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Trinity Test, July 16, 1945 - Eyewitness Accounts

Color photo of Trinity test by Jack Aeby

The first atomic bomb, a plutonium implosion device, was tested in the desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico at 5:29:45 a.m. on July 16, 1945.

Even 32 kilometers (20 miles) away, observers felt the heat of the explosion on exposed skin. The radiation level in the rising mushroom cloud was so intense that it emitted a blue glow.

Enrico Fermi dropped pieces of paper to estimate the force of the blast. Luis Alvarez, flying in an observation plane, made sketches of the cloud. Cyril Smith came to “the realization that a city is henceforth not the place in which to live.”

Eyewitness accounts of the Trinity test by:

Luis W. Alvarez

Enrico Fermi

Kenneth Greisen

Edwin M. McMillan

Philip Morrison

Robert Serber

Maurice M. Shapiro

Cyril S. Smith

Victor Weisskopf

Color photo of Trinity test by Jack Aeby, Los Alamos Laboratory.