Physics Is Fun

Guesstimating there were ~25-30 cars ahead of us

Hurry up and wait. That's what we did this chilly (below-freezing!) morning to get in line for the Trinity Site Open House. I had been told that the queue to get through the Stallion Gate Entrance of the White Sands Missile Range could get quite long, so we arrived around 7:15AM for the 8:00AM opening. 

And why exactly were we here? The Trinity Site is the location where the first atomic bomb was tested on July 16, 1945. Now it is open to the public only twice a year, on the first Saturdays of April and October.

After the gate opened and we passed through the checkpoint (government-issued photo ID required), we joined the parade of cars to the site. Once there, we decided to go see the McDonald Ranch House first since a line for the shuttle bus hadn't formed yet. 

The master bedroom (through the open doorway in the center) was used
as a clean room to assemble the plutonium core of the bomb

"Trinity Site where the world's first nuclear
device was exploded on July 16, 1945"

After we returned back to the parking lot, we walked about a quarter-mile to Ground Zero. The monument, a lava rock obelisk, marks the exact center of the explosion.

All that remains of one of the footings from the 100-foot tower
which suspended the bomb above the ground

Trinitite is the green glassy substance which covered the desert floor following the Trinity test. It is believed that much of the mineral was formed by sand which was taken up into the atomic fireball itself and then rained back down as a liquid and cooled on the ground. While most of it was removed by the government in the early 1950s, trace amounts can still be found. However, it is illegal to take any from the site. 

No radioactive souvenirs for you, J!

Clearly, we weren't the only ones interested in seeing this place!

Bomb casing (left) similar to the one used for Fatman

After exiting the missile range, we started our long drive back to Phoenix via US-60, with one small detour... the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Very Large Array.

Recognize it from the Jodie Foster movie, "Contact"?

The VLA was also holding an open house today, so we took a tour of the facility with one of the staff members. Science geek alert! We learned that the radio telescopes collect data in concert, so that they essentially function as a single giant telescope. The telescopes sit on rails so that they can be repositioned into four different configurations, ranging from two-thirds of a mile to 23 miles across. The wider an array is, the bigger its eye is, and the more detail it can see out in space. Pretty cool! 

Each dish is 82 feet in diameter

From the Very Large Array, it took us about 2.5 hours to reach Show Low, although we got an hour back when we crossed into Arizona. I really enjoyed driving this stretch of road across the high plateau - so beautiful! After a quick stop for ice cream (of course!), it took us about 3 hours more to come down from the mountains through the Apache-Sitgreaves and Tonto National Forests via AZ-260 and AZ-87.

Our final stop was a Phoenix restaurant featured on "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" - Paradise Valley Burger Company! J had been looking forward to eating here the entire trip!

Totally worth the wait!