2 interview questions 1 from Jim Williams, the other Bob Pease

The "friendly" bets from destroying New Mexico, atmospheric ignition, and so forth, were all speculation. No one would have collected on any of those bets, especially those within a few miles of the blast site. We certainly would have been here to argue about it.

There were things to learn with each detonation. I wonder what was said about the early days of black powder ... and it's destructive ability.

What about Alfred Nobel's experimentation with TNT?

And yet they did it.

Of course if Alfred Nobel were alive today, the elegance of his formula would be enough to convenience the planet to not use TNT ... not really. He would have to do it, it's part of the Scientific Method.

Richard Rhodes wrote the definitive history of the Atomic Bomb titled "Making of the Atomic Bomb"

JoeJester said:

The "friendly" bets from destroying New Mexico, atmospheric ignition, and so forth, were all speculation. No one would have collected on any of those bets, especially those within a few miles of the blast site. We certainly would have been here to argue about it.

There were things to learn with each detonation. I wonder what was said about the early days of black powder ... and it's destructive ability.

What about Alfred Nobel's experimentation with TNT?

And yet they did it.

Of course if Alfred Nobel were alive today, the elegance of his formula would be enough to convenience the planet to not use TNT ... not really. He would have to do it, it's part of the Scientific Method.

Richard Rhodes wrote the definitive history of the Atomic Bomb titled "Making of the Atomic Bomb"

Click to expand...

My point was the people who were sure the atmosphere was going to ignite (and incinerate the surface of the earth) could never have collected because we would all have been dead. So they made a bet where if they were wrong they had to pay and if they were right they could never collect. Dumb bet because no way to win.

The 'model' response to my interview question was:

It was an ill founded fear that the hydrogen in the upper atmosphere would be ignited by a rocket exhaust because if there were a flammable layer of gas it would be ignited pretty much all the time by hot objects entering the upper layers of the earths atmosphere from space, not to mention sparks caused by electrical discharge. Also for ignition oxygen is required and there would be insufficient to support ignition of any hydrogen present. I doubt that any scientist actually feared igniting the upper atmosphere. It sounds more like journalistic sensationalism.

The next best answer was to ask what I meant.

The worst answer was; 'I didn't come here to discus atmospherics! It is not part of my job!'

Another discussion topic was. 'When Dick Turpin (Brit infamous highwayman) knew that he was going to be caught by the authorities and hung in the morning, he led his trusted horse, Black Bess, into the woods and shot her. He then dug a hole and buried her.'

Worst answer, 'So what!'

spec

JoeJester said:

Richard Rhodes wrote the definitive history of the Atomic Bomb titled "Making of the Atomic Bomb"

Click to expand...

Read that book JJ- as you say, fascinating story. I couldn't believe they built the first atomic pile in a big city. Quite a few of the scientists got killed by radiation due to accidents or just lack of safety measures. Quite different characters, Groves and Oppenheimer.

spec

spec said:

Read that book JJ- as you say, fascinating story. I couldn't believe they built the first atomic pile in a big city. Quite a few of the scientists got killed by radiation due to accidents or just lack of safety measures. Quite different characters, Groves and Oppenheimer.

spec

Click to expand...

From what I read, the pile almost went critical because they didn't know what they were doing. As for dead scientists: I saw some old film of a guy coming out to do something where they were setting up the first bomb and the guy was skinny, wobbly and all his hair had fallen out (classic radiation sickness). I suspect quite a few people got poisoned.

Marie Curie got dosed so bad it killed her. They say you can still go to her lab today and the doorknobs and stuff still light up gieger counters.

bountyhunter said:

From what I read, the pile almost went critical because they didn't know what they were doing. As for dead scientists: I saw some old film of a guy coming out to do something where they were setting up the first bomb and the guy was skinny, wobbly and all his hair had fallen out (classic radiation sickness). I suspect quite a few people got poisoned.

Marie Curie got dosed so bad it killed her. They say you can still go to her lab today and the doorknobs and stuff still light up gieger counters.

Click to expand...

And after visiting the lab you may light up too...

I can imagine the list of scientist who payed the ultimate price in the name of science is quite large. The one that immediatly come to my mind is the wife of the guy who invented the X-Ray machine.

bountyhunter said:

classic radiation sickness

Click to expand...

True for those of us who followed. The trail blazers will always suffer so those that follow have a better understanding.

In some cases, generational history, the followers simply can't imagine some things happen ... i.e. Madame Curie's irradiation, the atomic bomb scientists irradiation, almost letting the Chicago pile go critical. I'm sure "going critical" wasn't in the vernacular at that moment, but was added after they changed their underwear.

Rumor has it that Admiral Rickover would take a new group of nuclear officers to a small reactor, inject a problem, and told the new officers to fix it before it went critical.

Another horror story I remember being taught in school was on an early military nuclear pile. It used the usual rods to control the reactor and had liquid sodium for cooling. One of the rods was kind of sticky and as the guy tried to pull it out, it stuck and he pulled and it came out a little too far and the pile instantly superheated the liquid sodium and it blew the rod he was holding straight through him and he was impaled on it. He didn't die immediately. The part I remember most clearly was that he was so radioactive that they had to dissect him into a bunch of small pieces and bury them far apart.

JoeJester said:

Rumor has it that Admiral Rickover would take a new group of nuclear officers to a small reactor, inject a problem, and told the new officers to fix it before it went critical.

Click to expand...

Now that's an interview question that will definitely find how you can do under stress....

JoeJester said:

There were things to learn with each detonation. I wonder what was said about the early days of black powder ... and it's destructive ability.

Click to expand...

But we were proud of the bomb back in the days after WW2. I grew up in the 50's in Shreveport.La next to Barksdale AFB where the SAC command was based that flew the surveillance patrols out of Turkey that constantly kept the Soviet Union at risk. There were B-52's in the air every second near the Soviet borders loaded with enough live H bombs to vaporize most of Russia. With that much usage, the planes were constantly being rotated home for service. If you ever wonder why Krushchev caved in and backed down on Cuba, that's why. We would have turned them into a cinder.

I still remember the big decal that you put on the driver's side window that let you get onto the base showed a picture of an atom, the nucleus with electrons around it. They wanted the russians to know what we had there, nobody tried to hide it. It was the deterrent that kept WW3 from going off.

I also remember getting a pack of "baseball cards" except the backs of the cards had color photos of all the hydrogen bomb test explosions. Kind of beautiful as art.

bountyhunter said:

Another horror story I remember being taught in school was on an early military nuclear pile. It used the usual rods to control the reactor and had liquid sodium for cooling. One of the rods was kind of sticky and as the guy tried to pull it out, it stuck and he pulled and it came out a little too far and the pile instantly superheated the liquid sodium and it blew the rod he was holding straight through him and he was impaled on it. He didn't die immediately. The part I remember most clearly was that he was so radioactive that they had to dissect him into a bunch of small pieces and bury them far apart.

Click to expand...

That would be this one https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SL-1
All the criticallity accidents are quite horrifying when you realize how dangerously close they were doing things like that day in day out in those times.
And actually it was a water cooled and moderated reactor, which I think made it happen so that it was supercritical only for a few miliseconds, instead of going off like the RBMK at Chernobyl.

Ratchit said:

To the Ineffable All,

I can only think of one way to measure tall structures with a yardstick, 100 ft cord, and 'scope. Go to the end of the structure's shadow. Place the o'scope at that point. Immediately, prop up the yardstick vertically and measure the lenth of its shadow. Measure the distance from the 'scope to the building with the yardstick and extension cord. Solve for the height of the structure by proportional triangles.

The balloon will go backwards because the deceleration will cause the weight of the air to have a forward component. Since a helium balloon travels in the opposite direction of the air weight, it will go backwards.

These two "problems", along the the R-cube are really puzzles. That means they are contrived problems with little or no practical use in the real world. If I were an employer, I would like to see whether someone could do a real world problem.

Ratch

Click to expand...

Yeah like fix the oscope that was dropped out the window to find the distance

Little Ghostman said:

Yeah like fix the oscope that was dropped out the window to find the distance

Click to expand...

I'm glad you quoted Ratchit, I didn't know he answered with Proportions.

Pay's to read the Thread posts. I withdraw my answer.

kv