May 27, 1957 a hydrogen bomb accidentally fell to the ground just outside of Albuquerque. As was the standard during the Cold War, planes were always armed (with nuclear weapons), in air, and ready to depart at a moment's notice. The unarmed Mk.17 dropped through the closed bomb bay doors and the sudden loss of the bomb's weight caused the B-36 to jump one thousand feet into the air.
Yesterday we ventured out to visit the Broken Arrow site.
"Although the weapon's parachute deployed, it failed to fully retard the weapon's fall because of the low altitude. The conventional HE components detonated on impact, destroying the weapon, dispersing some nuclear material, and creating a crater 12 feet deep and 25 feet across. A cow grazing nearby was killed by the blast...Plutonium was dispersed by the conventional explosive detonation of the device, and the area was contaminated by radiation. The plutonium core had been removed from the bomb (as per normal procedure) so the weapon could not have undergone a nuclear detonation on impact. Though the site was mostly cleaned-up by the military, some bomb fragments remain at the site and are still slightly radioactive." -from the CLUI site in their 1998 article
Yesterday we ventured out to visit the Broken Arrow site.
"Although the weapon's parachute deployed, it failed to fully retard the weapon's fall because of the low altitude. The conventional HE components detonated on impact, destroying the weapon, dispersing some nuclear material, and creating a crater 12 feet deep and 25 feet across. A cow grazing nearby was killed by the blast...Plutonium was dispersed by the conventional explosive detonation of the device, and the area was contaminated by radiation. The plutonium core had been removed from the bomb (as per normal procedure) so the weapon could not have undergone a nuclear detonation on impact. Though the site was mostly cleaned-up by the military, some bomb fragments remain at the site and are still slightly radioactive." -from the CLUI site in their 1998 article
to get to the site we passed many interesting signs
passed through gates onto dirt roads
past bullet shells
in the distance you can see how the landscaping becomes thinner, and smoother. This is the remediation site of ground zero
CLUI's Broken Arrow marker. A plaque was once here, but has gone missing since installation.
While we were at the site helicopters shuttled overhead and the sound of the rifle range could be heard in the proximity
after leaving the site we were followed for a couple of miles to the highway entrance
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