Eli5: Why does splitting an atom cause such a giant explosion?

Question

Where does all the energy come from?

In: 10

Answer 1

Splitting *an* atom does not release all that much energy. It’s just enough to produce a visible flash (which is already a huge amount of energy for an atom).

But there are a *lot* of atoms in even a small piece of material, and a nuclear bomb causes a significant percentage of *all* of those atoms to split within a fraction of a second.