The first shipments of highly enriched uranium were sent to the Los Alamos Laboratory in June 1944. Enrichment was performed at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where the electromagnetic separation plant, known as Y-12, became fully operational in March 1944. The vast majority of the work came in the form of the isotope enrichment of the uranium necessary for the weapon, since uranium-235 makes up only 1 part in 140 of natural uranium. As the first design developed (as well as the first deployed for combat), it is sometimes known as the Mark I. Development īecause uranium-235 was known to be fissionable, it was the first material pursued in the approach to bomb development. Little Boy was named by others as an allusion to Thin Man since it was based on its design. The "Fat Man" was round and fat so it was named after Kasper Gutman, a rotund character in Hammett's 1930 novel The Maltese Falcon, played by Sydney Greenstreet in the 1941 film version. The "Thin Man" was a long, thin device and its name came from the Dashiell Hammett detective novel and series of movies about The Thin Man. Physicist Robert Serber named the first two atomic bomb designs during World War II based on their shapes: Thin Man and Fat Man. All the Little Boy units were withdrawn from service by the end of January 1951. The Navy Bureau of Ordnance built another 25 Little Boy assemblies in 1947 for use by the Lockheed P2V Neptune nuclear strike aircraft which could be launched from the Midway-class aircraft carriers. However, by mid-1946, the Hanford Site reactors began suffering badly from the Wigner effect, the dislocation of atoms in a solid caused by neutron radiation, and plutonium became scarce, so six Little Boy assemblies were produced at Sandia Base. Unlike the implosion design, which required sophisticated coordination of shaped explosive charges, the gun-type design was considered almost certain to work so it was never tested before its first use at Hiroshima.Īfter the war ended, it was not expected that the inefficient Little Boy design would ever again be required, and many plans and diagrams were destroyed. Its components were fabricated at three different plants so that no one would have a copy of the complete design. It contained 64 kg (141 lb) of highly enriched uranium, although less than a kilogram underwent nuclear fission. Fission was accomplished by shooting a hollow cylinder (the "bullet") onto a solid cylinder of the same material (the "target") by means of a charge of nitrocellulose propellant powder. Like Thin Man, it was a gun-type fission weapon, but it derived its explosive power from the nuclear fission of uranium-235, whereas Thin Man was based on fission of plutonium-239. Little Boy was developed by Lieutenant Commander Francis Birch's group at the Manhattan Project's Los Alamos Laboratory during World War II, a reworking of their abandoned Thin Man nuclear bomb. The Hiroshima bombing was the second man-made nuclear explosion in history, after the Trinity nuclear test. It exploded with an energy of approximately 15 kilotons of TNT (63 TJ) and caused widespread death and destruction throughout the city. Tibbets, Jr., commander of the 509th Composite Group, and Captain Robert A. The bomb was dropped by the Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay piloted by Colonel Paul W. Also includes 20 pounds of small lava rock.Little Boy was the type of atomic bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 during World War II, making it the first nuclear weapon used in warfare. This Thunder Gray colored 36-inch set contains 38 balls and covers a 36 x 12-inch area. Extremely durable, Light Stone Balls are freeze tested & fire approved to handle the harshest weather conditions. They are also clean burning with no smoke, ash, or harmful fumes. Hand-crafted, these Light Stone Balls get their color from an environmentally friendly ceramic stain that is absorbed into the porous fireproof material. Whether you have an outdoor gas fire pit or an indoor gas fireplace, these lite stone balls will maximize the effect of your fire feature. Lite Stone Balls boast a modern, minimalist design to create a neat, uncluttered look for your gas fire pit or fireplace. Whether you are considering a more contemporary natural look or simply looking to change things up, the light weight ceramic Lite Stone Balls are designed to be accents and set on top of lava rocks in your fireplace or fire pit. Overall Dimensions: 13" Wide x 9" High x 13" Deep OverviewĪmerican Fire Glass Lite Stone Balls are the ideal addition to your fireplace or fire pit.
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