Blind girl 'saw' the first big flash

ZERO

hour for the new atomic bomb was 5.38am on July 16 last, in a remote area of the wastes of New Mexico.

on that day the biggest man-made explosion took place, while nature’s thunder and lightning shook the skies over the heads of the waiting scientists.

Code name for the whole plan was ‘Manhattan Project’.

The driving f orce behind the ‘Manhattan Project’ was stocky, greyhaired major General Leslie Richard Groves, of Pasadena, California.

he was there when the War Department exploded the first atomic bomb in new Mexico. The experimental bomb was mounted on a steel tower. Groves and his colleagues watched the explosion from a shelter ten miles away. The bomb was exploded by remote control.

CLOUDS VANISH

here i s the War Department’s description of the test:

‘At the appointed time there was a blinding flash, lighting up the whole area, brighter than the brightest daylight. Then came a tremendous sustained roar and a heavy pressure wave which knocked down two men outside the experimental shelter.

‘Immediately, a huge multi-coloured surging cloud boiled to an altitude of over 40,000ft. Clouds in its path dis- appeared. Soon shifting stratosphere winds dispersed the now grey mass. The test was over now, the project a success.

‘A blind girl near Albuquerque, 120 miles from the scene, cried “What’s that?” when the flash lighted the sky before the explosion.

‘The steel tower had been entirely vaporised. Dazed, but relieved at their success, the scientists controlling the experiment began to estimate the strength of the new weapon.

‘To examine the nature of the crater, especially equipped tanks were brought into the area.’

BALL OF FIRE

Groves, in his report, said: ‘ Two minutes before the scheduled firing time all persons lay face down with their f eet pointing towards the explosion. As the remaining time was called over the loud speaker, there was a complete, awesome silence.

‘Then came a burst of light of a brilliance beyond comparison. We all rolled over and looked through dark glasses at the ball of fire.’

General Farrell, Groves’s deputy, said: ‘ We were reaching into the unknown.

‘All seemed to feel that they had been present at the birth of a new age –— the age of atomic energy.’