User talk:HowardMorland

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Contents 1 Little Boy 2 Help desk question 3 Palestine Map (exchange with DRosenbach) 4 Current Status in the Palestine Article (exchange with Humus Sapiens) 5 Sandbox for Fat Man Changes 6 Interior of bomb 6.1 Physics package 6.2 Assembly 6.3 Detonation sequence 7 Notes 8 Sandbox for Little Boy Changes 8.1 Counter-Intuitive Design 9 Physical Effects of the Bomb 9.1 Blast 9.2 Fire 9.3 Radiation 10 Notes 11 French version of schema of Little Boy 12 German Version of Little Boy 13 Two-point diagram / NW design article update 14 Re: Nuclear weapon design

[edit] Little Boy

I wanted to note that I responded to your recent note on User talk:Fastfission, with some info of mine. We may want to exchange email addresses and discuss this offline. Georgewilliamherbert 01:18, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I sent another note to Carey. I am also going to send you an email via Wikipedia, if your account is set up for it. Georgewilliamherbert 04:52, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Hello, I reply on your notice on my german discussion. It's about the graphic(s)...and the german translation. 1st: Thank you for the info! The problem is: The main author of the german article gave up the work so it could take a little to find someone else who has the knowledge about the theme...--Hendrike 16:32, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help desk question

I fixed the image markup. You simply forgot to add the closing brackets ( ]] ) in the image coding.--Fuhghettaboutit 12:42, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Palestine Map (exchange with DRosenbach)

Hello. Would you be willing to elaborate on your statement that the map you removed, "reflecting political propoganda, is both misleading and incorrect?" I would like to debate this issue with you. I agree that Palestine is not, and likely never will be, a sovereign state, and that all its potential territory has been absorbed by Israel. But what, specifically, is wrong with the map, aside from its title (which is also the title of the Wikipedia article)? Thank you. HowardMorland 15:57, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

If there is no country of Palestine, how can there be a map of Palestine. It's not as though this article and its associated maps are about some allegorical or fictitious place like Narnia; on the contrary, this article is pushing a political agenda by exhibiting maps of locations that don't exist. The article did not posit that this was even a harbinger of the future; rather, the article and its maps assert that the current country of Palestine exists, inhabited by the Palestinians that live in territories under disputed rule. Let me know if this answers your questions. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 19:31, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply. Since your main complaint seems to be with the title of my map, "Palestine: West Bank and Gaza," I was planning to ask what title you might find acceptable. However, your reply seems to find fault with "this article and its associated maps" for "pushing a political agenda by exhibiting maps of locations that don't exist." (Locations that don't exist?)

We seem to be talking not about my map but about the concept of Palestine. As I stated, "I agree that Palestine is not, and likely never will be, a sovereign state," however, a Google search of "Palestine" gets 45 million hits, with this Wikipedia article at the very top of the list. There is obviously something called Palestine that a lot of people are interested in. And it is not imaginary, like Narnia; it is real estate and people.

The global consensus (neutral point of view) would be that Palestine is the West Bank and Gaza. The idea that they might one day constitute a nation is embodied in the name of the Palestinian National Authority, which operates in the West Bank and Gaza, and in the Palestine Liberation Organization, which has often been Israel's partner in formal negotiations.

You say, "If there is no country of Palestine, how can there be a map of Palestine." Maps don't have to be of countries. Aside from saying that my map reflects political propaganda, you have not challenged the veracity or relevance of anything depicted on the map. Would my map be acceptable to you under a different title? HowardMorland 17:57, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

To begin, I would like to comment on your extreme sense of sensitivity and thoughtfulness while posting on my talk page. I can only extrapolate that you are a new member to Wikipedia, for you are not jaded as most are, including me. Forgive me if I need a few more centuries to approach your level of calmness. :)

Now, you assert that maps need not be of actual places. True...but the map stated that its explicit depiction was that of Palestine. Although it did not make any assertion to the "State of" or "National Sovereign Land of" or "Country of," the implication of a map is that the map refers to an official place extant in modern times. Although a place labelled "Palestine" did exist at some times over the past however many years, it does not exist now. Should the map be entitled "Palestine: a future look at what might constitute a Palestinian homeland" or something of this nature, I could have nothing to argue. If your point is to reinclude this map into the article, a title such as this would posit no declaration of official status yet allow you/the article to exhibit the occupied territories as a free and independant entity entirely divorced from Israel. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 20:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Current Status in the Palestine Article (exchange with Humus Sapiens)

To: User talk:Humus sapiens

On April 11, 2007, I added three paragraphs and a map to the Wikipedia article on Palestine. There was clearly a hole in the story. The Current Status subsection of the History section had ended in the mid 1960s, before the Six Day War of 1967. With carefully chosen words, I attempted a brief update.

The next day, you removed the struck-out words from my text, with the explanation "an attempt at NPOV."

In the Six Day War of June 1967, Israel captured and occupied the West Bank and Gaza, the two territories most commonly designated today as Palestine. Since then, both territories have been entirely inside borders controlled by Israel.

According to the CIA World Factbook, of the ten million people living between Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea, 49% are Palestinian. One million of those are citizens of Israel. The other four million are stateless residents of the West Bank and Gaza, and potential citizens of a future Palestinian state. In the meantime, they live under Palestinian National Authority jurisdiction, subject to conditions imposed by Israel.

In the West Bank, 360,000 Israeli settlers live in a hundred scattered settlements with connecting corridors that effectively confine the 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians onto four discrete blocks of land centered on Hebron, Ramallah, Nablus, and Jericho (see map). All four blocks are separated from neighboring Jordan by military control areas along the Jordan River and the Dead Sea.

I did not immediately object, because the text you removed was mostly a restatement of information contained in the map, which you did not remove. (I am pleased to see that, three weeks later, no further changes have been made to the text.) Then on April 16, DRosenbach removed the map with the statement, "‘Palestine' is a political term. It does not exist as a state, and this map, reflecting political propoganda, is both misleading and incorrect."

After an exchange on our user talk pages, see User_Talk:HowardMorland|Palestine Map (exchange with DRosenbach), we have established that his only objection to the map was the word "Palestine" as the title. (On the same day, April 16, he also removed that word from two other parts of the article.) He stated on May 1, in our exchange, "Should the map be entitled ‘Palestine: a future look at what might constitute a Palestinian homeland' or something of this nature, I could have nothing to argue. If your point is to reinclude this map into the article, a title such as this would posit no declaration of official status yet allow you/the article to exhibit the occupied territories as a free and independent entity entirely divorced from Israel."

His suggested subtitle is clearly too many words for a map, but I note that some of the nuance he/she wanted was in the text you removed. Perhaps we could discuss restoring some of the text. Could you explain, in detail, your reasons for removing each of the phrases? Do you dispute the facts, the choice of words, etc.?

Thank you. HowardMorland 14:36, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your message. I'll respond briefly, in hope to have more time later. For now, let me say that you treat Palestine as a political entity, while it is a geographic region.

• To say that GS & WB are "the two territories most commonly designated today as Palestine" is wrong. Perhaps you meant Proposals for a Palestinian state.
• "connecting corridors that effectively confine..." - some think they confine, others think they defend. This is a kind of language that turns an article on a geographic region into a politicized WP:POVFORK of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. More later, sorry for the lack of time. Thanks. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 20:29, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sandbox for Fat Man Changes

[edit] Interior of bomb

The original blueprints of the interior of both Fat Man and Little Boy are still classified. However, much information about the main parts is available in the unclassified public literature. Of particular interest is a description of Fat Man sent to Moscow by Soviet spies at Los Alamos in 1945. It was released by the Russian government in 1992.^[1]

Below is a diagram of the main parts of the "Fat Man" bomb itself, followed by a more detailed look at the different materials used in the physics package of the bomb (the part responsible for the nuclear detonation).

AN 219 contact fuse (four) Archie radar antenna Plate with batteries (to detonate charge surrounding nuclear components) X-Unit, a firing set placed near the charge Hinge fixing the two ellipsoidal parts of the bomb Physics package (see details below) Plate with instruments (radars, baroswitches and timers) Barotube collector California Parachute tail assembly (.20-inch aluminium sheet)

[edit] Physics package

[edit] Assembly

To allow insertion of the plutonium pit as late as possible in the bomb's assembly, the spherical U-238 tamper had a 4" diameter cylindrical hole running through it, like the hole in a cored apple. The missing cylinder, containing the plutonium pit, could be slipped in through a hole in the surrounding aluminum pusher.

In 2003, these concentric spheres and cylinder were recreated as the centerpiece of an art installation called "Critical Assembly" by sculptor Jim Sanborn. Using non-nuclear materials, he replicated the internal components of the "Trinity" bomb, which had the same design as Fat Man. Critical Assembly was first displayed at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, in Washington, DC.^[2]

For dimensions and shapes, Sanborn relied on the unique work of nuclear historian John Coster-Mullen. His book, Atom Bombs, based on photos, documents, and oral histories he took from veterans of the 509th Composite Group which assembled and dropped the bombs, is also the main source for the diagrams in this article.^[3]

In August of 1945, the real thing was assembled on Tinian Island. When the physics package was fully assembled and wired, it was placed inside its ellipsoidal aerodynamic bombshell and wheeled to the bomb bay of a B-29 named "Bockscar" for its flight to Nagasaki on August 9.

[edit] Detonation sequence

The plutonium must be compressed to twice its normal density before free neutrons are added to start the fission chain reaction:

•      An exploding-bridgewire detonator simultaneously starts a detonation wave in each of the 32 tapered high explosive columns (12 pentagonal and 20 hexagonal - in the pattern of a soccer ball skin).
•      The detonation wave (arrows) is initially convex in the
•      faster explosive, Composition B: 60% RDX, 39% TNT, 1% wax. Its shape becomes concave in the
•      slower explosive (Baratol). The 32 waves merge into a single spherical implosive wave before they hit the
•      faster explosive, Composition B, of the inner charges.
•      The medium-density aluminum "pusher" transitions the imploding shock wave from low-density explosive to high-density uranium, minimizing undesirable turbulence; the shock wave then compresses the inner components. At the very center, the

•      beryllium–polonium-210 "initiator" (the "urchin") is crushed, bringing the two metals in contact to release a burst of neutrons into the compressed
•      "pit" of plutonium-239–plutonium-240–gallium delta-phase alloy (96%–1%–3% by molarity). A fission chain reaction starts. The tendency of the fissioning pit to prematurely blow itself apart is retarded by the inward momentum of the
•      natural-uranium "tamper" (inertial containment). The tamper also reflects neutrons back into the pit, speeding up the chain reaction.
•      The boron plastic shell was intended to protect the pit from stray neutrons, but was later deemed unnecessary.

The result is the fissioning of about two and a half of the thirteen pounds of plutonium in the pit, and the release of twenty-one kilotons of energy (21,000 tons of TNT).

[edit] Notes

[edit] Sandbox for Little Boy Changes

[edit] Counter-Intuitive Design

For the first fifty years after 1945, every published description and drawing of the Little Boy mechanism perpetuated the same mistake. It was natural to assume that a small, solid projectile was fired into the center of a larger target. That's how targets usually work, except in the game of horseshoes.^[1]

Critical mass considerations dictated that in Little Boy the larger, hollow piece would be the projectile. For the assembled fissile core to have more than two critical masses of U-235, one of the two pieces would need to have more than one critical mass, and to avoid criticality by means of shape, namely a hole in the middle. The ratio of mass to surface area determines criticality, because surface area allows fission neutrons to escape and avoid participating in a chain reaction.

It was also important for the larger piece to have minimal contact with the tamper of neutron-reflecting tungsten carbide until the moment of detonation. As the projectile, it would have only its back end in contact with tungsten carbide. The rest of the tungsten carbide could be installed around the target spike, called the "insert" by designers, where an air space would keep it away from the sides of the insert.^[2]

[edit] Physical Effects of the Bomb

Hiroshima was spared conventional bombing in order to serve as a pristine target, one where the effects of a nuclear bomb on previously undamaged urban real estate could be observed. While damage could be studied later, the energy yield of the untested Little Boy design could be determined only at the moment of detonation, using instruments dropped by parachute from a plane flying in formation with the one that dropped the bomb. Radio-transmitted data from these falling instruments indicated a yield of about a dozen kilotons.

Comparing this yield to the observed damage produced a rule of thumb called the 5 psi (pounds per square inch) lethal area rule. By that rule, the number of prompt fatalities equals the number of people inside the lethal area.

The damage came from three main effects: blast, fire, and radiation.^[3]

[edit] Blast

The blast from a nuclear bomb is the result of x-ray-heated air (the fireball) sending a shock/pressure wave in all directions at the speed of sound, analogous to thunder generated by a bolt of lightning. Studies of Little Boy at Hiroshima have given us most of what we know about urban blast destruction from nuclear weapons. Nagasaki was less useful in that respect because hilly terrain deflected the blast and generated a more complicated pattern of destruction.

At Hiroshima, severe structural damage to buildings extended about one mile in every direction from ground zero, making a circle of destruction two miles in diameter. There was little or no structural damage outside a two-mile radius. At one mile, the force of the blast wave was 5 psi, with enough duration to implode residential structures and reduce them to kindling as it passed. 5 psi is 720 pounds per square foot.

Later test explosions of nuclear weapons, with houses and other test structures placed nearby, confirmed that 5 psi is an important threshold figure. Ordinary urban buildings close enough to experience it will be crushed, toppled, or gutted by the force of air pressure. The picture at right shows the effects of a nuclear-bomb-generated 5 psi pressure wave on a test structure in Nevada in 1953.

The most important effect of this kind of structural damage was that it created fuel for a firestorm. For this reason, the 5 psi contour defines the lethal area for blast and fire.

[edit] Fire

The first effect of a nuclear explosion is blinding light, accompanied by radiant heat from the fireball. (The Hiroshima fireball was 1200 feet in diameter.) Near ground zero, everything flammable burst into flame, including human flesh. One famous, anonymous Hiroshima victim left only a shadow, permanently etched into stone steps near a bank building.

Some of the fires started by fireball heat were probably blown out by the following blast wave, like birthday candles puffed out by a child's breath, but not all were. And the blast wave would have started more fires from overturned stoves, wrecked vehicles, electrical shorts, etc. These numerous small fires quickly merged into a single firestorm which consumed everything inside the 5 psi lethal area.

The Hiroshima firestorm was thus two miles in diameter, corresponding closely to the severe blast damage zone. (See the USSBS map, right.) Blast-damaged buildings provided ideal fuel for the fire. Structural lumber and furniture were splintered and scattered about. Debris-choked roads prevented entry by fire fighters. Broken gas pipes fueled the fire, and broken water pipes rendered hydrants useless.

As the map shows, the firestorm easily jumped the natural firebreaks (river channels) as well as prepared firebreaks. The spread of fire stopped only when it reached the edge of the blast-damaged area and ran out of easily available fuel.

Accurate casualty figures are impossible because so many victims were cremated by the firestorm. For the same reason, the portion of firestorm victims who survived the blast and died of fire can never be known. Casualty figures are based on estimates of how many people were inside the lethal area when the bomb went off.

[edit] Radiation

Because Little Boy was detonated 1670 feet above the ground, as an air burst, there was no bomb crater and no radioactive fallout. Fallout is dust and ash from a bomb crater, contaminated with radioactive fission products. It falls back to the ground downwind of the crater and can easily produce, with radiation alone, a lethal area much larger than that from blast and fire. With an air burst, the fission products remain in aerosol form until they rise into the stratosphere, where they dissipate and become part of the global, rather than the local, environment.

However, an intense flux of neutron and gamma radiation came directly from the fireball. Most people close enough to receive lethal doses of that direct radiation died in the firestorm before their radiation injuries could become apparent. But survivors on the edge of the lethal area and beyond suffered injuries from radiation as well as from blast and fire.

Some temporary survivors died soon afterward of acute radiation illness, but most of the radiation effects show up statistically, as increases in cancer rates, birth defects, etc., over the lifetimes of the survivors and their descendants.

[edit] Notes

[edit] French version of schema of Little Boy

Hi, I have seen your message on my :fr page. I am going to make a vector version of this schema. I will leave a message here when I will have uploaded it. Your other illustrations are very interesting, I will probably convert them to SVG when I'll have some spare time. Just a tip, you should avoid using .gif format as it introduces dithering, png is better for illustrations ;) Cheers, Dake 18:40, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. If I could find software for SVG and learn to use it, I would. In the meantime, GIF and JPG are the only formats I am able to use. Can you suggest something? By the way, if you notice the section just above this one, you can see changes I am working on for the English text of Little Boy. HowardMorland 20:26, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

I use Inkscape. It is a free software to make vector graphics, it needs some time to get used to but you will find plenty of tutorials on the web. I finished converting the picture to SVG :

As you can see, I made it language-neutral using numerical labels. This is the handiest way to handle many languages, one just needs to add the information in the description. I took some freedom to improve the bullet and target. Dake 21:43, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh maybe you could be interested in this page I stumbled upon yesterday : http://www.snap2objects.com/2007/07/20/45-best-freeware-design-programs/ -- Dake 21:49, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] German Version of Little Boy

Letter to Hendrike on his/her talk page: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer_Diskussion:Hendrike

Sorry for writing in English. It's my only language. I noticed you recently edited the German Language version of the Hiroshima Bomb article "Little Boy." I have made some important changes to the English Language version, with new drawings. Could you, or someone else, translate the changes into German? For the drawing labels, which are embedded into the drawing, if someone could provide me a translation (on my discussion page), I can make and upload a German version. HowardMorland 17:06, 17. Sep. 2007 (CEST)

Hello HowardMorland, Thanks for your notice. Never mind writing in english :) I'll inform the main author of the article, so please be patient, could take a little while... --Hendrike 17:53, 17. Sep. 2007 (CEST)

Thanks. I forgot to mention that the best way to communicate with me is on my English discussion page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:HowardMorland

Please note my most recent changes to English Little Boy at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy HowardMorland 16:35, 27. Sep. 2007 (CEST)

[edit] Two-point diagram / NW design article update

Hah. That's probably the first accurate two-point diagram to ever hit the point it can be widely publically distributed... Georgewilliamherbert 02:07, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Re: Nuclear weapon design

Your decimal point formating is a little unconventional, but why not, feel free to revert. Same with the formula - note, though, that left-hand side subscripts are common for atomic numbers. GregorB (talk) 11:38, 2 February 2008 (UTC)