Eli5: Before the first atom bomb was detonated, there was some speculation that the chain reaction would keep continuing and lead to burning up the atmosphere. So what actually limits the size of the explosion?
In: Physics
The story I’ve heard is that project manager Robert Oppenheimer and Danish physicist Niels Bohr bet $1 on whether the test would ‘ignite the ozone layer of the atmosphere’, which would likely end life on Earth.
The ozone layer doesn’t have that much more oxygen than the rest of the atmosphere, around 20% or so. The calculations determined that the test wasn’t enough energy for that sort of ignition to occur. But it was discussed, and studied before it was ruled out.
I don’t know who won the bet. My guess would be Oppenheimer, but I’ve got no basis other than Bohr’s Danish upbringing leading to a darker sense of humor.
>So what actually limits the size of the explosion?So what actually limits the size of the explosion?
Air is a reasonable insulator, that absorbs energy from big explosions. Even if the test released energy without anything to absorb it, the energy would eventually spread, and the density would decrease, just as the Sun’s energy has a limit to its reach, even though it’s total energy output is in the order of millions (billions?) of atomic bombs *per second.*
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