OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (WATE) — Wednesday marks 80 years since the Manhattan Project‘s Trinity test, and the American Nuclear Society is commemorating Oak Ridge’s role in bringing World War II to an end.
The Trinity test was conducted on July 16, 1945, more than 200 miles south of Los Alamos, New Mexico. It marked the first detonation of a nuclear device. The Department of Energy says J. Robert Oppenheimer called the site Trinity in reference to a poem by John Donne. Manhattan Project facilities in Oak Ridge supplied enriched uranium used to create the atomic bomb.
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“As the country commemorates the 80th anniversary of the Trinity Test in New Mexico, the American Nuclear Society honors the 80,000 workers who worked on the Manhattan Project in Tennessee. Then known as the ‘Secret City,’ Oak Ridge played a vital role in supplying enriched uranium for the Manhattan Project, helping to bring a swift conclusion to the Second World War,” said Dr. H.M. “Hash” Hashemian, President of the American Nuclear Society.
While it is no longer hidden from the public’s eye, Oak Ridge remains a vital part of the national laboratory system. The city is home to several cutting-edge projects advancing nuclear technology, from TVA’s plan to build the United States’ first small modular reactor to a new multi-billion-dollar uranium enrichment facility set to open in the early 2030s.
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“The legacy of Tennessee’s World War II generation of nuclear pioneers lives on today—from the TVA’s carbon-free nuclear power to the life-saving nuclear medicine and cancer treatments in hospitals across the Tennessee Valley and beyond,” said Hashemian.
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Many of the buildings built for the Manhattan Project have been demolished or are set to be demolished as the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management takes down contaminated facilities and removes nuclear waste. Early this month, OREM allowed 6 News to view the progress on the open-air cleanup underway at the Alpha-2 facility…