Fri, Dec 30, 2005 (7:41 a.m.)

Atomic Testing Museum opens new exhibit

WHAT: "Gadgets," exhibit of items used during the nuclear age

WHEN: Saturday through July 9

WHERE: Harry Reid Exhibit Hall, Atomic Testing Museum, 755 E. Flamingo Road

HOURS: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Mondays through Saturdays; 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sundays

COST: Free

INFORMATION: 794-5151; atomictestingmuseum.org

A new array of gadgets from nuclear weapons testing at the Nevada Test Site goes on display Saturday at the Atomic Testing Museum.

The "Gadgets" exhibit features equipment ranging from special phones to cameras designed to capture pictures of the blasts.

There is also a Geiger counter used by prospectors to detect uranium ore deposits in the West during the 1950s.

Test Site workers used "sparkless" telephones, which were important for bomb designers assembling explosives because a spark could trigger a blast, J.L. Jordan, a museum spokesman, said.

Another phone on exhibit is a Soviet-made instrument used during the Joint Verification Experiment between the United States and the Soviet Union in 1988. Each nation exchanged scientists, who observed nuclear blasts at the other4s test site. Larry Neese, who worked for Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Co., brought the phone back from the Soviet test site in Kazakhstan after a test.

Most of this equipment has been in vaults for decades and there is scant information about the number of items or their costs at the time, Jordan said.

The word "gadget" was used by J. Robert Oppenheimer, chief physicist in charge of developing U.S. nuclear weapons, as a code to describe one of the first atomic bombs.

The Atomic Testing Museum, in association with the Smithsonian Institution since 1997, has promoted preservation of cultural, educational and scientific programs to encourage developing and exchanging public views regarding the Test Site and its impact on the nation, Jordan said.

Mary Manning can be reached at 259-4065 or at manning@lasvegassun.com.

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