The Atomic Age

1905
Albert Einstein developed a theory about the relationship of mass and energy. The formula, E=mc[2], is clearly the most famous outcome from Einstein's special theory of relativity.

December 1938
Enrico Fermi became the first physicist to split the atom. His research pioneered the nuclear age.

August 1939
Physicist Albert Einstein sends a letter to U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, warning him that German researchers are working on an atomic bomb. Roosevelt forms a special committee to consider the military implications of atomic research.

September 1942
The Manhattan Project was formed to secretly build the atomic bomb before the Germans. The Army appointed General Leslie Groves, the engineer responsible for building the Pentagon, to head the effort. At first, the research took place at several university laboratories.

December 1942
Enrico Fermi demonstrated the first nuclear chain reaction in a lab under the squash court at the University of Chicago. In a nuclear chain reaction, a neutron splits one uranium atom into two smaller atoms, which in turn release energy and neutrons; these neutrons split other uranium atoms, releasing more energy and neutrons.

July 1945
The United States exploded the first atomic device at a site near Alamogordo, New Mexico. At 5:30 am, July 16, 1945, scientists from Los Alamos, watching from observation bunkers 10,000 yards away, exploded an atomic device with a plutonium core, releasing a blast equivalent to 18,600 tons of TNT.

August 1945
The United States drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. On August 6, 1945, a B-29 bomber--the Enola Gay--released a 9,700-pound uranium bomb, nicknamed Little Boy, over the city of Hiroshima in southern Japan. On August 9, another B-29 bomber--Bock's Car--headed to bomb Kokura Arsenal; however, the pilot switched to his secondary target, Nagasaki, because of the weather over Kokura. Nagasaki was the home of a Mitsubishi torpedo manufacturing plant. Bock's Car dropped a 10,000-pound plutonium bomb, nicknamed Fat Man, over the slopes of Nagasaki. Fat Man killed 40,000, injured 60,000, and destroyed three square miles of the city.

August 1949
The Soviet Union detonated its first atomic device on August 29, 1949. The event surprised American nuclear scientists--who hadn't expected it so soon--and shook the American public's sense of security.

December 1949
The United States now has 200 A-bombs in its arsenal.

October 1952
England becomes the third nuclear power when it tests an Atomic bomb code named Hurricane at Monte Bello Islands, West Australia.

November 1952
The United States tests its first hydrogen bomb on Elugelap island. The bast was equal to 10.4 megatons, 700 times the power of Little Boy.

January 1954
The first nuclear submarine, U.S.S. Nautilus, was launched at Groton, Connecticut on.

December 1958
Atlas rocket developed using stainless steel tank for liquid oxygen + kerosene. The Atlas rocket would become the first Intercontinental Ballistic Missile armed with nuclear weapons.

Februray 1960
France joins the atomic club by testing a device in the Sahara desert, a plutonium implosion bomb.

October 1961
The Soviet Union detonates a nuclear device, estimated at 58 megatons, the equivalent of more than 50 million tons of TNT, or more than all the explosives used during World War II. It remains the largest nuclear weapon the world had ever seen.

October 1962
The Soviet Union ships nuclear missiles to Cuba. Upon discovery of the missiles, the United States demands they be removed. For two weeks, the world is thrust to the brink of nuclear war, until Moscow agrees to remove the missiles.

October 1964
The People's Republic of China explodes its first nuclear bomb.

May 1974
India detonates its first nuclear device, a 10-to-15 kiloton bomb, under the Rajasthan desert.

April 1986
A meltdown and fire occur at the Chernobyl Nuclear Reactor in the Soviet Ukraine. Massive quantities of radioactive materials are released, affecting much of Europe.

March 1993
South Africa confirms in the late 1980's it manufactured a total of 6 nuclear bombs.

August 1995
The "Jason report" proposes that nuclear tests can be conducted on computers without the need of nuclear explosions.

October 1995
The U.S. nuclear warhead stockpile totals 9000: 7000 in the continental U.S.; 480 in Europe; 1500 with submarines.

May 1998
India conducts five underground nuclear tests. Pakistan responds with its own series of nuclear tests, several days later.

August 2000
The giant Russian nuclear submarine Kursk -- carrying a crew of 118 -- sank in the icy waters of the Barents Sea after what Russian officials described as a "catastrophe that developed at lightning speed." More than a week later divers opened the rear hatch of the sub but found no survivors.

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