The Trinity explosion, 16 milliseconds after detonation. The fireball is about 600 feet (200 m) wide.

loveandromeda · 2012-10-09T18:08:31+00:00

Looks like Scrubbing Bubbles...

Shoeba · 2012-10-09T22:25:17+00:00

Here is another picture with a scale and in color

YellowJinn · 2012-10-09T19:46:01+00:00

Why is this in r/wtf? it's so cool

angstycoder · 2012-10-09T19:24:13+00:00

Looks like someone made Jell-o overtop of Feta cheese crumbles.

NoblePotatoe · 2012-10-09T20:00:54+00:00

I use this exact image in a Fluid Mechanics lecture where use Dimensional Analysis to estimate the energy of the bomb that created this fireball knowing only that it was exploded on earth, the time between detonation and the picture, and the width of the fireball.

Its one of my favorite lectures!

snaggletooth84 · 2012-10-09T23:10:20+00:00

"I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

cefarix · 2012-10-09T20:13:31+00:00

This is awesome and cool. Not WTF wtf. First time a non-wtf post on WTF has actually made me angry :X This belongs in /r/woahdude ...

Zenitram · 2012-10-09T19:13:01+00:00

Is that a ball of plasma?

drunkendonuts · 2012-10-09T19:29:11+00:00

Have fun.

crash7800 · 2012-10-09T22:28:47+00:00

This raises the question - Why didn't we equip Curiosity with a nuke to set off?

Would have been pretty cool looking. Reasonable use of resources.

scosha4502 · 2012-10-09T21:42:02+00:00

It looks to me like the Moon slamming into Earth.

Ali_Tarpati · 2012-10-10T02:16:02+00:00

Here's another nuclear explosion microseconds after detonation

Done by Harold Eugene Edgerton

Another - "It's full of stars!"

SimilarImage · 2012-10-09T18:30:25+00:00

Age	User	Title	Reddit	Cmnt	Points
2 months	w_is_for_tungsten	Picture of Trinity the first ever nuclear test [1483x1000]	/r/MilitaryPorn	13	190
10 months	F1zz0	The world's first nuclear explosion, 23ms after detonation (600 feet wide)	/r/pics	21	87
1 year	CheatasaurusRex	.016 seconds after a nuclear detonation	/r/pics	128	328

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rubeon · 2012-10-09T23:30:22+00:00

Scrubbing Bubbles!

STLouay · 2012-10-09T22:04:23+00:00

Good guy OP. posts in measurements in feet and meters.

photoengineer · 2012-10-09T22:15:57+00:00

I'm impressed they were able to guestimate the exposure for the photo without ever having set off a nuke before.

heath185 · 2012-10-09T23:33:34+00:00

I was actually fortunate enough to meet one of the people present at this nuclear test. He gave a talk to my work on it about a month or two ago. At the time he was essentially making electric parts for the bomb at Los Alamos Lab while in the military. Now he has a doctorate in physics and does quite a bit of research in high energy physics. Any ways they were a few miles out from ground zero and they were instructed to go prone on the ground. This guy being the stubborn bastard he was decided to say fuck it because he didn't want to lay in the mud. So he found a nice stump to sit on. Once the shockwave got to him he said it just kinda pushed him off the stump a few feet back into the mud haha. It's still amazing to me that such small nuclear payloads still have that power. Definitely would not want to be around for a modern age nuclear warhead, let alone a 65 year throwback.

malcolmxtacy · 2012-10-09T22:03:39+00:00

uhh cool picture bro, but definitely not WTF material

NoctisIgnem · 2012-10-09T23:08:22+00:00

For those wanting it in a more awesome wallpaper style, I made it into a coloured fractal wallpaper.

GotAirSpeed · 2012-10-09T21:29:57+00:00

not WTF

ramblingnonsense · 2012-10-09T19:19:48+00:00

I think this picture, or one very like it, was in the book Cosmos. When I was little I didn't realize what it was, I thought it was some kind of celestial object like most of the other pictures in that book...

balooistrue · 2012-10-09T19:52:51+00:00

So, physically, what are we actually seeing here? Is it a big bubble of plasma like when I do that grape-in-the-microwave thing?

IDrankAllTheBooze · 2012-10-09T20:05:09+00:00

Makes a good album cover too.

TheMadmanAndre · 2012-10-09T20:14:40+00:00

I bet there's a reel of slo-mo footage in an archive somewhere of the Trinity Test. I'd love to see it if it exists.

deadken · 2012-10-09T22:11:40+00:00

Damn Scrubbing Bubbles....

Darkstar68 · 2012-10-09T22:37:55+00:00

What is the name of the documentary that shows the beauty of these explosions in vivid color?

gravion17 · 2012-10-09T22:44:17+00:00

...and BOOM goes the dynamite!

Whostolemahinternetz · 2012-10-09T22:53:50+00:00

How could a series of APU cause this much destruction?!

Pat1234567890 · 2012-10-09T22:54:35+00:00

Wow. thats not a mushroom cloud. thats a jellyfish cloud.

superbad · 2012-10-09T23:17:09+00:00

/r/THATISFUCKINGAWESOME

Scarabesque · 2012-10-09T23:18:01+00:00

Would anybody else support one final round of nuclear weapons tests in a variety of environments, just so we can archive the footage for future generations in ways that seem fitting to this awful yet amazing piece of human technology?

Then silly movies like this would have the option to switch to 1080p.

AssBusiness · 2012-10-09T23:23:43+00:00

Are you serious, why is this WTF worthy? You seriously need to rethink your life if this is WTF to you.

not_me_but · 2012-10-09T23:29:05+00:00

Rope trick effect

abqcub · 2012-10-09T23:38:39+00:00

I was just there this weekend, they only open the site twice a year. It was exceptionally boring. Its just a plot of sparse desert land with a stone monument in the middle. The highlight of my trip was seeing a gigantic tarantula cross the road. There's some cool stones out there called Trinitite that were made from the super heat and radiation of the blast.

attentionpute · 2012-10-09T23:41:20+00:00

I wonder how they calculate the apperture. Maybe they just keep it as closed as they can or lots of ND filters.

tonygenius · 2012-10-09T23:44:59+00:00

Looks like somebody spilled their popcorn

copeling · 2012-10-09T23:45:25+00:00

Watch trinity and beyond for much much larger WTF.

duchovny · 2012-10-09T23:51:15+00:00

WTF?

cjthomas16 · 2012-10-09T23:55:59+00:00

nuke or jelly fish?

naonak · 2012-10-10T00:04:18+00:00

Thank you for metric.

Daniel_Cross · 2012-10-10T00:15:02+00:00

Wo, um, is it a picture or a really slow moving gif i have no idea...

SnowblindAlbino · 2012-10-10T00:30:09+00:00

I've stood at the base of the Trinity tower, or at least on what little is left of it (a few bits of steel in concrete). It's an awesome experience, in the old, meaningful sense of that word. Hard to imagine such forces unleashed there, or what it must have been like to see the flash reflect off the mountains to the east in person. Few other places I've been have felt so connected with history-- the bridge of the USS Missouri, some places inside the White House, etc. but those pale in comparison to Trinity.

coldcoast · 2012-10-10T00:31:29+00:00

KA-NE-DAAAAAAAA!!!!!

Non_Sane · 2012-10-10T00:35:11+00:00

Is that why the cod map "nuketown" is on trinity ave.?

ocher_stone · 2012-10-10T00:38:10+00:00

Time lapse of the nuclear explosions up to 1998.

I liked it.

WhodidCainMarry · 2012-10-10T00:39:52+00:00

Holy crap, that took only 8 milliseconds to get from ground zero to 100m out. That's faster than Usain Bolt.

korevil · 2012-10-10T00:39:52+00:00

So, r/science, what exactly are we seeing here?

newmexico · 2012-10-10T00:43:52+00:00

Visited the Trinity site last year. It was awesome. Took a piece of trinitite and I keep it in my nightstand.. I should probably move it to avoid the brain cancer it's probably giving me

SirJiggart · 2012-10-10T00:58:32+00:00

Its humbling to think this the result of breaking the tiniest things in the universe apart, and Trinity was pale in comparison to the Soviet 'Tsar' bomb.

Koffee_Kat · 2012-10-10T01:03:55+00:00

Looks like someone spilled a bowl of cottage cheese.

krankie1 · 2012-10-10T01:05:31+00:00

yeah, you see these all the time in the NES version of Metroid.

Xervicx · 2012-10-10T01:11:54+00:00

Now I want icecream. I never thought this subreddit would make me want tasty treats...

iamlegend188 · 2012-10-10T01:31:19+00:00

HOT damn.

MacabreReuben · 2012-10-10T01:34:00+00:00

Jellyfish!

jelde · 2012-10-10T01:40:40+00:00

In another millionth of a second, a planet of fire exists, silhouetting and dwarfing the Joshua Trees.

ApeofBass · 2012-10-10T01:41:20+00:00

You're all wrong! It is a metroid!!

JimmySticks2001 · 2012-10-10T01:54:34+00:00

I'm not certain if this is one of his photographs, but Harold Edgerton is the guy that made the camera that allowed for shutter speeds as little as two microseconds. Here is a page about him, his camera, and his pictures. There is a neat video too. Harold Edgerton

The camera was 7 miles away with a ten fool long lens.

fffawn · 2012-10-10T01:56:38+00:00

The little specks on the horizon are trees, guys.

geeeachoweteaeye · 2012-10-10T02:09:51+00:00

Assuming that it's height would be equal to its width at this point (which it isn't quite),

V = 12499.76 m/s

hungrytrex · 2012-10-10T02:21:49+00:00

So it began.. the atomic age

avocadoadvocate · 2012-10-10T02:38:11+00:00

For the first time, I went onto google maps and found a local street to get an idea of 200 metres. That shit is mental... can't even imagine and explosion the size of a nuclear weapon...

9-1-Holyshit · 2012-10-10T02:49:22+00:00

Fun fact - Those dots at the base of the thing. Those really tiny black dots, yea their full size trees.

Celebreth · 2012-10-10T03:05:59+00:00

/r/historyporn is >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> that way

Don't see how this is wtf ಠ_ಠ

Clownpounder2442 · 2012-10-10T03:18:01+00:00

Metroid

R3public0fD00M · 2012-10-10T03:32:30+00:00

War... War never changes...

CottageMcMurphy · 2012-10-10T04:50:05+00:00

The splotches are fragments of the bomb itself.

colindavis503 · 2012-10-10T04:53:59+00:00

It's a giant zit

xrelaht · 2012-10-10T06:10:42+00:00

/r/PerfectTiming

CallMeDOK · 2012-10-10T06:14:30+00:00

Why is this WTF? dv.

Receptical_4_shittin · 2012-10-10T06:51:31+00:00

the guy repeating everyone gets down voted 44 times,but the guys that post the same picture of a scrubing bubble get 100+ karma WTF.

Phaquebzech · 2012-10-10T07:35:42+00:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ru2PWmGIoB8#t=40s

rumpltrumpl · 2012-10-09T20:19:20+00:00

put this in r/woahdude. i'm sure they'd appreciate it more.

fitz3141 · 2012-10-09T20:29:07+00:00

Thats 45 000 km/h (27962 mph). Thats pretty cool.

mrwoolery · 2012-10-09T20:59:45+00:00

Scrubbing bubbles!

Pyrarson · 2012-10-10T01:53:57+00:00

"I am the clitoris!"

Texas_ · 2012-10-09T20:30:30+00:00

Is anyone else bothered by the 600ft (200m) conversion?

adidasaids · 2012-10-09T21:35:25+00:00

Reminds me of cumming after not fapping for a week.

tribalEDMpromotions · 2012-10-09T18:53:18+00:00

I was so sure that was moving

GillStipe · 2012-10-09T19:32:46+00:00

From the thumbnail I thought it was a helmet.

parsi328 · 2012-10-09T19:59:05+00:00

I'm not the only one who thinks it is moving a tiny bit right?

WTF

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