Jack Aeby

Jack W. Aeby (; August 16, 1923 – June 19, 2015) was an American environmental physicist most famous for having taken the only well-exposed color photograph of the first detonation of a nuclear weapon on July 16, 1945 at the Trinity nuclear test site in New Mexico.

Early life

Jack Aeby was born on August 16, 1923 in Mound City, Missouri, United States.

Career

In 1942, Aeby joined the Manhattan Project by filling out an employment application in Albuquerque. He did a lot of jobs, including ferrying scientists and equipment between Albuquerque and Los Alamos. Though a civilian, he worked his way up into the SED (Special Engineering Detachment) in technician roles and eventually witnessed nearly 100 nuclear explosions. After getting his degree at UC Berkeley after the war, he returned, in the Health Physics Department.

On July 16, 1945, Aeby took the only well-exposed color photograph of the first detonation of a nuclear weapon at the Trinity nuclear test site in New Mexico.

While color motion pictures of the Trinity test were made, most were badly overexposed or damaged due to the fireball's tendency to blister and solarize the film. Aeby was a civilian assigned to the Physics Group 5 with Emilio Segrè and Owen Chamberlain at the time his snapshot was taken.

The photo was taken with a Perfex 33 with a 35mm lens, using a shutter speed of 1/100 at f4 and Anscochrome color movie stock film.

Aeby was not an official observer at the test site, but was invited along to take informal photos of the work, which he had commonly done since he arrived at Los Alamos. He says he took the photos of the blast on a whim, "it was there so I shot it". He took the film, a non-standard piece of Ansochrome movie stock film, out of the camera that night at a local photo lab, and worked it through the 21 step procedure for color film developing. Later on, Los Alamos management asked him if they could keep the original negative "for safe keeping". It has since been lost.

Aeby says in most uses of the photo it is reversed. This was done intentionally so that the asymmetrical fireball and cloud would look the same as other official pictures taken from the north; Aeby was on the south at the Base Camp when he took the picture.

Aeby is a source for a story about a notable estimate made by Enrico Fermi at that test:

Personal life

Aeby lived in the Española Valley in northern New Mexico with his wife Jeanne. They had 5 children. Aeby died at his home in Española in 2015.Victoria (Australia)

See also

* Berlyn Brixner – official Trinity test photographer

References

Further reading

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External links

2003 Video Interview with Jack Aeby by Atomic Heritage Foundation
Voices of the Manhattan Project
Jack Aeby, Atom-Bomb Photographer
(MP3) on NPR's ''All Things Considered'' (July 15, 2005)
Jack Aeby exhibit
at the Los Alamos Historical Museum (photos), ''The Los Alamos Monitor''

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aeby, Jack
1923 births
2015 deaths
American nuclear engineers
American photographers
Los Alamos National Laboratory personnel
Manhattan Project people
People from Lawrence County, Missouri
People from Española, New Mexico
Physicists from Missouri
Scientists from Missouri