Manhattan Project Essay

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The Manhattan Project
At 5:30 AM July 16th 1945, the nuclear age had started. The world’s first atomic bomb was detonated. On August 6th 1942 at 8:15 AM, an American B-29 bomber, the Enola Gay, dropped a perfected atomic bomb created by the Americans, over the city of Hiroshima hoping to end the war. Thousands of people died in the two cities in Japan. They were Hiroshima and Nagasaki “the Manhattan Project”. The research and development project that produced these atomic bombs during this time was known as “the Manhattan Project”. Atomic bombs were the first nuclear weapons to be developed, tested, and used. In the late 1930s physicists in Europe and the United States realized that the fission of uranium could be used to create an extremely …show more content…

President Harry Truman made the decision to use these weapons against Japan. The American scientist needed a way to test their bomb. The first ever atomic bomb was really called Trinity. The detonation happened July 16th 1945. It was a test detonation in the Trinity site, or White Sands Proving Ground in New Mexico. This test bomb was created and built in the Jornada del Muerto desert about 35 miles southeast of Socorro, New Mexico, at the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery …show more content…

This bomb was dropped by a B-29 bomber called “Enola Gay” The first atomic bomb was to be used as a weapon. "Little Boy” was its codename, was dropped on to the flat terrain of Hiroshima .The bomb vaporized buildings and killed thousands of people. The bomb was detonated 580 meters over central Hiroshima at 8:15 AM local time with a yield estimated at 15 kilotons. The airburst height was selected to maximize the extent of prompt effects and to minimize residual radiation fallout. Individuals at ground zero received combined gamma and neutron doses of perhaps 80,000 rad, which is used to measure radiation. Although the flash and blast would have been immediately fatal, the thermal flash produced fires which merged into a fire like storm, razing much of the city. The Flash, blast, and prompt radiation killed most people within 0.8 miles of ground

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