Lab Conducts First X-Ray Test on Mock Weapon
By John Fleck, Albuquerque Journal Staff WriterSaturday, December 05, 2009
Los Alamos National Laboratory on Thursday evening took the first ever three-dimensional X-ray movie of a mock nuclear weapon detonation, a milestone two decades in the making.
The test at the lab's Dual Axis Radiographic Hydrodynamic Test Facility, known as "DARHT", used the world's most powerful X-ray machines to take pictures of the inner workings of a W78 nuclear warhead, said Dave Funk, head of the lab's hydrodynamics experiments division.
The 6:09 p.m. test, with more than 60 Los Alamos staff in attendance, was a success, yielding good data on the W78's behavior, Funk said in a telephone interview Friday.
The massive X-ray machine is part of the National Nuclear Security Administration's suite of test equipment and computer simulations used to maintain U.S. nuclear weapons without underground test blasts.
Garrett Harencak, a senior National Nuclear Security Administration official overseeing the lab's weapons work, issued a statement calling the test "an important development in the NNSA's stockpile stewardship mission."
"I applaud LANL for reaching this important milestone. DARHT will help ensure a safer and more secure stockpile without testing," Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., said in a statement.
The test ends an embarrassing episode for the weapons program. DARHT was originally planned in 1988 with a price tag of $30 million to $54 million, but a series of delays because of litigation by environmentalists, design changes and design flaws dragged out the project, and pushed the final price tag over $300 million.
For the first five decades of the U.S. nuclear program, weapons were actually detonated to test them, first above ground and then underground beginning in the 1960s. "You got the answer, right? It worked or not," Funk explained.
The United States abandoned full test blasts in 1992, establishing a program of small-scale experiments and computer simulations instead.
In a nuclear weapon, high explosives are used to squeeze plutonium to create a critical mass, yielding its nuclear blasts.
DARHT tests allow weapons designers to X-ray a mock nuclear weapon during the early stages of that blast, to compare the weapon's performance to predictions made by the lab's supercomputer simulations, Funk explained. Without the explosive plutonium, there is no nuclear yield, and the blast can be contained with a big steel vessel, according to Funk.
14 comments:
I hope this is true and I hope the people responsible for making DARHT a success are credited for their work.
The past problems with DAHRT resulted in punishment of the innocent.
This "success" will result in rewards for the non-participants.
Good news imo. It’s an important step for the success of our nuclear weapons program.
I suspect the anti-nuke people will see this as an evil attempt to build more powerful nuclear weapons rather than the obvious advantage of replacing our older weapons with safer and more secure weapons without the need for full-scale underground testing.
6:23 said: "this 'success' will result in rewards for the non-participants."
Amen, brother. Spent many a long day and into the night trying to get a shot fired at PHERMEX and DAHRT. So many tirekickers jammed into the control room on shot day you could hardly move. Next day, a press release from somebody we never even heard of taking credit for the success. Never a word about the two years of grunt work bringing it all together. Some guy in the Div Office gets a plaque on his wall....
A big round of bonuses and rewards is due to all the new DAHRT managers who've come on board with LANS.
Now, see to it that it breaks once again and let's "fix" it and hand out another round or rewards. Yahoooo!!!
So now both DAHRT and NIF can be characterized as resounding success stories, right? Never mind the years behind schedule, the watering down of project goals and milestones, the hundreds of millions of dollars (billions for NIF) over budget, and the Lab's penchant for spinning reality. Is it any wonder announcements like this are so hard to accept at face value anymore?
By any rational measure DARHT is a failure (more than 10x overbudget, 20 years behind schedule, and nowhere near meeting the real objectives). Nonetheless, because of the dedication of the individuals involved, it has finally come to pass...a bit like a kidney stone. Undoubtedly those with nothing whatsoever to do with it (Anastasio, McMillan, Knapp, Funk et al) will be credited with "fixing" the problems which they themselves created and continue to create. Sadly, Frank, your hope is in vain.
My hope may be in vain but I will continue to push for excellence and integrity at LANL. And thank you to all the people who are helping me.
DAHRT is not a failure if you consider all the manager level promotions, rewards and advancements it's been able to generate for well over 20 years while everyone waited for its development to be finished.
Seen in those terms, it's a brilliant success! In fact, I'm pretty sure LANS will be able to keep this "success" going for a few more years.
5:05 pm: "DAHRT is not a failure if you consider all the manager level promotions, rewards and advancements it's been able to generate for well over 20 years while everyone waited for its development to be finished."
DAHRT is a success programmatically. An expensive, overdue success, but a success.
LANS Definition Book...
* Failure + Good Spin == SUCCESS!
* SUCCESS + More Spin == 20% BONUS!!!
8:18 What program is DARHT a success for?
"What program is DARHT a success for?"
Uhhhh, the nuclear weapons program?
I heard the explosive shot was a crash and burn because it wasn't built correctly.
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