{"id":52980,"date":"2020-07-17T02:48:31","date_gmt":"2020-07-17T02:48:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/uncategorized\/2020\/07\/17\/anniversary-of-worlds-1st-atomic-test-fuels-nuclear-debate\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T08:13:24","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T08:13:24","slug":"anniversary-of-worlds-1st-atomic-test-fuels-nuclear-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/news\/2020\/07\/17\/anniversary-of-worlds-1st-atomic-test-fuels-nuclear-debate\/","title":{"rendered":"Anniversary of world\u2019s 1st atomic test fuels nuclear debate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. \u2014 Transported in the backseat of a blacked-out Plymouth sedan was the culmination of years of feverish work \u2014 a hefty plutonium core that would soon be used to trigger the world\u2019s first atomic explosion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Within days of being taken in 1945 from a top secret installation in the mountains of northern New Mexico to a desert outpost more than 200 miles away, the core and other components were assembled for what was code-named the Trinity test.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scientists weren\u2019t entirely sure whether the \u201cGadget\u201d would work as intended or if the explosion would ignite the Earth\u2019s atmosphere or maybe lead to the evaporation of the planet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They found out in the early morning hours of July 16, 1945.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The detonation forever changed the course of history, ensuring the end of World War II and marking the dawn of the atomic age. After 75 years<\/a>, the test is both revered for the scientific advancements it helped to usher in and vilified for the moral and diplomatic implications that still linger in its wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
A mockup of the “Gadget” that was detonated during the Trinity Test in 1945, marking the world’s first atomic explosion, is on display Wednesday, July 15, 2020, at the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History in Albuquerque, N.M. (Susan Montoya Bryan\/AP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Lisa Gordon-Hagerty, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, traveled to Los Alamos National Laboratory on Thursday to commemorate the anniversary. The lab is known as the birthplace of the atomic bomb \u2014 where Robert Oppenheimer and a disparate collection of physicists went about untangling the theoretical and practical challenges of what came to be known as the Manhattan Project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The immediacy of their work was fueled by word in the late 1930s that German chemists had discovered fission through their work with uranium and that the possibility of the Nazis setting up nuclear chain reactions had become more real and could lead to the construction of bombs. A group of scientists that included Albert Einstein pressed then-U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt about the importance of the United States getting the jump on Germany.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gordon-Hagerty, a self-described science and history geek, said she often has thought about what it would have been like to stand in Oppenheimer\u2019s shoes the morning of the Trinity test.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI look to the good of what happened 75 years ago,\u201d she told The Associated Press in an interview. \u201cIt has saved us from world wars. It has saved untold millions \u2014 perhaps billions \u2014 of lives over the past 75 years through its application in nuclear medicine and science. To me, that can\u2019t be glossed over.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For others, the atomic test in southern New Mexico and subsequent tests elsewhere have left a painful legacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From uranium miners, truck drivers and government workers to those living in communities near test sites, thousands were exposed over the years to radiation that resulted in cancer, birth defects and other illnesses.<\/p>\n\n\n\t