Operation Grapple
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Operation Grapple was a set of four series of British nuclear weapons tests of early atomic bombs and hydrogen bombs carried out in 1957 and 1958 at Malden Island and Kiritimati in the Gilbert and Ell
Grapple X test in November 1957. Britain's first fully successful hydrogen bomb test
The survey ship HMNZS Lachlan
Royal Engineers assemble huts on Christmas Island
HMS Warrior, a Colossus-class light aircraft carrier, was the headquarters ship for Britain's atom hydrogen tests on Christmas Island.
The British hydrogen bomb programme was the ultimately successful British effort to develop hydrogen bombs between 1952 and 1958. During the early part of the Second World War, Britain had a nuclear w
Operation Grapple
…and 1958 at Malden Island and Kiritimati (Christmas Island) in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands in the Pacific Ocean (modern Kiribati) as part of the British hydrogen bomb programme. Nine nuclear explosions were initiated, culminating in the United Kingdom becoming the third recognised possessor of thermonuclear weapons, and the…
Sir John Anderson, the minister responsible for Tube Alloys
James Chadwick (left), the head of the British Mission, with Major General Leslie R. Groves Jr., the director of the Manhattan Project; Richard C. Tolman, his scientific advisor; and Henry DeWolf Smyth
President Harry Truman and prime ministers Clement Attlee and Mackenzie King boarding USS Sequoia for discussions about nuclear weapons, November 1945