Nuclear Weapons and International Relations

The huge nuclear disaster hidden by the Soviets

In 1958, the United States conducted a series of nuclear tests known as Operation Hardtack I in the Pacific Ocean, aimed at studying the effects of atomic explosions in different environments. Among the most striking was an underwater detonation at Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where a nuclear device was exploded beneath the surface to observe how water, shock waves, and radiation would behave in a marine setting. The blast created a towering column of water thousands of feet high and

Thermal Radiation

How Some Animals Can Survive Radiation From a Nuclear Disaster—and Even Thrive