Posted on 06/29/2025 6:16:51 PM PDT by Az Joe
This harrowing incident on May 21, 1946, remains one of the most infamous accidents in the history of nuclear research, a fatal moment of human error and hubris known as the "demon core" incident.
First, though, he performed one last experiment, a criticality test on a 14-pound plutonium core, the same core previously involved in another fatal accident just months earlier.
Dubbed “tickling the dragon’s tail” by those who understood the danger, the experiment involved delicately bringing two beryllium hemispheres close around the core to observe neutron reflection, edging the core toward critical mass without tipping it over.
This guy’s Momma never told him not to play with plutonium…
Such a brilliant man killed by an act of stupidity. What was he thinking, using a flathead screwdriver to keep the core halves separated?
It appears the article refutes that assertion.
Maybe: Louis Slotin a bullheaded, situational moron from backward yokel Canaduh....
One of the few, who actually died of radiation.
Radiation is actually quite safe, but Slotin got like 10 Sv.
Definitely too much. But his colleagues, who were just few feet away all survived.
Unfortunately, few accidents like this generate the anti-radiation hysteria, we are all experiencing.
A lot more people die falling from ladders every year than all people died of radiation, ever!
This is the origin of the expression “FAFO”.
But I read it with fascinated horror, as it described the utter breakdown of his cells, skin, blood, heart, etc., as a result of the powerful blast of gamma rays and neutrons. The blue flash was also mentioned, but I thought the blue flash was in the air; I didn't realize it's source was Cherenkov radiation within his eyeballs.
Also in that book was the story of George Franklin Smith, who was the first man to eject from an airplane going faster than the speed of sound (an F-100 Super Saber) in 1955.
Another story in the book was about the search for the cause of Hodgkin's disease, which was described as "cancer of the blood." I thought this was amazing and frightful, and I wanted to work on medical research as a result of reading the book.
https://resource.rockarch.org/story/the-atomic-bomb-development-rockefeller-foundation-role/
https://dimes.rockarch.org/objects/dnSnsjCMYKjdLLZyE6cDTe/view holds over 1000 pages reporting on their activities between 1947 and 1950 a person can view on line.
I suspect there are videos floating about on YouTube that depict a simulated version of what that plutonium incident looked and sounded like. There was so much the world didn’t know about radiation until later in the 20th Century.
This horrible tale is almost as horrible as when I read about
The Philadelphia Experiment of 1943. Most now say the worst stories are a hoax. The conjecture that sailors absorbed so much radiation that their bodies began the process of dissolving and then fusing with the surfaces of their ship.
I read about it, and later heard about it on several Art Bell radio shows. Jury is still out.
I am getting pretty old now myself and I don’t know how much longer The. Almighty will allow me.
Somebody needs to check this out.
In 1983 I was working at Downey, CA on classified programs.
I was chatting with one of our North American veterans who was way past retirement age but still working.
He suddenly commented, “I am the last one alive. I need to tell someone “.
What?
He told the story:
“In 1949 we had a small reactor which was funded by military. Suddenly, they cut the funding. Management told us to get rid of it. Of course, the project was classified so few knew it existed. We took the reactor out on a Saturday night, dug a hole under the runway and covered it with concrete”.
This was at the old Rockwell North American plant in Downey. They used to fly out the aircraft they built there in WWII. It is at the corner of Lakewood and Stewart&Gray if I remember correctly.
The runway was in the middle and ran diagonal.
I heard they turned it into a car lot.
Somebody needs to find that reactor before it hits the ground water.
You will not find this incident in history books or on the internet. I suspect I am the only one alive who knows the story.
Truly
Interesting
“There was so much the world didn’t know about radiation until later in the 20th Century.”
This core was destined for the third bomb to be dropped on Japan.
He was the top bomb assembler in the world.
He knew the danger. He was know for his disregard of danger. This was about his twelfth time doing this experiment.
Having found out about his methods, Fermi said he would be dead in less than a year.
Yep!
Fascinating stuff
Are you counting Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
“Somebody needs to find that reactor before it hits the ground water.
You will not find this incident in history books or on the internet. I suspect I am the only one alive who knows the story.”
LOL!
You waited 42 years to warn us?
My dad hired many brilliant theoretical physicists, scientists and engineers for very tough, advanced technical project. He always told me “Son, these people are brilliant, but they don’t know which end of the hammer to pick up.”
His brother, a PhD Mechanical Engineer, machined plutonium cores at Los Alamos National Lab in the early 50s. He was 98 or 99 years old when I was talking to him about his work there. I asked him about some machining tolerances and he stopped talking, went quiet for almost a minute, and finally said “I can’t tell you that. It’s classified.”
He was a hoser, eh?
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