US Forgets How To Make Trident Missiles 922
Hugh Pickens writes "The US and the UK are trying to refurbish the aging W76 warheads that tip Trident missiles to prolong their life and ensure they are safe and reliable but plans have been put on hold because US scientists have forgotten how to manufacture a mysterious but very hazardous component of the warhead codenamed Fogbank. 'NNSA had lost knowledge of how to manufacture the material because it had kept few records of the process when the material was made in the 1980s, and almost all staff with expertise on production had retired or left the agency,' says the report by a US congressional committee. Fogbank is thought by some weapons experts to be a foam used between the fission and fusion stages of the thermonuclear bomb on the Trident Missile and US officials say that manufacturing Fogbank requires a solvent cleaning agent which is 'extremely flammable' and 'explosive,' and that the process involves dealing with 'toxic materials' hazardous to workers. 'This is like James Bond destroying his instructions as soon as he has read them,' says John Ainslie, the co-ordinator of the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, adding that 'perhaps the plans for making Fogbank were so secret that no copies were kept.' Thomas D'Agostino, administrator or the US National Nuclear Security Administration, told a congressional committee that the administration was spending 'a lot of money' trying to make 'Fogbank' at Y-12, but 'we're not out of the woods yet.'"
Not the only time (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:5, Interesting)
Actual Explanation ... (Score:5, Interesting)
The material in the design specification was essentially unobtanium. It couldn't be manufactured at all. Quietly, the manufacturing engineers developed a solution that almost met all of the design specifications, and this was an excellent compromise. Unfortunately, the design engineers couldn't be convinced to sign off on the design change because of quality procedure 15, and military qualification 7. However, the biggest reason the design engineers wouldn't sign off on the change was because of a supposedly critical but practically useless mandatory project requirement, like the missile must work when fired in -40 degree water from 20 feet under the polar ice shelf.
The manufacturing engineers decided that the "fire nuclear missile while under ice shelf function", probably wouldn't be used, so the modified material was actually just fine. They shipped the missiles, got paid, and everyone was happy. Until now, when someone tries to "fix" the original "fix".
This story has happened before and will happen again. Whenever you bump into a design that requires a part that "does not exist", watch out for the possibility that the part never did "exist". It could be that you are reading a "design" document, and not what manufacturing actually built. I've worked in manufacturing, and there are lots of stories about impossible to make designs that somehow got shipped.
Re:Not the only time (Score:4, Interesting)
Who is still flying them? To my knowledge the last SR-71 flight was 10 years ago or so.
On a somewhat related note, I was watching some stuff on the U-2 a few days ago and I have to think that the days are numbered on that aircraft as well. Between advances with satellites and UAVs, manned surveillance aircraft don't seem to make much sense.
Re:Not the only time (Score:5, Interesting)
Who is still flying them? To my knowledge the last SR-71 flight was 10 years ago or so.
They have two at Beale AFB in Marysville, CA. According to people I know who work on base, one is kept in a constant state of operational readiness. That's expensive, so you wouldn't do this unless you were using the damned thing. You'd never notice a launch, because they're launching aircraft of all sizes out of there night and day with constant training flights and U2 overflight.
Re:Not the only time (Score:5, Interesting)
Incidentally, regarding lost war tech., I had always heard that the U.S. no longer has the ability to cast the shells for the large 16" guns on the iowa class battleships, I have no idea if it's true though.
Re:Not the only time (Score:4, Interesting)
Problem is, when you shoot a satellite down, it can take years to develop another one, and weeks to launch it into orbit. UAV's can have their signals jammed, and most depend on satellites for either GPS, or control. A plane can maneuver, and quite often be there much quicker than waiting for a satellite to come into position.
Re:just when the warranty runs out ... (Score:3, Interesting)
To my knowledge we've never tested a live ICBM but we DID test a SLBM during Operation Dominic [wikipedia.org]. The USS Ethan Allen launched a Polaris Missile and the RV came down somewhere near Christmas Island and had an airburst detonation. Check out this [nuclearweaponarchive.org] site and search for "Frigate Bird" for some pictures.
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:NOTA BENE: This is not possible. (Score:5, Interesting)
Having worked at this facility in the '80's as an engineer, I can say definitively that this scenario is either misunderstood, or incorrectly reported, or deliberately obfuscated, or a lie, or postulated from sketchy evidence, but it is factually and wholly wrong.
Every project for every material or product, special or otherwise, was properly documented. These files would not be destroyed. (Note here that I'm assuming the files on "fogbank" were not lost in an accident or by malicious destruction.)
Now, has the practical and hands-on knowledge of the step-by-step, moment-by-moment synthesis reaction to make this material been lost? Perhaps in the course of 25 years it has. Lots of people have left the plant since then. But all the information, notations and observations necessary to reconstruct the process/project do exist, I assure you.
Great point. My experience is often when people we say "we lost the instructions..." they really mean:
1. We've scrapped the production line and its components so we do not have the physical capability to build x anymore, or
2. We have the instructions but since we last did this 25 years ago all the people who knew the little tricks to really make it work are long gone.
Another possibility is the files have been moved so many times over the years to make space for new material that nobody remembers where they are anymore.Probably locked up in some obscure SCIF, waiting to be moved again when the space is needed.
Re:Disinformation (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:3, Interesting)
The Chinese and Russians are every bit as barbaric as Americans. If anything, their scarcity of resources might encourage them think a little harder before going to war.
The main difference between terrorists and the U.S. military is terrorists fight smart (and dirty). A thousand uniformed men with M4 rifles are nothing compared to a dozen plain-looking civilians with a big holy chip on their shoulder.
Re:sounds like a good time for some innovation. (Score:3, Interesting)
Without additional testing, the designers cannot be certain that any replacement foam they use would not affect the properties of the device, in particular the energy transfer from the fission component to the fusion component. If the designers knew how to make "Fogbank" again, they would have a direct like-for-like replacement. If they have to develop something new, they will probably spend a lot of time and money bombarding it with neutrons and X-rays to validate its properties.
Nukes in WWII (Score:3, Interesting)
How does nuking thousands of Japanese civilians un-nazi the world?
By the end of WWII the Japanese were ready to fight to the last Japanese. Not the last Japanese soldier, the last Japanese. The US was also ready to fight to the last Japanese. For example, they got so many purple hearts (the wounded soldier decoration) made, they still had supplied in 2000.
If it hadn't been for Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japanese culture might have gone the way of the Sioux. A remnant would have survived, but only a remnant.
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:4, Interesting)
That's generally what happens when you provide logistical support and a base of operations to a terrorist organization that attacks a Great Power.
Now I understand why the United States is imploding, it's suicide. "How DARE we fund Al Queda, who attacked....ourselves!"
Often times... (Score:5, Interesting)
That "supposedly critical but practically useless mandatory project requirement" is the result of experience. Inexperienced engineers often make the mistake of assuming that if they can't understand why the requirement exists, it must be arbitrary.
Perhaps this is apocryphal, but during the Cold War, submarines would routinely get stuck under polar ice floes. Having a missile which would work when fired from underneath the polar ice was probably a very large concern for the system designers. Had the engineers pointed out the impossibility of this requirement, it is possible that military doctrine would have been changed to reflect the limitations of the technology. If you are correct about the difference between requirements, design, and actual manufacture, then the actions of these engineers (or perhaps bureaucrats) put the entire United States at risk of nuclear holocaust. Had the Soviets known this during the Cold War, they might have been more willing to risk a nuclear confrontation.
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:3, Interesting)
Give over. (Score:2, Interesting)
...yet...
This is exactly why most of the world has an unshakeable conviction that Americans are adolescents. It seems that America has no identity at all if it isn't fighting the perennial "last war", whether it be against Russians, Muslims or others as yet unnamed.
Re:Not the only time (Score:2, Interesting)
here are some recent articles on the U2. Journalist gets a flight and writes a series of them...good reading.
Future of U2:
http://www.flyingmag.com/turbine/1377/dragon-hawks-the-u-2s-future.html [flyingmag.com]
Training/Prep For U2 Flight:
http://www.flyingmag.com/piloting/1378/so-you-want-to-fly-a-u-2.html [flyingmag.com]
U2 Flight Report:
http://www.flyingmag.com/turbine/1379/dragon-hearts.html [flyingmag.com]
How to score a U2 Flight:
http://www.flyingmag.com/flyinglessons/1376/from-dream-to-reality-a-girl-a-plane-and-a-space-suit.html [flyingmag.com]
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:1, Interesting)
NASA too (Score:3, Interesting)
NASA is also suffering the same issue with its latest rockets, in that everyone who knew anything about the Apollo missions has left, and they actually had to call in some old engineers to help. I really believe, at least for the space side of things we need to develop a Wiki where are space related technology can be documented. We could worry about some of this technology getting into the hand of a 'rogue nation', but from what I can tell these nations already have access to the technology, one way or another. What they don't necessarily have access to are the funds or the people capable of applying the knowledge.
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:4, Interesting)
"What you call barbarism I call self-defense."
Destroying ones enemies has a far better track record than titrated violence in "limited" war.
Re:Rumor has it.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Ah the naivety of youth (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, because making a rocket go a few extra thousand miles is such a challenge compared to developing a nuclear bomb.
Making a rocket go a few extra thousand miles is pretty easy. Making it go a few extra thousand miles and still hit something you want to hit is quite hard.
As an example...North Korea has built a nuclear weapon (1940s technology) but not a reliable ICBM (late 50s/early 60s technology).
Scorched Earth? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm in Afghanistan right now.
Scorched earth? Not likely. All our efforts are are focussed on either rebuilding Afghan state capacity (police, fire, hospital, army, and government institutions) or on providing security for those rebuilding efforts.
The Afghans scorched their own earth during the civil war that followed the end of the Soviet occupation (and the Soviets gave them a good head start). Al Quaida and the Taliban occupied the law vacuum left by the collapse of the Afghan government.
The tough part about the Afghan mission is attempting to build reliable, non-corrupt government institutions in a land where almost nobody has any experience with a life in a place that is governed by rule of law. That's the major obstacle.
The Afghan mission is marked by its LACK of revenge-based policy. It is Marshall Plan 2 (although not as well funded or manned, to its detriment)
DG
Re:That Thing We Did? (Score:2, Interesting)
No, you should have negotiated more. Make a few small concessions - allowing the emperor to remain in power, perhaps.
When you mobilize the entire resources of your nation to fight said war then the entire resources of your nation become legitimate targets.
Bollocks; and, I suspect, only said at all because your nation never had its civilian towns bombed.
Call it criminal all you want but we didn't start the war. We just ended it as quickly as possible.
(The US contribution to the war, particularly if measured in terms of lives lost, is relatively small, and it irritates me when you try and claim all the credit, but leaving that aside) No, the quickest way to end it would've been to surrender. Even given that the war needed to be thought, do you really think Dresden/Kobe/Hirishima/Nagasaki shortened the war any? Did they save more lives than they cost? They didn't succeed in halting industrial production (in at least one case planes were being put together in fields, under canvas, the very next day); they seem to have been more about killing and demoralizing than war effectiveness.
Don't get me wrong, I absolutely think the war needed to be fought, and I understand that those at the time had been through years of hell and didn't have the benefit of our hindsight and rationality. But for the sake of trying to prevent it happening again, it needs to be said: the deliberate bombing of civilian populations that was done towards the end of the war (and it was largely the end of the war, the western front in Europe was fought relatively cleanly for most of the war, and the attacks on civilians in eastern europe and china (which, incidentally, don't for a moment think I don't condemn strongly; no major player in the war's hands are clean) were done by more conventional methods)was wrong, even in wartime, and should not be repeated.
Re:Desceptive title (Score:4, Interesting)
I find it tough to believe that the foam in the W88 is really that different from the foam in the W76. I thought the goal of the foam was to just become completely ionized and become transparent to X-rays? How hard can that really be when a fission weapon is exploding a few feet away.
I imagine there might be some physical characteristics of the foam related to ballistic devices (can handle G's on launch, re-rentry, etc.) but that would be similar across all ballistic weapons.
Unless there is something they aren't telling us ;)
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:5, Interesting)
but look at after 9/11. Scorched fucking earth in Afghanistan.
As someone who spent 2 years not scorching the earth in Afghanistan, I can tell you you're incorrect. Perhaps you were just engaging in hyperbole, but for the most part what we do there is convince the locals to shoot at Taliban/al Qaeda (or at least rat them out to us), because there aren't enough of us to be everywhere. "Scorched earth" policy is something we haven't had the luxury of pursuing since WW2. There's a reason we're not getting our asses handed to us like the Russians did, and that's because our first choice is to make allies of the locals, rather than "conquering" them.
Re:Desceptive title (Score:2, Interesting)
If its true though that this foam is so critical then it tosses a couple of questions up on what people have been speculating.
Re:NOTA BENE: This is not possible. (Score:4, Interesting)
And I've spend a couple of decades working in the aerospace and commercial aviation biz. And I can tell you that there's documented procedures and then there's the actual way to get it done. The documentation isn't always complete, with some critical steps or knowledge being left out. Either they were overlooked, or in some cases its a matter of a trade secret (a company doesn't want a competitor to bid the contract) or job security (the guy on the shop floor doesn't want to get replaced, so he doesn't document the specifics that keep the whole shebang from blowing up).
I can see how such a situation can arise quite easily.
Re:Ah the naivety of youth (Score:3, Interesting)
Port security procedures have improved quite a bit.
US customs actually has a truck at the port that is just a giant gate that lowers down and passes over the container, scanning from 3 angles at once. The idea of a nuclear cargo container isn't a new one.
Containers are actually catalogued pretty thoroughly these days. Their contents and routing are recorded at the origin, and transmitted to the US in advance. They photograph from multiple angles as they pass through terminal gates. The containers are given unique seals to make sure it hasn't been tampered with, and their status is documented at every stop along the way(more advanced carriers report the status of a given container electronically so customers can get daily tracking reports).
Of course, just like everything else, the security isn't impenetrable. However, security isn't just about catching attempts, but preventing someone from trying. The risks of using a shipping container for this task are prohibitive compared to other methods of delivery.
I would guess that if they wanted to detonate a nuclear bomb on U.S soil, they would deliver smaller components through more discreet methods, and make the final assembly within our borders instead.
Re:Good reason to get shut (Score:4, Interesting)
I liked the Jebus character, but I thought he could have used a love interest.
It was in there [wikipedia.org], but it got cut.
Re:Reality.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Japan was preparing to defend its islands inch-by-inch. Without the atomic bombs, 1 million+ Americans would likely have died in block-by-block fighting in Japan.
This is far from being clear. Of course this was the official justification, but in retrospect, the military clique has already lost most of its power by the time the nukes fell.
Then also there's the issue of dropping two nukes, when Japanese were already preparing the surrender after the first one...
3 that cheated (India, Pakistan, North Korea)
Cheated who? The fact that a bunch of countries who had nukes already decided to get together and define rules for everyone else doesn't mean that the rules have any legal or moral standing, or that they will be followed.
Re:sounds like a good time for some innovation. (Score:3, Interesting)
Um, no. Plain low-Z foams are well documented in a number of nuclear weapons - are perfectly straighforwards to make, use, and test. Fogbank's described properties pretty much only match an aerogel of some sort with suspended high-Z material, and extensive (non-public) analysis by a physicist with inertial confinement fusion experience indicates that Fogbank could be extremely critical to the operation of highly compact thermonuclear secondaries (the second, fusion implosion stage after the primary fission fires). Very thin radiation cases and energy buffered into the aerogel's high-Z constituent apparently allow you to effectively push the secondary without having a thick (heavy) radiation case to contain the primary's energy for much longer. There are a number of weapons that didn't have that level of compact secondary still in use - B61s, B83s, W62s, etc. However, a number of the very tight tolerances secondaries in use - W76, W87, W88, possibly W80 and the other B61 derivatives with stepped radiation cases, possibly W89 and RRW derivatives, probably don't work without the suspended high-Z aerogel material. Could we redesign them with thicker radiation cases instead? Sure. Add ... 20% perhaps to overall weight. Oh, and we'd have to withdraw from the nuclear test ban treaty and the threshold test ban treaty to test the redesigned weapons, because that redesign is NOT a minor issue with reliability, it's a fundamental physics/engineering change, even if the primary and secondary are the same. It's changing the dynamics of the energy capture from the primary and the timing and intensity of the energy pulse delivered to the secondary, in a radical manner. So, you need to test it.
Or we could go back to earlier, heavier designs, like the B61 and B83s. Except that all our current ICBM warheads appear to use Fogbank now. Oops. Error. Try again.
Re:NOTA BENE: This is not possible. (Score:3, Interesting)
Fogbank is a light, highly insulative, strong yet fragile material that was very, very expensive years ago and was made using a solvent called acetonitrile in a very flammable process.
Aerogel is a light, highly insulative, strong yet fragile material that was expensive years ago and made with a variety of solvents, including acetonitrile, in a very flammable process(Supercritical drying).
You'd think they'd pick a better codename.
Still is pretty expensive for the space(and apparently nuke)-grade stuff, although you can make so-so aerogel fragments with CO2 and high-pressure pipe fittings. A 10 year old did it [noisebridge.net] with sched 80 pipe and liquified CO2.
Re:Not the only time (Score:1, Interesting)
Reminds me of something that happened to me years ago. I was digging a waterline through the ponderosa pines between the Middle and North forks of the Yuba River, not far from Beale AFB. About 1971. I was crossing a small clearing when a huge black plane flew right over the tree tops. Scared me. I swear it didn't make a sound -- maybe a whooshing, but no engine noise. Later at lunch down at the building site where the line was going -- 300 yards away -- I asked if anyone saw the big black plane. No one had. A few days later, a couple of guys came up to me in Nevada City and asked if I was the guy who saw the big black plane. When I admitted it was true, they told me they saw it too. It crossed a road-cut at tree top level and scared them so badly they drove off the road into a ditch.
I asked some of the AF guys from the base about the big black plane. They went rigid, diverted their eyes, and said "NO sir, never saw a plane like that." Well disciplined, but poor liars!
Years later I saw a picture of the SR-71 and I am sure it was the plane I saw. One always hears about how high and fast it can fly, but it has other tricks, too.