# No Boom? Scientists forget how to build atom bomb. Newslink **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 15, 2009, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885 "2009-06-15T22:50:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/1 "2009-06-15T22:50:11Z")
no boom? > **[Scientists Forget How to Build Nuclear Bomb](http://www.allgov.com/news/unusual-news/scientists-forget-how-to-build-nuclear-bomb?news=838928)** > > After spending billions of dollars to create the nation’s stockpile of nuclear weapons, the government’s top scientific minds apparently forgot one very important task: Write down the instructions for how to make a nuclear weapon explode. Such is ... > [@](#): > > In order to keep the nuclear arsenal primed for war, the government needs to replace aging warheads that first came off the assembly line in the 1970s and 1980s with refurbished models—only they can’t because no one working today at the nation’s weapons laboratories knows how to fashion a key element that makes the warheads blow up. At the center of this huge problem is a particular warhead known as the W76, which makes up more than half of the U.S. arsenal, and is used in the Navy’s Trident missile submarine system. Well, I’ll be double-damned.:mad: ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/2 "2009-06-15T23:05:05Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > No boom? No boom _today_. Boom tomorrow. There’s always a boom tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![Stealth\_Potato](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Stealth\_Potato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stealth_Potato)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/3 "2009-06-15T23:27:15Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > No boom _today_. Boom tomorrow. There’s always a boom tomorrow. And boom yesterday. The rule is, boom tomorrow and boom yesterday, but never boom today. It’s boom every _other_ day, you see. ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/4 "2009-06-15T23:27:51Z")
Great! Now if only we could forget what they’re used for… ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/5 "2009-06-15T23:28:03Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > No boom _today_. Boom tomorrow. There’s always a boom tomorrow. Cue Annie: “The boom’ll go offffffff TO-morrow! Your atoms smashed together, on tomorrow, like the sun! The boom’ll come out, TO-morrow! Clears away the buildings and the cities, 'til there’s none!” ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/6 "2009-06-15T23:34:10Z")
Having worked in the military-industrial complex, I know that ordnance (bombs) is perhaps the most thoroughly documented product on earth. The detail of the documentation is beyond belif. So, I think a bit of exaggeration is involved. ---
**Author:** ![kitemaker\_chuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a88e4f/32.png) [@kitemaker\_chuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kitemaker_chuck)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/7 "2009-06-16T00:22:17Z")
I guess there’s always "boom for improvement’! ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/8 "2009-06-16T00:40:45Z")
Not the most well-written article, since at best (worst?) no one’s forgotten how to build nuclear weapons, just how to manufacture one component, and that component apparently is used only in compact thermonuclear (fusion) weapons. Presumably we can still merrily build and detonate the old-fashioned big-assed fission kind to our heart’s content if we want. Seems the specific item that’s giving trouble is known as [‘fogbank’](http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/1814/fogbank), an aerogel that presumably is somewhat more complicated to manufacture than polystyrene, which, I seem to recall reading somewhere, was used in some of the early fission weapons. BTW, the blog I linked to (also reachable from the OP’s link) has a number of wonderful little bits of lore in it, including this gem of top secretness: > [@Dennis Ruddy of](#): > > “It reprocesses a material that we’re taking out of weapons so that we can reuse it in refurbished weapons. That’s probably all I can say.” > > “The material is classified. Its composition is classified. Its use in the weapon is classified, and the process itself is classified,” Ruddy said. In fact, please forget that you just read any of that. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/9 "2009-06-16T01:01:23Z")
Cue John Lee Hooker: Boomboomboomboom: gonna shoot ya right down, Boomboomboomboom: If I only knew how. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/10 "2009-06-16T01:36:22Z")
So, nobody thought to write this information down? They don’t have engineering drawing document control? Maybe it’s written under the drawer in a desk or something, like the combination to the wall safe. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Knig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@Typo\_Knig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Knig)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/11 "2009-06-16T02:00:22Z")
\Where’s the ka-boom? There’s supposed to be an earth-shattering ka-boom! And who took my Illudium-Pu36 explosive space mod-u-lator? I’m getting angry! (Huff. Puff.) So very angry! (Huff. Puff.) K-9, go get that retired earth creature weapons scientist! Here’s a pot full of money you can use as bait. \ ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/12 "2009-06-16T03:17:31Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > In fact, please forget that you just read any of that. fnord ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/13 "2009-06-16T03:54:25Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > So, nobody thought to write this information down? > They don’t have engineering drawing document control? > Maybe it’s written under the drawer in a desk or something, like the combination to the wall safe. IIRC from the last time I heard this story, they lost the original information. Being so secret there weren’t a lot of copies, or a lot of directions as to where the data was stored which made that a lot easier to lose it. ---
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/14 "2009-06-16T03:57:35Z")
So, I guess there is no need to worry about North Korea or Iran developing these weapons. Wheew, that was close. I call BS along with Ralph124c. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/15 "2009-06-16T06:35:10Z")
Have they tried looking under the couch cushions? ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/16 "2009-06-16T07:28:10Z")
A limited supply substance called “fogbank” that has to be replaced due to deterioration sounds like tritium gas to me. Fog being linked to water and thus tritium (hydrogen-3). [From Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium): \*\* Production history According to IEER’s 1996 report about the United States Department of Energy, only 225 kg of tritium has been produced in the US since 1955. Since it is continuously decaying into helium-3, the stockpile was approximately 75 kg at the time of the report.[3] Tritium for American nuclear weapons was produced in special heavy water reactors at the Savannah River Site until their shutdown in 1988; with the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty after the end of the Cold War, existing supplies were sufficient for the new, smaller number of nuclear weapons for some time. Production was resumed with irradiation of lithium-containing rods (replacing the usual boron-containing control rods) at the commercial Watts Bar Nuclear Generating Station in 2003-2005 followed by extraction of tritium from the rods at the new Tritium Extraction Facility at SRS starting in November 2006\*\* ---
**Author:** ![BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/17 "2009-06-16T07:59:36Z")
If they need more tritium, they just need to go stop Dr Octopus from making a mini sun again. ---
**Author:** ![gravitycrash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@gravitycrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gravitycrash)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/18 "2009-06-16T14:04:56Z")
Even though most stories about incompetence of our government are believable this one is really doubtful. It somewhat reminds me of the story that NASA somehow lost the blueprints of the Saturn V rocket. Yeah, they just misplaced them in the same huge warehouse where the Ark of the Covenant was placed. ---
**Author:** ![Kingspades](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecae2f/32.png) [@Kingspades](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kingspades)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/19 "2009-06-16T15:01:08Z")
I thought I’d heard about this before, and then once I heard the term “fogbank” I remembered this was a the subject of a [Slashdot discussion](http://tech.slashdot.org/tech/09/03/09/1428240.shtml) back in March. Some of the more interesting opinions from that page: > [@](#): > > This issue is a far more worrisome problem. Due to the need for secrecy (there was a HUGE concern that the USSR would obtain our technology), many of the steps were maintained as secrets in people’s heads rather than on paper. That makes it difficult to combat the brain drain that invariably happened both as the engineers and researchers aged and the Cold War wound down. > [@](#): > > The material in the design specification was essentially unobtanium. It couldn’t be manufactured at all. Quietly, the manufacturing engineers developed a solution that almost met all of the design specifications, and this was an excellent compromise. Unfortunately, the design engineers couldn’t be convinced to sign off on the design change because of quality procedure 15, and military qualification 7. However, the biggest reason the design engineers wouldn’t sign off on the change was because of a supposedly critical but practically useless mandatory project requirement, like the missile must work when fired in -40 degree water from 20 feet under the polar ice shelf. > > The manufacturing engineers decided that the “fire nuclear missile while under ice shelf function”, probably wouldn’t be used, so the modified material was actually just fine. They shipped the missiles, got paid, and everyone was happy. Until now, when someone tries to “fix” the original “fix”. > > This story has happened before and will happen again. Whenever you bump into a design that requires a part that “does not exist”, watch out for the possibility that the part never did “exist”. It could be that you are reading a “design” document, and not what manufacturing actually built. I’ve worked in manufacturing, and there are lots of stories about impossible to make designs that somehow got shipped. > [@](#): > > Having worked at this facility in the '80’s as an engineer, I can say definitively that this scenario is either misunderstood, or incorrectly reported, or deliberately obfuscated, or a lie, or postulated from sketchy evidence, but it is factually and wholly wrong. > > Every project for every material or product, special or otherwise, was properly documented. These files would not be destroyed. (Note here that I’m assuming the files on “fogbank” were not lost in an accident or by malicious destruction.) > > Now, has the practical and hands-on knowledge of the step-by-step, moment-by-moment synthesis reaction to make this material been lost? Perhaps in the course of 25 years it has. Lots of people have left the plant since then. But all the information, notations and observations necessary to reconstruct the process/project do exist, I assure you. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2009, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885/20 "2009-06-16T15:59:01Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > So, nobody thought to write this information down? > > They don’t have engineering drawing document control? > > Maybe it’s written under the drawer in a desk or something, like the combination to the wall safe. There is often more to a design than just the information represented in the engineering documentation. Sometimes there are production methods which are not fully documented and highly operator dependent (informally called “tribal knowledge”). Or there is a particular piece of tooling that is no longer available and the information to manufacture it is not in evidence, requiring expensive and error-prone reverse engineering. And yes, sometimes information becomes abandoned after production is shut down and is lost in some archive or damaged beyond use by improper storage methods. > [@gravitycrash](#): > > Even though most stories about incompetence of our government are believable this one is really doubtful. It somewhat reminds me of the story that NASA somehow lost the blueprints of the Saturn V rocket. Yeah, they just misplaced them in the same huge warehouse where the Ark of the Covenant was placed. As it happens, I work with legacy rocket systems, and it has been the case in many instances that the engineering documentation, particularly information like Design Analysis Reports, test reports, and attendant data and models, which are not necessary for production builds, is irretrievably lost, damaged in storage, or the “Best Available Copy” is too blurry or incomplete to build from. In the particular case of the Apollo system, I know for a fact that while the engineering drawings for the Lunar Module are still available, many of the tooling drawings, material specifications, vendor procured component specs, et cetera are not available, having been lost or destroyed by subcontractors to Grumman, thus making it impossible to produce a LM to the same specifications as the original. I can’t speak to the Saturn rocket system other than to note that while certain elements are still in use today, many of the subcontractors to The Boeing Company such as Rocketdyne, Douglas Aircraft, Fairchild Semiconductor, North American Aviation, et cetera, have gone through numerous mergers, reorganizations, buyouts, et cetera, and so both the official documentation and tribal knowledge has certainly been lost. As for the case linked by the o.p., the engineering and scientist talent for the nuclear weapon industry has declined dramatically due to uncertainty in the long term stability of those jobs, lack of prestige, and opportunities for young graduates in other fields. I would find it not at all surprising that there is difficulty in reproducing some elements of nuclear designs, though I would be surprised if complete manufacturing and aging surveillance documentation were not available for a weapon maintained in the Active Stockpile. As a side note, the W76 has a reputation for being a somewhat craptastic design that has some significant safety and reliability concerns. SWFPAC was replacing W76 with the more modern W88 warheads on the D-5 Trident II SLBMs that are fully one-point-safe compliant and use insensitive high explosive until Savannah River shut down plutonium production. I’m surprised that the Navy isn’t decommissioning W76s given the scaling back of the Strategic Fleet. Stranger [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-boom-scientists-forget-how-to-build-atom-bomb-newslink/499885.md?page=2)