E-mail a link to this story to a friend

The National Atomic Museum

By Frank Zoretich
Originally published as part of the "Cheap Thrills Adventure Club" in the Albuquerque Journal
So far, only two cities have been destroyed by nuclear attack.
Considering the possibilities - and anyone who every 'ducked-and-covered' beneath the flimsy shelter of a schoolroom desk has considered the possibilities - that 'only' has been the good news for years. At the National Atomic Museum, located behind the gates of Kirtland Air Force Base on the southeast edge of Albuquerque, interpretive exhibits and a sizable array of weaponry tell the story of "the complete history of U.S. nuclear developments."
There's special emphasis, of course, on the role New Mexico played in World War II development of The Bomb:
The Manhattan Project, centered at the "secret city" of Los Alamos.
The successful test at Trinity Site, southeast of Socorro, in the pre-dawn hours of July 16, 1945 - the first brilliant "point of light" of the thousands that could yet be ignited in a final twinkling.
Without stretching, a child can put one hand on the casing of a bomb identical to "Little Boy," which we dropped on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, and put his or her other hand on the much larger casing of a bomb identical to "Fat Man," which we dropped on Nagasaki three days later. Smile. FLASH!
"Cameras Welcome" proclaims a sign at the entrance to the museum. It helps to have a flash attachment, because the main display room seems to be filled with shadow. Despite spotlights attached to the high ceiling, many of the aerodynamically shaped bombs, missiles, and projectiles on display lurk in darkness.
The Mark 5, the Mark 8, the Mark 7, the Mark 17, the Mark 28, the March 39. Technological marvels, each one was developed to fit with more sophisticated delivery systems.
The Mark 17 was the "first dropable thermonuclear bomb" - also known as a H-bomb, triggered by the A-Bomb it contains.
(It may reassure museum visitors to know that although almost all of these are authentic bomb casings rather than replicas, none still contain nuclear explosives.)
There's a nuclear torpedo, a nuclear depth charge, and a relatively tiny, 70-pound nuclear projectile named Davy Crockett.
Displayed on the tarmac just outside the museum are a Polaris submarine-launched missile, several nuclear-capable Cruise missiles, and 280-millimeter nuclear cannon that could "propel a 600-pound nuclear shell more than 20 miles," an F105D fighter bomber "designed to carry nuclear weapons" and an entire gigantic B52B - the bomber that dropped the last nuclear weapon tested in the atmosphere by the U.S.
In another, more brightly and evenly lighted display room of the museum, there are exhibits devoted to such topics as handling nuclear waste, the uranium mill-tailings problem and fusion-energy research.
There's even a alcove display dedicated to the memory of Herman E. Roser, a New Mexico native who rose as high in the government as U.S. Assistant Secretary of Energy for Defense and who was the man responsible for 1962 to 1968 for "initiating and implementing plans for the evolution of the government-owned town of Los Alamos into a normal American community.