Operation Redwing was a United States series of 17

nuclear test Nuclear weapons tests are experiments carried out to determine nuclear weapons' effectiveness, yield, and explosive capability. Testing nuclear weapons offers practical information about how the weapons function, how detonations are affected by ...

detonations from May to July 1956. They were conducted at

Bikini A bikini is a two-piece swimsuit primarily worn by women that features two triangles of fabric on top that cover the breasts, and two triangles of fabric on the bottom: the front covering the pelvis but exposing the navel, and the back coveri ...

and

Enewetak Enewetak Atoll (; also spelled Eniwetok Atoll or sometimes Eniewetok; mh, Ānewetak, , or , ; known to the Japanese as Brown Atoll or Brown Island; ja, ブラウン環礁) is a large coral atoll of 40 islands in the Pacific Ocean and with it ...

atolls by Joint Task Force 7 (JTF7).Blumenson, Martin and Hugh D. Hexamer (1956). ''A History of Operation Redwing: The Atomic Weapons Tests in the Pacific''. Joint Task Force Seven Headquarters, Washington, D.C. p. 19. The entire operation followed '' Project 56'' and preceded ''

Project 57 Project 57 was an open-air nuclear test conducted by the United States at the Nellis Air Force Range in 1957, following Operation Redwing, and preceding Operation Plumbbob. The test area, also known as Area 13, was a by block of land ...

''. The primary intention was to test new, second-generation

thermonuclear weapon A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a lowe ...

s. Also tested were fission devices intended to be used as primaries for thermonuclear weapons, and small tactical weapons for air defense. ''Redwing'' demonstrated the first United States airdrop of a deliverable

hydrogen bomb A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a lowe ...

during test ''Cherokee''. Because the yields for many tests at

Operation Castle Operation Castle was a United States series of high-yield (high-energy) nuclear tests by Joint Task Force 7 (JTF-7) at Bikini Atoll beginning in March 1954. It followed ''Operation Upshot–Knothole'' and preceded ''Operation Teapot''. Condu ...

in 1954 were dramatically higher than predictions, ''Redwing'' was conducted using an "energy budget": There were limits to the total amount of energy released, and the amount of fission yield was also strictly controlled. Fission, primarily "fast" fission of the natural

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

tamper surrounding the fusion capsule, greatly increases the yield of thermonuclear devices, and constitutes the great majority of the

fallout Nuclear fallout is the residual radioactive material propelled into the upper atmosphere following a nuclear blast, so called because it "falls out" of the sky after the explosion and the shock wave has passed. It commonly refers to the radioac ...

, as

nuclear fusion Nuclear fusion is a reaction in which two or more atomic nuclei are combined to form one or more different atomic nuclei and subatomic particles ( neutrons or protons). The difference in mass between the reactants and products is manifest ...

is a relatively clean reaction. All shots were named after various Native American

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English language, English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in p ...

Redwing series tests

References

External links

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Summary and review of ''The Atomic Times''
{{Authority control Explosions in 1956

Redwing The redwing (''Turdus iliacus'') is a bird in the thrush family, Turdidae, native to Europe and the Palearctic, slightly smaller than the related song thrush. Taxonomy and systematics This species was first described by Carl Linnaeus in h ...

1956 in military history 1956 in the environment 1950s in the Marshall Islands 1956 in the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands