Atomic Museum. Nuclear Weapons Museum or what is “Kuzka’s mother”
Judging by the lack of comments, few people were interested in the topic. But still, I will bring the photo report about the RFNC-VNIITF museum to its logical conclusion. Maybe it will be useful to someone... First part.
Model of the first nuclear charge developed in the United States.
The first one on the left is a detachable monoblock warhead of a ballistic missile. The launch is carried out from a submarine at a range of up to 1500 km. This missile system is the first to implement an underwater launch of a missile from a depth of 40-50 m. The product contains a megaton-class thermonuclear charge. Overall dimensions: length 2300 mm, diameter 1304 mm. Weight 1144 kg. The product was developed and tested in the early 1960s and put into service in 1963.
Second from the left is the warhead of an intercontinental ballistic missile. Length 1893 mm, midsection diameter 1300 mm, weight 736 kg. Megaton class thermonuclear charge. The housing has a multi-layer structure that provides a power shell and thermal protection. The tip of the housing is made of radio-transparent material. Development and testing took place in the 1960s.
Monoblock warhead of the first intercontinental submarine missile. The combination of intercontinental range with the high power of a megaton-class thermonuclear charge made it possible to obtain high efficiency of the new missile system. Product weight 650 kg. The product was put into service in 1974.
Warhead for the first multiple warhead of a sea-based ballistic missile. The product contains a small-sized thermonuclear charge and automation system devices with minimal dimensions. Among the developers, the project was called “One Hundred by One Hundred” (to fit a power of 100 kilotons into 100 kg of charge).
The dense arrangement of the components of the warhead made it possible to create a lightweight and small-sized product that meets the requirements of placing three warheads on one launch vehicle. The mass of the warhead is 170 kg. The product was put into service in 1974.
The first multiple warhead with individual targeting points.
BB weight 210 kg. The product was put into service in 1978.
An operational-tactical missile with an inseparable warhead. The length of the rocket is 11 meters. The length of the head part is 2870 mm, the midsection diameter is 880 mm, the weight is 950 kg. The charge is nuclear, with a power of several tens of kilotons. The power shell of the body is made of steel. The body has thermal protection and thermal insulation, the tip is made of radio-transparent material. Firing range up to 370 km. The modification with a non-nuclear warhead is known as “Scad”. Development and testing took place in the early 1960s.
The warhead of the anti-aircraft missile has been developed in two versions: with non-nuclear and nuclear charges.
The nuclear version is designed to combat group air targets.
The smallest nuclear weapon is the 152mm artillery shell. Withstands the overload of an artillery shot without destruction or loss of characteristics. Designed to resemble the contours of a standard high-explosive fragmentation projectile for a self-propelled artillery mount.
Nuclear explosive devices developed in the second half of the 1960s. specifically for underground explosions intended for industrial and scientific purposes, in particular: the elimination of emergency gas and oil fountains; creation of underground tanks for hazardous waste disposal; creation of underground storage facilities for liquid or gaseous chemical products; intensification of development of oil and gas fields; seismic sounding and geophysical research of the earth's crust. In 1968, it was successfully used to eliminate an emergency gas fountain at the Pamuk field in Central Asia.
Snezhinsk, until recently, was a strictly classified nuclear center of the Institute of Technical Physics.
The smallest nuclear weapon is the 152mm artillery shell. Withstands the overload of an artillery shot without destruction or loss of characteristics. Designed to resemble the contours of a standard high-explosive fragmentation projectile for a self-propelled gun.
Operational-tactical missile
The operational-tactical missile, known in the world as the ground-based solid-fuel Skad missile, has two warheads: non-nuclear and nuclear. Length 11 m, diameter 880 mm, firing range up to 370 km.
2/3 of the USSR's nuclear weapons were developed here. In the museum of the center you can see the largest hydrogen bomb, known as Kuzkina’s Mother, and the smallest atomic bomb - a howitzer shell, flight range - 30 km.
Monoblock head part of lightweight design with a small-sized powerful charge
Warhead for the first multiple warhead of a sea-based ballistic missile
The starting keys of the first atomic and first hydrogen explosions are also stored here. Snezhinsk is one of the most modern research and production centers in the Urals and Russia.
The first multiple warhead with individual targeting points
Intended for installation on a rocket that was part of a new missile system. BB weight 210 kg.
Capsules with keys
Capsules with authentic keys to the towers on which the first atomic and first thermonuclear charges were tested. These keys were handed over to the museum by test participant Georgy Pavlovich Lominsky, who was the last to leave the towers.
Industrial nuclear charges
Developed in the second half of the 1960s. specifically for underground explosions intended for industrial and scientific purposes
Thermonuclear bomb.
The bomb was intended for full-scale testing of high-power nuclear charges (20–50 megatons). It is a streamlined ballistic body with a tail unit. Diameter 2 m, length 8 m, weight 30 tons.
Nuclear bomb for use from supersonic aircraft
The first atomic bomb mastered by mass production and adopted by front-line and long-range aviation.
Length 3365 mm, diameter 580 mm, weight 450 kg.
Detachable monoblock ballistic missile warhead
The launch is carried out from a submarine at a range of up to 1500 km. This missile system was the first to implement an underwater launch of a missile from a depth of 40-50 m.
The product contains a megaton class thermonuclear charge.
Overall dimensions: length 2300 mm, diameter 1304 mm.
Weight 1144 kg
Warhead of an intercontinental ballistic missile
Length 1893 mm, midsection diameter 1300 mm, weight 736 kg. Megaton class thermonuclear charge. The housing has a multi-layer structure that provides a power shell and thermal protection.
The head part of an operational-tactical missile
The product is an inseparable part of the rocket. Length 2870 mm, midsection diameter 880 mm, weight 950 kg. The charge is nuclear, with a power of several tens of kilotons. The power shell of the body is made of steel. The body has thermal protection and thermal insulation, the tip is made of radio-transparent material.
The very first hydrogen bomb, mastered by mass production and adopted by strategic aviation.
Completion of development - 1962
While all progressive humanity was spotted in Domodedovo, I visited one of the most secret and most closed cities in our country - Sarov. It is located in the Nizhny Novgorod region on the border with Mordovia. It is impossible to get into this city - it is surrounded on all sides by fences and barbed wire. The city is guarded by the Internal Troops of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs. Whenever an alarm is triggered, a team is immediately sent to the site. You can get into the city by filling out a bunch of papers and going through a bunch of checks with the competent authorities. If you mess up somewhere, you will be denied access. It’s strange, despite all my “failures” and “jambs”, the Motherland still trusts me. Nice!
In general, the earliest mentions of Sarov places date back to the 13th century. Until the 19th century, there was a monastery here, then a colony for street children, then a colony for prisoners. In 1946, the government of the country decided to locate the Russian scientific and production nuclear center here. The decision was not made by chance - relatively close to Moscow, but at the same time in the wilderness - there are dense Mordovian forests around, and there is a railway.
A little history: On August 6 and 9, 1945, the United States carried out nuclear explosions over Japan, in response to this, the USSR, which had not healed the wounds of the war, began to forge its own nuclear shield. According to the documents, this scientific center was classified as an “object”; all documents on it were automatically classified as “top secret”. Thanks to the work of scientists and the work of our intelligence, already on August 29, 1949, the USSR produced the first nuclear explosion at the Semipalatinsk test site.
The museum I visited displays all the nuclear weapons that were developed and produced here. Part of the exhibition is still classified as “secret” and cannot be photographed or videoed, so I apologize for some bad angles - this is due to the fact that what should not be included in the frame does not end up there.
Shall we go and have a look?
Here is the first Soviet serial atomic bomb "Tatyana"
01. This is the body of the first Soviet atomic bomb "RDS-1". What RDS is is not known for certain; someone deciphered it as “Stalin’s jet engine,” but most people like the idea of deciphering it as: “Russia does it itself.” The bomb is a large product: length - 3.7 meters, diameter - 1.5 meters, weight - 4.6 tons. She looks like the American "Fat Man" that the US blew up over Nagasaki. The similarity is not accidental - intelligence gave scientists all the information about the American nuclear bomb. However, the charges are significantly different - the RDS-1 is an analogue, not a copy, of the US atomic bomb. Remember? “Russia does it itself!” This bomb did not enter service, but “just in case” several of them were released...
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03. And here is our “Tanya”, aka “RDS-7”. Let me remind you that this is the first SERIAL atomic bomb in the USSR
04. RDS-6S. Or rather, the charge body. This is the famous “puff pastry”, tested at the Semipalattinsk test site in 1953. Academician Sakharov took an active part in its development. This is not just an atomic bomb, it is the world's first hydrogen or thermonuclear bomb. The power of its charge, for a second, is 400 kilotons of TNT equivalent...
05. The first Soviet atomic artillery shell.
06. The first combat nuclear part for a tactical missile. Flight range - 32 km.
07. thermonuclear warhead for the first intercontinental ballistic missile with a multiple warhead. Flight range is 12 thousand kilometers.
08. Well, here we come to that very “Kuzka’s mother”, about which Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev spoke from the podium, tapping his shoe. He meant RDS-37. This is the world's most powerful experimental hydrogen bomb, A602EN. Tested at the Novaya Zemlya training ground in 1961. Performance characteristics: length - 8 meters, weight 26.5 tons. The power of the zarad is one hundred million tons of TNT equivalent (100000000000)! On Sakharov’s initiative, its testing power was halved. The bomb explosion was so strong that the seismic wave circled the globe three times. The flash was visible at a distance of thousands of kilometers. The diameter of the dome made of hot explosion products reached 20 km. This test showed that nuclear weapons are destructive for planet Earth, and in 1963 the USSR, USA and England signed an agreement banning ground-based nuclear tests.
09. Nuclear torpedo. Caliber 533 mm.
10. Neighborhood
11. "Kuzka's mother." Back view. in this compartment there were six parachutes, which opened sequentially and slowed down the fall of the bomb. This was necessary so that the Tu-95 could retreat to a safe distance. The area of the largest parachute was 1 thousand 600 square meters. meters.
12. It was on such computers that all this was developed. Many of us now have faster cell phones...
13. Keyboard
14. The museum also presents the latest Sarov developments. Specifically, a super computer.
15. Performance characteristics
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17. The largest white cone is the head of the R-7 rocket. In service since December 19, 1959. This date is considered the birthday of the Strategic Missile Forces.
18. Ultra-powerful explosive magnetic energy sources for thermonuclear and physical research
19. Who will say what this is?
20. That's it!
21. Let me remind you that part of the museum’s exposition cannot be filmed, it is behind the scenes, so RDS-1 is slightly cropped
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25. Sarov was like this until 1927. Something has survived to this day.
26. For example, a bell tower
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28. Sarov is surrounded on all sides by forest
29. Cool sign! I remembered my childhood!
30. Opera House. By the way, Sarov was first called the Kremlin, then Arzamas-16. The chosen ones could leave its borders. And some, for example, Academician Khariton, were forbidden to fly on airplanes. He had his own railway carriage.
31. Grandmother saves her grandson from an angry dog
32. An awesome sign, but tourists won’t be able to use it for obvious reasons. Let me remind you that this city is under 24-hour security and behind three fences!
33. The Mathematics Olympiad among schoolchildren is being held in Sarov. The artists greet them
34. Planet. They sell ice cream here
35. It’s a pity, I didn’t have time to go to the bathhouse...
This is how this tiny city, which you will not find on every map of Russia, saves the whole world from the third world war. As long as parity of forces in nuclear weapons is maintained here, the inhabitants of the earth can sleep peacefully. No America is afraid of us!
As usual, all the most interesting things are in my
Guests of the Russian Federal Nuclear Center - VNIIEF, its employees, residents of Sarov - all visit the historical and memorial Museum of Nuclear Weapons, opened on November 13, 1992, with great interest.
Museum visitors will get acquainted with one of the most interesting pages of Russian history. For many years it was completely classified, but today you can see samples of the developments of the country's first nuclear center and learn about the events that took place here for more than half a century.
Our museum is the first in the country to tell about the main stages of creating a domestic nuclear shield.
The story about the work of KB-11 (RFNC-VNIIEF) is preceded by materials about the past of unique places where Russia’s nuclear shield was created.
The earliest mentions of settlements in these places date back to the 13th century. At the end of the 17th century, these protected places were chosen by monks. One of the first buildings of the Sarov Monastery appeared in 1706. It was a small wooden temple, which received the beautiful name of the Church of the Most Holy Theotokos, Her Life-Giving Source. At that time, only a few monks lived in the monastery. A century later, the monastic brethren numbered about three hundred people, and the buildings of the monastery were distinguished by their diversity and beauty.
Thousands of pilgrims came here to pray and bathe in the holy springs. The glory of the Sarov desert especially increased thanks to Elder Seraphim, one of the monks of the monastery. He lived there at the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th centuries and during his lifetime he became a real saint for Orthodox believers. Official canonization, that is, canonization, took place in the summer of 1903. Then the monastery was visited by Emperor Nicholas II and his wife, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. On the model, placed in the center of the historical hall of the museum, the Sarov Monastery is recreated from photographs of the early twentieth century.
The main exhibition of the museum tells about its history and the labor feats of its employees. The key exhibits in this section of the exhibition are samples of products that have become legends in the history of the country’s nuclear industry: the first Soviet atomic bomb RDS-1 (charge and body), the famous “Tatyana”, or RDS-4, the first serial atomic bomb; the first artillery shell with a nuclear charge, as well as the warheads of the first strategic missiles of the USSR and a sample of the world's most powerful experimental thermonuclear bomb, tested in 1961 over the Novaya Zemlya archipelago.
A selection of materials dedicated to the creation of the nuclear industry in the USSR takes us back to those moments in history that became turning points for the Soviet state and the world as a whole. With the explosions of two atomic bombs over Japanese cities on August 6 and 9, 1945, the United States demonstrated to the world its priority in possessing nuclear weapons. The leadership of the USSR decided to give a worthy rebuff to this challenge in order to preserve state independence. The country, which did not have time to heal the wounds inflicted by the terrible war, began to forge its nuclear shield. To organize a new industry, operationally manage it and solve the most complex defense tasks set by the government of the country, on August 20, 1945, the so-called First Main Directorate (PGU) of the USSR was formed.
The new industry was headed by Boris Lvovich Vannikov, who served as People's Commissar of Ammunition during the war. Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov became the scientific director of the entire Soviet atomic project. From the government’s side, the work of PSUs throughout the country was supervised by Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria.
In the large chain of enterprises that made up the new industry, our center (“facility”), which was created in April 1946 and received the name KB-11, played an important role. His task was formulated very clearly and clearly - to create a prototype of an atomic bomb. The first leaders of the new center were Pavel Mikhailovich Zernov (head of the “facility”) and Yuliy Borisovich Khariton (chief designer, then scientific director of KB-11 for almost fifty years). The range of responsibilities of Zernov and Khariton was very wide. It was necessary to simultaneously develop the design of the first atomic bomb and carry out a lot of experimental work, equip test sites, build production facilities and housing - in a word, create a base that would allow the plans of scientists to be realized.
From the very beginning, priority in KB-11 was given to research and engineering work. In the spring of 1947, more than three hundred specialists arrived here. Since that time, a unique research team has been formed in KB-11 - a unity of theorists, experimenters and production workers, which is the basis for more than half a century of successful work of the nuclear center.
A significant role in the creation of the first atomic bomb belonged to two pilot plants KB-11. Working in the most difficult conditions, they provided the material basis for scientific research and design development. Scientists, designers, engineers, workers all worked selflessly to create the first model of the Soviet atomic bomb. They worked 12-16 hours a day. It took less than three years for the first Soviet nuclear charge to be developed, designed and implemented in a specific product. Its successful test took place on August 29, 1949 at the Semipalatinsk test site in Kazakhstan. The power of the explosion was 20 kt in TNT equivalent.
Now museum visitors can see the famous RDS-1 charge in one of the halls. Nearby is the remote control, the signal from which detonated this charge, and the body of the aerial bomb made for it. The bomb was a large product (its length was 3.7 m, diameter 1.5 m, weight 4.6 tons), similar to the American “Fat Man” bomb, detonated in 1945 over Nagasaki. The similarity is not accidental - intelligence took an active part in the creation of our first product, transmitting to the USSR information voluntarily provided by American specialists. The charges, however, differ significantly; RDS-1 is an analogue, and not a copy, of the first American nuclear charge, tested on July 16, 1945 in New Mexico.