"BALL OF FIRE" BLAST

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21933, 30 January 1946, Page 5

"BALL OF FIRE" BLAST

ATOMIC BOMBS EXPERTS’ VISION VAST HEAT & WIND COMING SEA TESTS (10 a.m.) NEW YORK, Jan. 29. American Navy and Army scientists predict that a wind, ranging' in velocity from 500 to 1000 miles an hour, an explosion temperature of 100,000,000 deg. Fahrenheit and waves 100 ft. high will follow the dropping of atomic bombs on the target fleet in the Pacific in May. They are confident, however, that there is not even a remote possibility of any chain of reaction which would affect faraway areas. The test will take place in May and Julv at the anchorage at Bikini atoll, in the Marshall Group. , The predictions of colossal disturoances have been made as a result of information obtained from studies made of the bombs dropped in New Mexico Desert, on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It has not been indicated that the new type bomb will be used, though Admiral Chester Nimitz stated there would be an opportunity during the exercises to try any new weapons. General MacArthur is reported to have stated that the United States possessed a bomb one thousand times more powerful than that dropped on Japan. Scientists’ Predictions Scientists engaged on the preparation of data for the tests expect that, following in the wake of the explosion there will be a true wind ranging in velocity from 500 to 1000 miles an hour, though it is likely to be of short duration. A wind of 75 miles an hour is normally considered hurricane force. The fantastic temperature of 100,000,-

000 degrees Fahrenheit is expected to occur in the initial “ball of fire,” and to drop sharply as the heat waves move outward. While no after-effects are expected from the bomb to be exploded above the water, precautions are being taken against radio-activity from the bomb to be detonated on the surface. The inhabitants of nearby islands will be evacuated to protect them against possible harm from radio-active water and clouds drifting from the scene of the explosions. Tremendous Down Pressure The scientists expect the target ships will have to withstand a tremendous downward pressure. They say that at Hiroshima and Nagasaki the walls of some buildings directly under the burst were left standing, but the roofs and floors were crushed into the ground. The steel-frame structure of the Mitsubishi torpedo works at Nagasaki was collapsed by the pressure. Dr. Clement Henshaw, of the Colgate University’s physics department, reported that tests made on unexposed film indicated that two small pieces of fused earth from the atom bomb crater in New Mexico were still radio-active six months.after the experimental ex-, plosion.