BLAST (ANIMATION)
Yucca Flat, Nevada (March 17, 1953)
Resources: Photo Gallery

The eight images above are a sequence of photographs of a house constructed 3,500 feet from "ground zero" at the Nevada Test Site being destroyed by the Annie test shot.  The only source of light was the blast itself, detonated on March 17, 1953.  The final image is two-and-one-third seconds after detonation.  In the second image the house is actually on fire, but in the third image the fire has already been blown out by the blast.  Annie, part of the "Upshot-Knothole" test series, had a yield of 16 kilotons, roughly the same size as the Trinity, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki explosions.  Two photographs of the Annie mushroom cloud are at the bottom of this page.

The photographs are courtesy REECO, Bechtel Nevada; they are reprinted from Terrence R. Fehner and F. G. Gosling, Origins of the Nevada Test Site (Washington: History Division, Department of Energy, December 2000), 85.  The animation of the eight images is original to the History Division, now Office of History and Heritage Resources, 2003.  Scroll down to see all eight images at once, followed by very large versions of each one.  The photographs of Annie are courtesy the Federation of American Scientists.

Click on a link below to return to