All language subtitles for A-Bombs Over Nevada.en

Las Vegas in the 1950's.

This small desert town of 50,000

is just starting
to gain attention

for its mafia-run
gambling casinos

and glittering nightlife.

But for many,
the real attraction

is a very different
kind of light show.

For nearly a decade,

Cold War scientists set off
a series of nuclear bombs

just 65 miles from Vegas,

in a quest for bigger
and more destructive weapons.

It is a place where you can
have a nuclear bomb go off,

and you can have the media crush

that turns it into
kind of a circus atmosphere.

It was big entertainment.

If everything
goes according to plan,

we'll soon see
the largest explosion

ever set off
on the face of the earth.

It was the nation's
grand atomic experiment.

You are here to participate
in an atomic maneuver.

Complete with
its own subculture

that spawned beauty queens

and radioactive superheroes.

You adapt to it,

you make it familiar,
you make it funny,

and then it's not so scary.

Along with
mind-blowing images

of doom towns being annihilated
by nuclear fire storms.

Welcome to Nevada.

The
atomic weapon of which Churchill

spoke is tested...

A hazard unique to nuclear warfare

is radioactive fallout...

Unseen, unheard, and odorless,

this substance can only be...

We bring you a report

on the atomic explosion
being tested.

We take you now
to the Yucca Flats of Nevada

for operation doorstep.

This is Walter Cronkite

on the Yucca Flats,

some 75 miles north
of Las Vegas, Nevada.

For the first time, we will be
able to report such an explosion

seven miles
due north of us here,

on the Yucca Flats.

And, incidentally, too,
this time,

perhaps not so incidentally
for the men concerned,

some thousand troops
will be in trenches,

closer than man has ever
been before, intentionally,

to the explosion
of an atomic device.

March 17, 1953.

It's been eight years

since two atomic bombs
devastated Japan

and put an end to world war ii.

Now the explosive power
of nuclear destruction

is about to be beamed live
from the Nevada desert

to television audiences
across the United States.

In the trenches,

about two miles
from the blast site,

is a group of soldiers,
technicians, and even reporters,

positioned much closer
than anyone else that day.

Ernie Williams, an administrator
at the test site,

is a veteran of more
than 50 atomic tests

and knows well the experience
of being inside these trenches.

I knew that
the gamma rays, the x-rays,

and neutrons were gonna
come through.

I knew that the shock wave was
gonna be probably pretty rough.

I guess I have to say
I was a gutsy guy.

I, I wanted to know
what it was to be like.

Out there,

some seven miles
north of us here,

on a tower 300 feet high,

an atomic device of some
15,000 tons dynamite equivalent

will be exploded
at 5:20 our time.

That's 2 minutes
and 20 seconds from now.

Besides the national
television and radio audience,

hundreds of people
were at the site that day

to watch
the 16-kiloton bomb detonate.

The Cold War
with the Soviet Union

is in full swing.

The race is on to build
bigger and better bombs.

Let's face it,

the threat
of nuclear bomb warfare

is the greatest danger
our nation has ever known.

Enemy jet bombers
carrying nuclear weapons

can sweep over
a variety of routes

and drop bombs
on any important target

in the United States.

It is essential that no country

gain ascendancy
over the United States

in the development, manufacture,

and tactical use
of atomic weapons.

In this desolate desert,

miles from anything,

the atomic energy commission,
the A.E.C.,

gives the press a ringside seat.

It wants to show the world
exactly what it can do.

There is a place
out at the site well known

called news nob,

which was just
a series of bleachers

that had a very good view

of both Frenchman Flat
and Yucca Flats,

where most of the experiments
were done.

And you would have
a lot of the big names...

From ABC, NBC, and CBS.

This was part of
that PR effort by the A.E.C.

They wanted to let people know
that they could be safe,

that we had this weapon,

we could win this Cold War.

You are here to participate
in an atomic maneuver.

Atomic weapons
are truly powerful,

but they don't mean
the end of all life,

as so many people think.

You can live through
an atomic attack.

And by taking
common-sense precautions,

live to fight another day.

H minus 10 seconds.

Then you hear the countdown.

You hear the 9, 8, 7, 6...

5, 4, 3...

2, 1...

Zero!

And at the time of zero,
an extreme bright light comes,

and I mean
extremely bright light.

Probably 10 times brighter
than what the sun is.

Just lights up everything.

At 4:30 in the morning

you can see the mountains
eight miles away,

and they're just as bright
as, as the daylight.

Seconds after detonation,

those closest to the blast

must steel themselves
for what comes next:

A shock wave in the air

that can travel faster

than even the most destructive
winds of a hurricane.

Shock wave
travels, on the average,

a mile every five
to seven seconds.

So when you're in a trench
at a mile and a quarter,

you've got roughly
between eight and ten seconds.

After that, it's too late.

You better be ready.

So I just buckled my knees

and got my head down below
the surface of the ground,

because I knew if I didn't,
I was gonna eat a lot of dirt.

The shock wave
went over the top of us.

My guess is it's probably
in excess of 500 miles an hour.

And that's, that's pretty rough.

But how did
this patch of land

65 miles from Las Vegas

become America's
atomic ground zero?

Even though the war was over,

the American military
wanted to maintain dominance

with atomic weapons.

To create an effective arsenal,

the United States needed to
build and test more weapons.

The nation's nuclear program

had been developed

in Los Alamos, New Mexico,

but after the war,

the government wanted
to test bigger bombs

in a more remote location.

So testing was moved
to the Bikini Atoll

nearly 5,000 miles

from the west coast
of the United States.

During the war,

the world had seen

what an atomic bomb
could do to a city.

Now the government
wanted to know

how our military infrastructure

would withstand
a possible nuclear blast.

One test involved dozens
of decommissioned warships.

We are seeking
primarily to learn

what types of ships,
tactical formations,

and strategic dispositions
of our own naval forces

will best survive attack
by atomic weapons

should we ever
have to face them.

On July 26, 1946,

a nuclear bomb was anchored

90 feet below
the surface of the water.

If everything goes
according to plan,

we'll soon see
the largest explosion

ever set off
on the face of the earth.

While this device
was just a little bigger

than the bomb
dropped on Nagasaki,

because it was placed beneath
the surface of the waves,

the result was nothing
like anyone had ever seen.

But the Bikini Atoll
was far from home,

and the distance made
logistics difficult.

This led the government to begin
secretly searching for a site

to detonate smaller bombs
in the continental U.S.

The secrecy
about the program itself is

that we didn't want
our adversaries to know

what we were doing.

The more we could
keep them in the dark,

the better off we were

to try and have an edge
on the competition.

The government
launched project nutmeg

to determine if nuclear weapons
could be safely tested

in the United States.

Its conclusions:

If the weather was right and
the site was properly monitored,

atomic blasts in the atmosphere

would not cause damage
to property or population.

The only problem was,

no one knew just how big
the bombs tested would be,

or how much radiation
they would spread.

They looked
at various places,

including up in Alaska
and northern Utah.

They looked at the outer banks
of the carolinas,

mainly because of
the wind conditions out there.

They felt any radioactivity
would be blown out to the sea.

But then they realized

the population centers
were just too much

to even consider that area.

In 1949,

without a clear consensus
on where to go,

the atomic energy commission

shelved all plans for
the testing of nuclear weapons

in the United States.

The only exception would be if
there was a national emergency.

A few weeks later,

the Soviet Union exploded
its first nuclear bomb...

Setting the world on a path...

Towards an atomic showdown.

In September 1949,

the United States
believed the Soviet Union

was at least five years away

from duplicating the most
destructive force on earth...

The atomic bomb.

The United States was wrong.

The Soviet detonation

was followed by the communist
government of Mao Zedong

taking over China
in the fall of 1949.

Six months later,

north Korean troops stormed
the 38th parallel,

starting the Korean War.

Fear of all-out war between
the superpowers was rife,

and the United States wanted to
be sure it had the upper hand.

It was what was called
"Mutually Assured Destruction,"

and that was the policy

that both countries lived by

to prevent the world

from erupting
into a nuclear catastrophe.

And the reason was,

if we had all these bombs that
could wipe out civilization,

nobody would have any incentive
to try and really set one off.

The race was on
to build bigger atomic bombs.

The question was
where to test them...

some place even farther away
from civilization

than Los Alamos, New Mexico,

where the bomb was developed
during the war.

So, our need is pressing
for a nearby test site,

a place where nuclear tests
can be made frequently, quickly,

and more economically.

And, thus,
the Nevada test site was set up

for the first in a series
of continental tests

that are part of our
continuing atomic program.

The Nevada site
was 1,300 square miles...

larger than
the state of Rhode Island.

The Southern section
had good logistics.

It was 25 miles

from the Indian Springs
air force base.

Las Vegas,
then a small town of 50,000,

was 65 miles away,

meaning access
to a growing labor force.

A major state highway
was only seven miles away.

And other than Las Vegas,

there was not much else around.

Las Vegas was a small town.

It was less than 50,000
at that point.

And we didn't have the tourism
and the gambling

that we have today.

So, when the federal
government came to town

and established
a permanent payroll,

a lot of people
employed with good jobs,

people welcomed it.

And so we just found ways to
adapt it into our local culture.

It is historical fact

that military weakness is
an invitation to aggression.

By being prepared,

our army hopes
to avoid a future war.

But should war come,

it may also become
historical fact

that the war was won in advance.

On January 27, 1951,

flying 3 1/2 miles
above the desert floor,

the crew of an air force plane

released the first
nuclear weapon in Nevada.

4, 3, 2, 1,

turn.

A 1,000 pound bomb
named Able.

It sent out
a blinding white flash

followed by a red-orange glow
and a shock wave.

A mushroom cloud
rose 14,000 feet,

and a thunderous burst

reverberated across
the Mojave Desert.

The following morning,

a second,
more powerful atomic blast,

code-named Baker,

lit up the pre-dawn sky.

100 miles away,

a truck driver
told the local paper

he could see the glare
from the blast.

It almost blinded him

to the point where he was
wondering, what about driving?

Was it safe to do this?

In just ten days,

five nuclear weapons

were detonated
over the Nevada test site,

ranging from 1 kiloton...

Up to 23 kilotons.

Most were smaller than
the 15 & 20 kiloton bombs

dropped on Japan
at the end of World War II.

The fifth test,

which was a 23-kiloton shot,

actually was felt and seen
as far as Los Angeles,

and they actually saw
the bright light from the test

and felt
some of the ground motion.

Anyone at the test site

to witness an explosion

had to wear a pair
of cobalt goggles.

Put on your goggles.

Observers without goggles
must face away from the blast.

The reason
they had to have these

is that those nuclear tests
that they were doing back there

had the intensity
of suns, plural.

So, if they didn't wear these,
it would burn their retinas.

I mean, if you
look through these now

and just look out
into the normal area,

you can't see anything,

but you can look
and stare at the sun

by just wearing these goggles.

For those guys,

those brave men,

and there were some women, too,
at the test site,

for them to actually see
a nuclear blast go off,

looking through
cobalt glasses...

This was "Star Wars" of its era.

They published
A Little Green Book

that advised people
on what to do

when the bomb was going off.

We wear sunglasses
when you look at the fireball,

you don't stand next to
plate glass windows...

Things that seem
pretty silly now,

but at the time, people felt
like they would keep them safe.

Bruce church
grew up in rural Utah,

near the Nevada border,

working on
his family's dairy farm.

He would later work
as a radiation physicist

at the test site.

He has vivid childhood memories

of seeing nuclear explosions
light up the pre-dawn sky.

My dad
would drag me out of bed

about 5 o'clock in the morning.

We would be working away,

and the whole western sky
would light up

like a huge light bulb went off.

It was awesome.

It's a little bit like
an instant sunrise.

It was that bright.

And it happened so many times
that dad would say,

"Well, looks like they detonated
another one in Nevada."

You know, and we'd go about
our business, milking cows.

Building an arsenal
of nuclear weapons

required thousands of people
to work at the Nevada site.

The government creates a city
to house employees.

They call the town "Mercury."

The scientists
that were in charge

of establishing
the government town of Mercury

had sent someone
to the post office

to give the town an address.

The guy shows up,
and the postmaster asks him,

"Well, what is the name
of this place?"

So they thought, "Well, we saw
these little cans of Mercury

on the side of the road

that the gold miners used to use
to amalgamate the ore

to make sure it was gold
that they were looking for,

so let's call it Mercury."

Peggy Hallerberg
was a secretary at the site.

She says there was an air
of professionalism in Mercury,

despite its remote location.

There's
a very close-knit group

that was like working downtown
at any other job,

except it was
at this remote area,

very secretive.

It's a big fraternity,

this order of the mushroom,

and it's growing all the time

as more and more of us
from all the services

have an opportunity to be
a part of this big effort

to collect the knowhow
for atomic warfare.

In an effort to make
life in Mercury more tenable,

the government brought in
all the comforts of home.

The government town of Mercury

had a reputation for having
a very good steakhouse,

set up a bowling alley.

There was movies.

When people got off work

it wasn't just all,
you know, bombs and tests.

With the
infrastructure in place

to continue large-scale testing
of nuclear weapons,

scientists in the early 1950's

wanted to know
how bombs would behave

when detonated
at different altitudes.

They learn
during their experiments

that bombs dropped
from higher altitudes

spread their destructive force
over a much wider area...

sometimes more than a mile.

Bombs dropped
closer to the ground...

Nearly liquefied
anything beneath them,

but the devastation covers
a much smaller patch of ground.

To make their experiments
more precise,

scientists began detonating
bombs secured in towers.

This way they knew the exact
height at which a bomb goes off,

compared to those
dropped from planes.

Setting off nuclear weapons
was always serious business.

Officials from
government laboratories,

either Los Alamos
or Lawrence livermore,

controlled the tests.

The test controller

knew exactly
where every person was

upwind from
the Nevada test site.

We knew exactly how many people
were on the test site,

where our radiological
emergency people were located.

It was a business-like
kind of an operation

and taken very seriously.

By the mid-1950's,

scientists knew that the bombs
released radiation,

but believed that
the resulting fallout

would not be dangerous enough
to affect human health.

Little did they know

that radioactive debris
from larger blasts

from the Pacific
and the Soviet Union

were circling the globe

and already starting to enter
the world's food chain.

...wind sweeping across

the desert...

American homes

will be exposed
to atomic blasts.

In area one
of the Nevada test site...

Direct bearing

on the welfare
of every American family.

...sits a vacant house,

battered by decades of abuse
from an unforgiving desert.

Yucca flat,

a barren area of desert,

Sagebrush and Joshua Trees...

And blasts
from nuclear bombs.

Today, thousands of tourists
visit this house.

But a spot just two miles away,
where atomic bombs were set off,

is still off-limits because
of the high levels of radiation.

At the 5,500-foot line

is a re-designed house...

This house was pummeled

by a nuclear test in 1955
called "Apple 2."

Designers were looking for ways
to make homes strong enough

to withstand a blast
from an atom bomb.

This new design provides additional

strength at a cost increase
of approximately 10%.

Scientists wanted
Americans to be prepared

for the unthinkable
yet possible,

to see how homes
would withstand blast waves

from an atomic weapon launched
at an American community.

This house was 6,000 feet
from ground zero.

Other homes that were closer
were incinerated.

Everybody has seen

that very famous footage

of the houses just imploding

and then exploding out.

What happens first
is that it gets hit by the heat,

and so it blistered
almost all of the paint.

When you look on
the backside of the house,

you can still see
some remnants of the paint.

It ripped all the gutters
off of the house.

The chimney here was shifted
about six inches.

The blinds
that were on the windows

were all blown out.

But otherwise this house
withstood the blast pressures

and the heat
from the nuclear test.

The apple-2 bomb

was placed in a tower
1,500 feet above the ground

so the resulting fireball

wouldn't destroy
monitoring equipment.

Technicians built small towns
within the blast zone...

shops, gas stations,

dozens of homes
made of brick and wood.

They called the small cities
"Doom Towns."

Here, just before dawn,

for the first time
in our history,

American homes will be
exposed to atomic blasts.

Today, main street of every
American city and town.

We had all kinds
of houses built,

grocery stores...

We had the electrical systems.

Single-story homes,
two-story homes,

wooden, brick, block, and so on,

different distances
from the ground zero,

to see what the effects would be
from the blast and the heat.

Inside the buildings,

workers positioned
entire families of mannequins,

who silently waited
for the explosions to come.

Let's see
what would happen

to a normal, average family.

We had mannequins

with all different types
of clothing on...

wool, you know, cotton,
rayon, nylon.

The mannequins had a house
roughly 5,000 feet away.

They had them sitting
at the kitchen table.

We had a lean-to
in the basement.

The mannequins became

some of the most famous
participants of the tests.

The mannequins were
furnished by J.C. Penney's.

Those mannequins
that had radiation,

they never got them back.

But the rest of them
that didn't,

they took them back.

What they did with them,
I don't know.

Ha ha ha!

Seems typical
of the American family at home.

First-floor living room,

children at play,
unaware of approaching disaster.

Mannequins thrown about,

clothing cut,

plaster bodies pockmarked
by flying glass.

Remember this dining room group?

Again, effects
of an atomic blast

in the house farthest
from ground zero.

Builders of bank vaults

came out to see
what's the best way,

how much concrete do they need,

how much steel do they need?

There were underground
parking facilities.

What would happen to Bridges

at what distances
from the actual event?

For example,

something as simple as changing
2x4 pieces of wood to 2x6s

increased structural integrity
of a building by 12%,

upping the odds of a home
withstanding a blast.

Las Vegas

as the caravan sets out

for the site of A.E.C.'s
Nevada proving grounds,

a variety of passenger cars,
old and new,

loaned by the dealers
and manufacturers of America.

Operation hot rod

had vehicles placed a half-mile
to two miles from ground zero

to determine if they could
be used as shelters.

Often,
if they were a mile away,

they might have broken windows,

but they would be operable,

where if they got within
a quarter mile or half mile,

they often were
no longer operable.

Having gone through
some of the remnants

of the testing at Frenchman Flat

and seeing the twisted metal

and seeing what got burned
and what didn't get burned,

what got tipped over,
what didn't get tipped over,

it gives you a new perspective

on how powerful
these explosions really were.

Right in close
to ground zero,

everything gets vaporized
from that immense heat.

The big thing for the scientists

was to be able to get that
footage of what happened,

what was going on.

The best way
to record the effects of a bomb

was with a high-speed camera.

A camera slows down

the split-second burst
of a nuclear blast

so that we can apply
a tape measure to it.

The only way that
they could protect that film

from the x-rays
and the radiation

that were being emanated

was a lead wall.

And in that lead wall
there would be a pinhole,

and that camera's
looking through the pinhole

directly at ground zero.

Seconds before a blast,

a signal was sent to the cameras
to start rolling.

The cameras would run
through the explosion

and stop only
when they ran out of film.

Fears of nuclear annihilation
by the Soviets

force the scientists to push
the limits even further.

They needed to know just how
much exposure to an atomic blast

could be absorbed
by living things.

Hundreds of sheep, pigs,
and small barnyard animals

are put in the path
of the bomb's wrath.

Some are placed
in enclosures at ground level

while others are placed
in below-ground positions.

Some of the more similar things

to the human body,

as far as reaction
to things like radiation,

is pig skin.

So they would actually put pigs

at different distances
from the shot,

and then go in and see
what the effects were.

A large part
of the experiments

was to determine
their biological effects

on living things,

and the effects
on some of the animals

were pretty gruesome.

Most of the animals
used in tests

were incinerated...

Their carcasses studied
for effects from the blasts.

All this was done to collect
as much data as possible

to determine how to build bombs
for maximum effect.

The atomic energy commission,

in collaboration with the united
states army and air force,

will conduct the atomic test
known as exercise desert rock,

the first in which troops
will participate

as part of an atomic experiment.

U.S. military
wanted to push the limits

and see how soldiers would
hold up to the stresses

of being close
to a nuclear detonation.

As early as the first year
of testing in Nevada,

marines, and later
other military units,

were stationed in trenches
within two miles of ground zero.

What could
our military troops endure?

What did they need
to protect themselves

against the bright flashes,

the shock wave,
the radiation

that they would have to be
sent in to ground zero

and clean up?

Could we fight
a nuclear war and win it,

or were there going to be
no winners?

We didn't know.

But, Burt, don't you think
that the atomic weapon

would be a mighty powerful thing

for our soldiers to avoid
on the battlefield?

Well, al, there's no,
no question about it.

It is a powerful weapon.

But we have had proven to us
in these tests

that a soldier can fight and
survive on an atomic battlefield

if he protects himself
adequately.

Well Burt,
you were out there.

How's about some comments

on this radiation
I hear so much about?

Well, there is radiation.

There's no question about that.

But, well, for example,

the other day I was out there
at 2,500 yards from ground zero,

and I received one milliroentgen
of radiation during that time,

and it takes
approximately 450 roentgens

to place one
in the critical category.

So, as you can see,
I'm, I'm still here.

Once the bomb is ignited

and the mushroom cloud
soars above their heads,

they wait for the initial
shock wave to pass.

Dick mingus
crouched in a trench

during one of these tests.

H minus 10 seconds.

Now the countdown is going.

8...

I crouched a little bit,

not knowing how severe
it's gonna be.

6...

5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

And then you see
that terrible flash.

And then it's dead silence
for a period of time.

All of a sudden it hits,

like somebody pushing you.

The wind hits you,

and the noise hits
at the same time.

It's just immense.

You think about it a little bit,

it will run a cold chill
up your back.

It was also
kind of a measurement

of how does a person react to
such a magnificent detonation?

This is not a conventional bomb
we're talking about.

This is something
that's pretty scary.

And would our soldiers
be scared, too?

Troops would then get
out of their protective trenches

and march toward
the detonation site.

Today, these soldiers
are called nuclear veterans,

and many have suffered
health problems

from literally walking
into clouds of radiation.

I remember
seeing footage

of soldiers being
brushed off with brooms,

just to get the contaminated
soil off of their clothes.

And later on,
some of these soldiers

were coming down with diseases
related to the fallout.

This became a huge problem.

I think,
had our government known

what the health effects
would be down the road,

they probably would have done
these tests differently.

The federal government

eventually compensated
soldiers and "Downwinders,"

people living
in the fallout zones

of Nevada, Utah,
and northern Arizona.

Laws passed in the 1990's

allowed for a one-time
payment of $75,000

to atomic veterans
who had contracted

one of 21
different types of cancer

attributed to fallout.

People who lived downwind
were awarded $50,000.

$800 million has been paid out
since the program began.

Seeing nuclear explosions
up close was terrifying,

and as these experiments
become more dangerous,

the life around them
gets more absurd.

From a rooftop
in downtown Las Vegas,

it's easy to look
a few miles north

of the sheep mountain range,

toward the Nevada test site.

Between 1950 and 1960,

the city's population
grew by 161%

to a quarter of a million.

Many people were drawn

by the explosion
in the casino industry,

and tourists flocked to the city
for another type of explosion:

The nuclear kind.

Back in the day,

when the Nevada test site

was conducting
nuclear weapons tests,

you could look
in this direction...

And you could actually see
the remnants of a nuclear cloud,

a mushroom cloud,

orange glow in the sky.

During the 1950's,

the detonation
at the Nevada test site

gave Las Vegas
a new way to make money:

Atomic tourism.

People came
from all over the country

to witness the detonations,

which always went off at dawn.

Hotel casinos would host
atomic parties

on their rooftops.

Guests would drink until dawn

and finish their evening
with a nuclear blast.

Welcome to Nevada.

It is a place where you can have
a nuclear bomb go off,

and you can have the media crush

that turns it into
kind of a circus atmosphere.

The impact
on popular culture

and how pervasive that was.

It was kind of like
whistling in the dark.

You adapt to it,

you make it familiar,
you make it funny,

you make it sexy,

and then it's not so scary.

"Atomic" just was
in everybody's jargon.

And of course atomic liquors
is still here,

and I don't think it'll
ever change that name.

The word "Atomic"
was just an adjective used

in many, many, many ways.

And you saw it reproduced
in song, in movies,

in television, in logos.

The mushroom cloud was on
the cover of the yearbook

of Las Vegas high school.

Some people even think
the Las Vegas sign

is a reflection
of that mushroom cloud.

The mushroom cloud
was pretty much glorified.

It became an iconic symbol.

It was hot, hot, hot.

Even beauty pageants

found a way to add
"Atomic" to their name

as casinos crowned
miss atomic bomb.

You had gigi,
the hairdresser at the flamingo

who would fix you a hairdo that
looked like a mushroom cloud.

But, you know,
the bottom line was

there were signs on the dice
table and the roulette table

that said if the ball clicked
or the dice flipped

because of some trembling,

house rules prevailed.

You could
hear the people say,

"Oh, I got up
at 4 o'clock in the morning

so I could see
that flash in the sky."

It was big entertainment.

The curious
would travel for miles

up into the Sheep Mountains
north of the city

to get a better view.

I am so glad that I
actually saw a mushroom cloud.

And you definitely felt
the earth shake,

the sound wave that would
come across the desert,

and you would feel
the vibration.

Neither I nor any of my friends

had any concerns at all,

but very aware that something
really important was going on

65 miles away.

Congressional hearings in 1957

put the spotlight
on atmospheric testing,

and the atomic energy commission

had to defend
the importance of the tests

against public fears.

All employees and anyone within
20 miles of ground zero

were given film badges to wear.

The badges
measured the intensity

of radiation exposure.

Film badges
and dosimeters issued to you

enable the radiological safety
monitor in your unit

to read the amount
of your exposure.

Every month, employees
would turn in the film badges

to be checked
for radioactive material.

I used to put
film badges with clips

on anybody I could find
that would wear them out there

around the test site,

including highway department,
police, sheriffs,

fire department, and so on.

And with film badges,

if you have radiation,
it darkens the film.

It was basically
the same thing

as the dentist used
to put in their patient's mouth

to have an X-ray.

It was a type of film that,

when exposed
to gamma ray radiation,

which is like an X-ray,

it would be exposed,

and the density
of the film was such

that you could measure
the intensity of the exposure.

If there was a test

in which there was a release
of radioactivity,

we would go around,
pick up the film badge

and replace it with a fresh one,

take the initial one
back to the lab for analysis.

It was part of their uniform.

All of the monitors

carried plastic bags
to collect vegetation

and collect milk samples
and water samples.

We pretty much tested
everything we could think of.

In all my years out there,

we never exceeded
the permissible levels.

But reassurances
from inspectors in Nevada

couldn't sway public opinion.

With the Soviet Union testing
even larger bombs,

sometimes
in more populated areas,

the atomic age was casting
a dark cloud of doom

over a testing program

originally intended
to protect the world.

After seven years
of atomic tests in Nevada,

fears over radioactive fallout
peaked in 1958,

and the United States
imposed a moratorium

on nuclear weapons testing.

The blasts at the Nevada
testing grounds stopped.

It had been a long time coming.

There had been 152 atmospheric
atomic detonations

done by the United States
in Nevada...

And the pacific

between 1946 and 1958.

82 of them
at the Nevada test site.

As scientists were
learning more and more

about the effects
of nuclear weapons,

it became clear
that maybe we should not be

detonating nuclear weapons
in the atmosphere

because the fallout
was circulating the globe,

it was causing unrest
in people that were downwind.

And the Soviet Union was
conducting some really big ones

that were showing up
on our soil, too.

Newsmen enter
a 1,900-foot tunnel

into a Nevada rock mesa,

where an atomic bomb blast
last summer makes news now.

One purpose of the original test

was to see whether
an underground atom blast

could be detected
by sensitive instruments

at remote points.

After the test, the atomic
energy commission announced

the limit of detection
was 250 miles,

an error just corrected.

The blast
was picked up in Alaska,

over 2,000 miles away.

And so new fuel is added
to the debate

on a temporary worldwide ban
on nuclear explosions.

The blast itself collapsed only
some 500 feet of the tunnel

and was scarcely felt outside,

in odd contrast to
the political reverberations

now being felt
months afterwards.

By 1958, the entire
world had become concerned

as radioactive isotopes
had been found in nature,

like iodine 131
and strontium 90,

both of which
turned up in cows' milk.

Worse, there were reports
of similar radioactive material

found in the breast milk
of new mothers.

Legendary newsman
Walter cronkite

had originally been
thunderstruck by the blasts,

like at this one in 1953.

You will hear the blast

and, of course, see the fireball
from this bomb.

But now, in 1961,
eight years later,

he feared the worst.

Strontium 90 is just one

of a couple of hundred
kinds of radioactive garbage

left by atomic bombs,

thrown into the air as a powder,

carried downwind,

drifting back to earth

over the course
of days, weeks, years.

Three years to the day
that the ban went into effect,

the Soviets broke the moratorium
and began testing again.

The move by the Soviets

gave the United States
the green light

to continue its own new testing

despite safety concerns
from the public.

Many of the tests
were moved underground

in an effort to stop
radioactive fallout

from skyrocketing
into the atmosphere.

The decision was made
by our government

to restrict the places

where we can conduct
nuclear weapons tests.

There was a train of thought

that we should see

what peaceful uses
we could make

of testing nuclear weapons.

What could we use nuclear
weapons for besides war?

Excavations of new harbors,
big dams, canals,

passes through rugged
mountainous terrain.

These and other

massive, imaginative
earth-moving projects

may soon be ours.

There was a plan
to dig a massive waterway

in Nicaragua,

nicknamed the Pan Atomic Canal.

It was one
of the first attempts

to look at using a bomb
for peaceful purposes.

This is when they thought they
might dig a new Panama Canal

using the bomb.

We could
use nuclear bombs

for something besides war,

and we could do this
in an instant.

We could move
all this earth suddenly,

and it would make a nice perfect
little divot in the earth.

For more than a year,

test site secretary
Peggy Hallerberg

and her colleagues

had asked the scientist
for whom they worked

to take them to see
an underground detonation.

We climbed into
this gray government trailer.

There probably were
ten people in the trailer,

we were waiting
for the shot to go off.

Called the Sedan Shot,

it was the largest of the Nevada
site's underground tests,

a 100-kiloton device placed
636 feet below the ground

in a shaft drilled
into the desert floor.

You see tons
of dirt flying into the air,

you feel the vibration
and the shock wave,

and everybody is
looking at each other like,

"Oh, my god.
Look what just happened."

The blast
lifted a dome of earth

more than 300 feet in the air.

After three seconds,
the dome vented.

It collapsed in on itself.

The secondary shock wave

sent 12 million
cubic tons of soil

into the Nevada sky.

It was
an astounding thing to observe.

Blew sky high.

Shook the ground.

It's something I'll never,
ever, ever forget.

Today, what remains
of the Sedan nuclear test

stands as
a looming silent witness

to the power
unleashed here in 1962.

One of the things

that's really hard
for people to understand

unless you're actually
standing here

is to grasp the size
of this crater...

how big it is,
how far across it is,

how deep it is.

With a big 1,800 feet deep,
335 feet deep,

it's just almost
impossible to imagine

unless you're actually
standing here

to get some sort of scale.

Some radioactivity
still lingers,

but not enough to make this
place dangerous for tourists.

You will see
this huge crater

that's unbelievable in size

and look down
at the bottom of it,

and you'll see tires that look
about the size of lifesavers.

Despite the continuing
arms race with the Soviets,

in 1963,

president John F. Kennedy cited
unprecedented health risks

from nuclear fallout

and urged passage
of the nuclear test ban treaty.

The loss of even one human life

or the malformation
of even one baby,

who may be born
long after all of us have gone,

should be of concern to us all.

The Soviets agreed.

From that point forward,

above-ground nuclear tests
by the superpowers stopped.

The mushroom clouds
above the Nevada desert

disappeared.

Between 1951 and 1992,

there were 1,021 detonations
at the Nevada test site.

100 of them above ground

during the 1950's
and early 1960's.

An arms treaty
with the former Soviet Union

ended the detonations
for good in 1992.

Now called the Nevada
National Security Site,

the area remains busy

with underground
super computer testing labs

simulating detonations.

Hopefully
we'll never have to detonate

a nuclear weapon,

but if we do, we want
to make sure they work,

and how do you do that

if you don't have
full-scale nuclear testing?

I wouldn't take anything
for the experiences.

It was a job
that needed to be done,

and I'm very, very proud
to be there

to take part in it.

Those that know the story

of the atomic age in this desert

know if nuclear tests
ever need to resume,

the Nevada test site
is always ready.