Eleven more launches were made from USS Boxer in the waters near Eniwetak
from March 9 to April 18, 1958, just before HARDTACK I began. The purpose of
these flights was to familiarize the Air Force launch crew and Navy crew with
launch procedures. These flights also tested the instrumentation and telemetry systems. In all, 76 balloons were launched in preparation for the event.
On the morning of April 28, USS Boxer sailed from Bikini to the launch point.
The bomb was assembled and armed and the balloon released at 11:25. During the
ascent the nuclear device was separated from the balloon a distance of 568 feet by
a hydraulic load-lowering device and the measurement instrumentation was additionally deployed along a nylon line at specific intervals totaling 3,000 feet below
it. At 12:50 the balloon achieved a floating altitude of 26 km (85,500 ft) and finally
at 14:40 the nuclear device was detonated by radio command at a point 136 km
(85 mi) northeast of Eniwetak. The device delivered a yield of 1.7 kilotons – relatively small by the standards of that time. The fact that a nuclear detonation creates an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) was discovered during the earliest days of
nuclear weapons testing, but the magnitude of the EMP and the significance of its
effects weren’t realized for some time. According to the data published in the final
report of HARDTACK (declassified several years later) YUCCA provided the first
indication in the U.S. nuclear test program that high altitude EMP could be more
than 1,000 times as intense as EMP at low altitude. The data was so different from
that expected that it was generally ignored until after the 1962 tests of Operation
FISHBOWL had proven the earlier theory of high altitude EMP to have been dramatically incorrect.
For a 1:41 minute film of the Yucca balloon test, go to:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ro9mKomIuww&feature=youtu.be
The 1956 movie “On the Threshold of Space”
Another important project carried out at Holloman AFB in the Cold War era was
HIGH DIVE, a study of high altitude escape systems. Under this initiative, the
group assisted with dozens of balloons that carried life-sized anthropomorphic
dummies that were released at high altitude to test different types of parachutes
and to study the rate of spin they acquired with conventional systems. Several of
these launches were conducted from remote locations around the base in order to
take advantage in different months of the prevailing winds to drop the dummies
inside the restricted areas of the WSMR. By that time, the Air Force Cambridge
Research Laboratories (AFCRL) had taken over the overall responsibility of the
development work in the field of ballooning, which became an important part of
the activity carried out at Holloman AFB.
A singular milestone was set on 1956 when the Balloon Branch assisted 20th
Century Fox in the making of the movie “On the Threshold of Space” starring
302 Appendix 3: Interesting Stories
from March 9 to April 18, 1958, just before HARDTACK I began. The purpose of
these flights was to familiarize the Air Force launch crew and Navy crew with
launch procedures. These flights also tested the instrumentation and telemetry systems. In all, 76 balloons were launched in preparation for the event.
On the morning of April 28, USS Boxer sailed from Bikini to the launch point.
The bomb was assembled and armed and the balloon released at 11:25. During the
ascent the nuclear device was separated from the balloon a distance of 568 feet by
a hydraulic load-lowering device and the measurement instrumentation was additionally deployed along a nylon line at specific intervals totaling 3,000 feet below
it. At 12:50 the balloon achieved a floating altitude of 26 km (85,500 ft) and finally
at 14:40 the nuclear device was detonated by radio command at a point 136 km
(85 mi) northeast of Eniwetak. The device delivered a yield of 1.7 kilotons – relatively small by the standards of that time. The fact that a nuclear detonation creates an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) was discovered during the earliest days of
nuclear weapons testing, but the magnitude of the EMP and the significance of its
effects weren’t realized for some time. According to the data published in the final
report of HARDTACK (declassified several years later) YUCCA provided the first
indication in the U.S. nuclear test program that high altitude EMP could be more
than 1,000 times as intense as EMP at low altitude. The data was so different from
that expected that it was generally ignored until after the 1962 tests of Operation
FISHBOWL had proven the earlier theory of high altitude EMP to have been dramatically incorrect.
For a 1:41 minute film of the Yucca balloon test, go to:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ro9mKomIuww&feature=youtu.be
The 1956 movie “On the Threshold of Space”
Another important project carried out at Holloman AFB in the Cold War era was
HIGH DIVE, a study of high altitude escape systems. Under this initiative, the
group assisted with dozens of balloons that carried life-sized anthropomorphic
dummies that were released at high altitude to test different types of parachutes
and to study the rate of spin they acquired with conventional systems. Several of
these launches were conducted from remote locations around the base in order to
take advantage in different months of the prevailing winds to drop the dummies
inside the restricted areas of the WSMR. By that time, the Air Force Cambridge
Research Laboratories (AFCRL) had taken over the overall responsibility of the
development work in the field of ballooning, which became an important part of
the activity carried out at Holloman AFB.
A singular milestone was set on 1956 when the Balloon Branch assisted 20th
Century Fox in the making of the movie “On the Threshold of Space” starring
302 Appendix 3: Interesting Stories