources.

During WWII, japanese opened a camp called unit 731 to develop biological weapons. They drove all kinds of horrible and inhuman experiments on war prisoners and Chinese civilians (Killing 10 000 and 400 000 while testing weapons). Americans gave them immunity in exchange of the results.

In 1968 over 6,000 sheep died in Utah after a mishap at a chemical weapons test range some 50 miles away. A cannister aboard a spray plane malfunctioned, dispersing the gas to a height of 1,400 ft instead of the intended 150 ft. - source

The inhabitants of Bikini Atoll were asked to move to a neighboring island, so the US could test a weapon "to end all World Wars". They agreed, and were moved to a smaller island with inadequate food and water, where they starved.

When did the us stop testing nuclear weapons?

Nuclear weapons testing artificially altered the proportion of the carbon isotopes in the atmosphere, making radiocarbon dating after 1945 likely to be unreliable.

How do you enrich uranium to weapons grade?

The US military conducted tests to investigate the use of nuclear weapons for mining, cratering, and other peaceful civilian purposes. The radioactive fallout from this test contaminated more US residents than any other nuclear test.

Newly declassified public records obtained via the Freedom of Information Act shed light on Utah’s Dugway Proving Ground military experiments. Tests involved human exposure to biological and chemical agents while others studied weaponized mosquitos released on civilian populations in the U.S.

Most of the signatory nations to the PNTBT do not have nuclear weapons programs.

Khan was later involved in a highly controversial atomic bomb project which originated in Pakistan. This project, which launched in 1971 and was allegedly in response to the testing of India's own nuclear weapon near the Pakistan border, spurred Khan to want to contribute to his country's defense efforts.

At the Nevada Test Site, about one third of the underground nuclear weapons detonations occured directly in aquifers, contaminating over 1.5 trillion gallons of water.

Interesting facts about weapons testing

The United States of America has nuked inside it's own borders at least 988 times. That's only slightly less than the number of nuclear weapon tests conduct by the rest of the world combined at ~1,011.

Thanks to all the nuclear weapons testing in the 40's to 60's, researchers can pinpoint the precise age of dead bodies, tissues within humans, or even individual cells, by measuring the amount of carbon-14 in them. This will no longer be possible after 2030.

During the Cold war, the US government tested biological weapons on housing project residents.

When "The Gadget" (the first nuclear weapon to be detonated; equivalent to 22 kilotons of TNT) was being hoisted to the top of the 100-ft tall test tower, "a truckload of mattresses was placed underneath in case the cable broke and the Gadget fell."

That, in 1956, a F11F-1 managed to shoot itself down while test firing his weapons.

How is weapons grade uranium made?

A certain Gandhi was indeed obsessed with nuclear weapons; Indira Gandhi was PM in 1974 when Smiling Buddha (first Indian nuclear test) occurred.

At the Operation Plumbbob atom bomb test in Nevada, USA, Alan Blunt and others were told, "turn around, put your weapons down...Turn your backs, cover your eyes and don't look." "The bomb went off and in the light" Alan "could actually see right through" his "hands and into another guy's body."

Roughly 2.4 million people could eventually die from cancer as a result of nuclear weapons testing

The Department of Energy is Responsible for the Design, Testing and Production of All U.S. Nuclear Weapons.

The 1956 movie "The Conqueror" was filmed near a nuclear weapons testing area and 40% of the crew members including John Wayne developed cancer.

In 2016 scientists recommended a new geological age to acknowledge the impact from the nuclear weapons tests in the 1950s and later.

Australia has a weapons & rockets test range that is bigger in land size than 21 individual US states

Tsujigiri, a samurai practice of testing a new weapon or fighting style by attacking another person, usually a random defenseless passer-by

US and NZ Military tested a 'Tsunami bomb' in 1944-45 - Analysis of the declassified documents suggested the weapon would be viable.

The word Downwinders. It refers to the individuals and communities who were exposed to radioactive contamination or nuclear fallout from atmospheric or underground nuclear weapons testing, and nuclear accidents.

Britain once placed a tank 500 yards away from a 9 kiloton tactical nuclear warhead during a weapons test. The tank survived with only minimal damage, and was eventually deployed to Vietnam.

The 1956 film The Conqueror staring John Wayne was filmed in Utah, about 137 miles downwind from the Nevada National Security Site. In 1953, eleven above ground nuclear weapons were tested at the sight and soil from the area was later used in Hollywood set shots for the film. It is believed that of the 220 cast and crew who worked on the film, ninety-one, including Wayne, contracted some form of cancer.

In 1979, Israel and South Africa, both of which were signatories to the PNTBT, may have violated the terms by conducting a nuclear weapon test in the South Pacific.

On the post STS-3 goodwill tour in Beijing, Commander Lousma displayed a photo of a beautiful emerald lake in China and was caught off guard by the audience's reaction. He later learned that the picture was likely of a secret atomic test site for the Chinese nuclear weapons program.

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