The Trinity site and the Manhattan Project

Manhattan Project

Whether due to a morbid self-satisfaction, naivete, or sheer stupidity, the members of the Manhattan Project reveled with "elation" and "jubilation" at the sight of the mushroom cloud (Department of Energy). The Trinity Site, located in a remote part of New Mexico, was believed to be far enough from the civilian population to guard against fallout, but local ranchers lived only 20 miles away. Official reports indicate that civilians suffered "little external injury," but that their "livestock were not as fortunate, suffering skin burns, bleeding, and loss of hair," (DOE). Stafford Warren, the project's chief medical officer, would later recommend that future tests be conducted within no less than 150 miles from human population and claimed that the Trinity nuclear tests had been near-misses (DOE).

The Trinity site is known as the birthplace of the nuclear age. In fact, the nuclear age was born several years earlier when the Manhattan Project began in 1939. The world's top scientists including Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, Neils Bohr, and Enrico Fermi participated on the project for the planning and design of the world's first nuclear weapons. Einstein and other European scientists had urged the American government to develop a nuclear weapon before Hitler did, as rumors that a German scientist had successfully split the atom gave rise to widespread fears of a Nazi detonation.

Fission experiments took place at some 40 laboratories and factories throughout the United States, involving as many as 20,000 people in spite of the fact that the Manhattan Project was kept secret ("The Manhattan Project"). Even maintenance crew were unaware of the project. Once the fission process had been mastered and the government acquired a source of plutonium and uranium, the Trinity Site was selected for testing the bomb. Robert Oppenheimer named the site, which was located on an area of the White Sands Proving Ground called the Alamogordo Bombing Range. The specific spot designated for the Trinity test was aptly named Jornada del Muerto by early Spanish explorers: "Journey of Death." The Trinity site is located 210 miles south of the Los Alamos laboratories.

Several Manhattan Project scientists did not believe the nuclear chain reaction would even succeed: even during countdown some of the project's scientists remained doubtful anything would happen (DOE). Three days before the scheduled test, the plutonium core was taken to the Trinity site in an Army vehicle separately from the non-nuclear components of the bomb. Contingencies were made for the storage and disposal of the plutonium if the chain reaction failed. The McDonald Ranch house was selected as the assembly area for the bomb, as the early 20th-century ranch was conveniently located about two miles from the test site.

On the 15th of July, 1945, less than 24 hours before the scheduled test, the world's first nuclear bomb was assembled and hoisted on a 100-foot high firing tower in the pouring rain (DOE). Rain delayed the test by just over an hour, and team scientists made playful bets about whether or not the bomb would actually detonate (DOE). When the Trinity bomb was finally tested, imploded at 5:30 AM on April 15, 1945, the Project had arranged three observation bunkers only 10,000 yards away from Ground Zero. Observation teams watched for patterns of explosion: at the time no one knew what the explosion would look like and had yet to see a mushroom cloud. The scientists observing the implosion included the Manhattan Project's top scientists: Oppenheimer and Fermi. They watched for the symmetry of the explosion, the amount of energy it released, and the behavior of the ensuing fireball (DOE). Radioactivity and its dangers were already well-known.

The Army stood guard, "ready to evacuate the people in surrounding areas" in case the implosion were larger than expected (DOE). However, no warning was offered to the ranchers who lived 20 to 30 miles from the test site or to the residents of nearby towns in New Mexico. An official Manhattan Project medical group known as TR-7 arranged on-site and off-site monitoring for radiation. On site, a team of medical doctors and expert radiation monitors tested the ground at the base camp and on all roads leading to Ground Zero, also providing personnel present with protective clothing when necessary and patrolling the area surrounding Ground Zero and toward the test posts. Personnel were also systematically tested for radiation and monitored for signs of radiation exposure.

After the bomb was set off, radioactive dust from the mushroom cloud shifted northeast, forcing an emergency evacuation of the North observation center. Several other Guard Posts were evacuated too, from concerns over radiation. Nearby New Mexican towns including Nogal, Roswell, Fort Sumner, and Socorro were believed not to be in any danger since the dust from the cloud drifted only northeast. Official tests reveal, however, that "Significant fallout from the TRINITY cloud did not reach the ground within about 20 kilometers northeast of ground zero. From this point, the fallout pattern extended out 160 kilometers and was 48 kilometers wide," ("Radiation Protection at Project Trinity"). Chief medial officer for the Manhattan Project Stafford Warren would later note that the radiation dust posed "a very dangerous hazard over a band almost 30 miles wide extending almost 90 miles northeast of the site," (DOE). After the bomb imploded, the launch tower was vaporized, the asphalt around it turned to "green sand," (DOE). Half a mile a way, a 200-ton steel container was blown open, and all the windows of the George McDonald ranch house were shattered: two miles from Ground Zero. The ranch house fell into disarray in the aftermath of the nuclear test but not due to radiation but to weather. In 1984 the McDonald ranch was partially restored as part of the Trinity site historical area.

In 1975, all 51,500-acres of the Trinity test site was declared a national historic landmark. Currently a lone obelisk marks Ground Zero, an appropriately star reminder of the awesome power of nuclear detonation. Such secrecy surrounded the Manhattan Project that workmen on the Trinity site remained in the dark until after the test. Project members referred to the bomb lightly as "the gadget," again underscoring their childlike innocence about the repercussions of nuclear fallout. Small bits of trinitite, an eponymous green, glass-like mineral created by the extreme heat of the blast, can still be found on site (Walton). Base camp, which was located ten miles from Ground Zero, no longer exists.

Now known as the White Sands Missile Range, the Proving Ground and the Alamogordo Bombing Range "has been largely given over to its original inhabitants: the jackrabbits, pronghorn antelope and mule deer" (Walton). The range is open to tourists and to hunters several times a year. Although not used for active missile testing, the White Sands Range and the historical preserve of the Trinity Site are evacuated periodically when missile tests are being conducted. Tourists are told that risk of radiation exposure is minimal and far less than that experienced when flying in a commercial jet: "one hour at the site means exposure to.5 to 1 milliroentgens of radiation, compared to 3-5 milliroentgens normally experienced in a coast-to-coast airline flight," (Walton).