Trinity Test — First Nuclear Weapon Detonated

At 5:29 AM Mountain War Time on July 16, 1945, the world's first nuclear weapon was detonated at the Trinity test site in the Jornada del Muerto desert of New Mexico. The 'Gadget' (a plutonium implosion device similar to the Nagasaki bomb) yielded approximately 21 kilotons. A blinding flash was seen 250 miles away; the blast wave knocked observers off their feet at 10 miles. Manhattan Project director J. Robert Oppenheimer recalled the Bhagavad Gita: 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' The successful test confirmed that atomic bombs were ready for operational use against Japan.