DEMON CORE

[COSMO]

An interesting little history story...

The Demon Core

     So on this Tuesday afternoon in May, Slotin was working in the 49 room of the secret Omega Site laboratory, testing a new core geometry and demonstrating procedures to his replacement. The 6 Kg sphere of bomb grade Plutonium was surrounded by two half spheres of Beryllium, which was a neutron reflector. The Beryllium covering would bounce stray neutrons back into the Plutonium core, and thus increase the strength of the chain reaction. The Be cladding was divided into two half spheres, and Slotin was gradually lowering the top half sphere closer and closer to the core cradled in the bottom half-sphere of Beryllium. As the two halves got closer, more radiation was released and the chain reaction approached full criticality.

       Author Martin Zeilig describes what happed next, at 3:20 P.M. on Tuesday afternoon 21 May 1946:

       "Then, in that fatal moment, the screwdriver slipped. The halves of the beryllium sphere clapped together, and the Plutonium went supercritical...It happened in an instant. A sudden blue glow momentarily enveloped the room before evaporating. In that moment, as the Geiger counters clicked wildly...



Check out the link to find out what happened!

http://talesfromthenuclearage.wordpress.com/2009/11/26/the-demon-core/

So...BERYLLIUM as a neutron reflector...

Cosmo

[Fruitbat]

I can't help but notice that the demon core only gained it's reputation for evil when it killed a couple of scientists, whereas it's whole reason for existing, that of killing tens of thousands of people in the blink of an eye, didn't make it evil in their eyes...

And these are the smarter examples of the human race!

No wonder the frigging aliens reputedly don't want us to go off planet..

FB.