The Material So Classified We Forgot How to Make It

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  • Опубліковано 24 гру 2024

КОМЕНТАРІ • 1,9 тис.

  • @ailivac
    @ailivac Рік тому +4098

    "What is FOGBANK?" "That's classified"
    "What does it do?" "Classified"
    "Does it contain-" "That's also classified"
    "Wait, do you even know what it is anymore?" "That's... classified"

    • @alanrobertson9790
      @alanrobertson9790 Рік тому +138

      Maybe its an undefined material which only exists to make youtube videos.

    • @Dunkopf
      @Dunkopf Рік тому +97

      ​@@alanrobertson9790 can't be, that would be classified information

    • @ballsackfart
      @ballsackfart Рік тому +59

      @@Dunkopf The information that tells us if it’s classified is classified

    • @ultimaxkom8728
      @ultimaxkom8728 Рік тому +43

      @@ballsackfart **
      Answer: *[Classified]*
      Why is it classified?
      Reason: *[Classified]*
      Why the reason is classified?
      Reason: *[Authority Insufficient]*

    • @ashutoshkukreti6706
      @ashutoshkukreti6706 Рік тому +10

      Am I ruining the joke or is this a Haruhi reference?

  • @Hiro_Trevelyan
    @Hiro_Trevelyan Рік тому +4686

    Fun fact : this isn't the first time that imperfection is actually better.
    I don't know if it's true, but there's a story about the Japanese Shinkansen and how it couldn't reach French TGV speed without tearing its catenary (the cable that sits above electric train lines). They sent some engineers to France to study how we did it, there weren't many differences until one engineer pointed out that our catenaries weren't built with perfect spacing, whereas Japanese precision made them space each pole at the exact same distance, increasing the resonance effect when a high-speed train goes through until it tore down the catenary.
    So, French clumsiness actually is not a defect but a necessary part of the design. "It's a feature".

    • @JPSimen
      @JPSimen Рік тому +513

      Side effect of allowing them to drink wine and eat smelly cheeses. The engineers were inebriated.

    • @jordonfreeman166
      @jordonfreeman166 Рік тому +294

      Actually, both trains have the same top speed: 300 KPH. The Shinkansen gets the crown as the fastest train in the world because it spends more time at its top speed compared to the TGV. The Shinkansen is also an Electric Multiple Unit (EMU), meaning the electric motors are distributed throughout the train, instead of being clustered under the locomotive and adjoining passenger car axle, which the TGV does. This gives the Shinkansen a higher acceleration rate than the TGV.

    • @brylozketrzyn
      @brylozketrzyn Рік тому +168

      Same thing killed SONGS. They ordered new steam generators in Japan, but due to extremely high accuracy new pipes were made - they went into resonance when operated at full power. Manufacturing imperfections and little lower tolerances would dampen vibrations (or just one more level of supporting grate). However, second replacement was blocked by so-called "environmentalists"

    • @OntarioTrafficMan
      @OntarioTrafficMan Рік тому +171

      @@jordonfreeman166 Actually the French LGV Est and Japanese Tohoku Shinkansen run at 320 km/h. But yes their in-service speed is the same.
      What they were probably referring to was the world record attempts. The Shinkansen achieved a record speed of 443 km/h in 1996, which failed to beat the TGV's 515 km/h record from 1990.
      France beat their own record again in 2007, reaching 575 km/h which remains the rail speed record for wheeled vehicles. Japan holds the record for Maglev trains at 603 km/h.

    • @nlpnt
      @nlpnt Рік тому +129

      Same thing happened to Rolls-Royce when they began building their own GM Hydra-Matic transmissions under license. They hand-polished the internal components' surfaces of the first ones and wondered why they drove horribly, it turns out GM wasn't doing that just because they couldn't put that amount of hand work into a Pontiac at its' price, they were doing it because certain surfaces needed a rough finish for the fluid dynamics to work right.

  • @thedownwardmachine
    @thedownwardmachine Рік тому +8211

    If they had found someone who actually wrote it down, they probably would have thanked them profusely and then sent them to prison.

    • @ItsASkelley
      @ItsASkelley Рік тому +762

      prob why they all claimed to have forgotten how to make it

    • @toahero5925
      @toahero5925 Рік тому +386

      ​@@ItsASkelley Complex chemical formulas aren't exaxtly easy to memorize

    • @DavidAbyssal
      @DavidAbyssal Рік тому +228

      Nay, OP is right, might have claimed that the person has been leaking the info for making bombs since it can be remembered...

    • @Shinobubu
      @Shinobubu Рік тому +111

      @@toahero5925 well knowing the molecular structure and composition is one thing but synthesizing it is what is patentable.

    • @theuseraccountname
      @theuseraccountname Рік тому +64

      @@Shinobubu You really think the government would detail how to make it in a patent?

  • @RayTheMickey
    @RayTheMickey Рік тому +300

    This happened to a customer I had.. They had a very specific production process that allowed them to make parts better than their competators. They were bought out and as they were winding down production and transfering everything to the new owners, they realized they had run out of a key component that they used for making these parts. They also realized that they had nothing written down about how to make it. There was one machinist still there and they found out he knew how it was made. They asked him to make some and he said"sure". They then asked him to write down the process and he said"no". The company that bought them was also a customer of mine. Last time I visited he was still coming in on a contract basis and making that material for them.

    • @cesaravegah3787
      @cesaravegah3787 8 місяців тому +88

      He did the right thing, on a company where my acountant worked they got a new manager, he brefiended the oldest manufacturing employee, convinced him of write down every single process that the old guy knew, as soon as the manager tested that everything could be replicated he fired the old guy, bosses nowdays can't be trusted

  • @patrickmeyer2802
    @patrickmeyer2802 Рік тому +6690

    Okay, so funny story, this is the same reason we can't make any F-1 rocket engines (the big ones on the first stage of the Saturn V) anymore. We have all the technical plans for them, but the state of NASA and engineering in general in the 1960's was such that certain unrecorded adjustments had to be made to the engines to get them to work, and all the people who did it are either dead or have forgotten. F-1s were essentially craftsman-assembled.

    • @flurf5245
      @flurf5245 Рік тому +889

      which is both okay because
      1. we've moved on from F-1 engines because it's 1960's tech and will likely either design a modern engine as big or simply keep using a lot more, smaller engines
      2. if we really wanted to use the F-1 again we would do the same reverse-engineering process on what we already know of the design, and making more modern small adjustments to get it to work (at this point an F-2 or perhaps F-1A)

    • @sophie_a
      @sophie_a Рік тому +303

      @@flurf5245 yeah no need for an F1 these days, especially for how inefficient they were

    • @chaklee435
      @chaklee435 Рік тому +206

      Not just the 1960s, even now I bet it takes unrecorded adjustments to get most factories working as planned.

    • @mech____
      @mech____ Рік тому +82

      F1 engines could be made today, to better specs lol theres just no reason to when you consider the budget involved. tbh even a dedicated hobbyist could do it if they magically had the resources. CPUs would be a similar example, complex but not impossible with the right resources. its amazing how much we can do in the information era

    • @2Lelouch5
      @2Lelouch5 Рік тому +52

      There is a proposal for a F-1B during the early stages of the SLS development. Which is a modern redesign of the F-1.

  • @knightsljx
    @knightsljx Рік тому +1223

    As a chemist, I immediately spotted the problem when a purer version was made. You don't randomly change the chemical composition of something when you reverse engineer it when you don't know what it does. You try to replicate it 100% first, then start experimenting with changes in variables

    • @heyhoe168
      @heyhoe168 Рік тому +137

      Yeah, it it as stupid as making purer Si crystal in attempt to replicate semiconductor. Most likely the whole point of the material was the impurity of one.

    • @jannegrey
      @jannegrey Рік тому +61

      That is how they did it in second attempt. Thanks to that, they also improved the management of impurities and found the optimal ratio of them.

    • @armageddonready4071
      @armageddonready4071 Рік тому +18

      Kinda like making hydrogen, distilled water doesn’t work as good as heavy water.

    • @jmacd8817
      @jmacd8817 Рік тому +26

      ​@gacekky1 Because sometimes, it's the impurities that cause functionality.
      If you're doing brand new "blue sky" r&d, then yeah, you usually go for most better best purity. But this wasn't blue sky. They had a known target.
      Think of this project as a root cause analysis. If you're investigating why a jet engine failed, you don't get a pristine engine that was exactly perfectly in spec, with brand new oils, etc, you get a similar used engine, wirh similar fluids, etc. You are trying to mimic the circumstances of "the event " as closely as possible. And starting with perfection is (usually) not the ideal starting point.
      Or, think of this as a modern experimental archeology. The folks in France building a 16th century castle don't just use a hydraulic lift to move large stone blocks. They use a man powered crane, to see jow and ehy things ended up the way they do in other castles.
      Hope this helps. 🙂

    • @mernokimuvek
      @mernokimuvek Рік тому +6

      @@armageddonready4071 Distilled water has a low conductivity, so cant be used for electrolysis. Heavy water is deuterium oxide, so you would get deuterium or heavy hydrogen from its electrolysis. You probably meant an electrolite solution, which has a higher density than pure water when you wrote heavy water.

  • @dura2k
    @dura2k Рік тому +10975

    FOGBANK seems a very good name for something everyone has forgotten.

  • @SKKVTOL
    @SKKVTOL Рік тому +443

    Making something so classified that we essentially forget how to make it is the most Warhammer 40k thing ever

    • @Usinghealer099
      @Usinghealer099 10 місяців тому +21

      Ah, praise be the omnissiah

    • @potentiallyaheretic9281
      @potentiallyaheretic9281 5 місяців тому +4

      Reminds me of the two opposing administorum departments; one is constantly trying to find lost information and keep careful records, the other is responsible for censoring sensitive information, which happens to be most of everything.

  • @kpzdme
    @kpzdme Рік тому +1994

    Rookie Mistake. They just could have ask War Thunder to put it in the game and some player would have complained about how inaccurate it is and post the blue print.

    • @andrewyoung4473
      @andrewyoung4473 Рік тому +144

      It might actually work too.

    • @OzixiThrill
      @OzixiThrill Рік тому +168

      That idea was scrapped because it would have allowed countries outside of the US to learn of it as well.

    • @TheTrueForbidden
      @TheTrueForbidden Рік тому +9

      fr

    • @igorpachmelniekzakuskov776
      @igorpachmelniekzakuskov776 Рік тому +65

      I don't know what's dumber... this idea, or the fact that it might even work.

    • @BrowncoatInABox
      @BrowncoatInABox 11 місяців тому +10

      @@andrewyoung4473 which is absolutely terrifying

  • @d.b.cooper1
    @d.b.cooper1 Рік тому +325

    Surprised this doesn't happen more often. Oddly enough in many industries like engineering you often find many senior people close to retirement who never pass on key knowledge or processes, thus in retirement are always called in to fix things as consultants on huge wages. Lucractive industry, dare I say human nature.

    • @straighttothepoint2717
      @straighttothepoint2717 Рік тому +1

      Yeah but at the same time if you know how to do something the other guys don't you won't be getting paid more to do it

    • @jacobfreeman5054
      @jacobfreeman5054 Рік тому +27

      @@straighttothepoint2717 not when you’re an employee but if you get called as a consultant you will. There’s a radiation physicist I work with that had these “secrets of the trade” when he left he was making good money but now they need him as a consultant he’s making $400/h because literally no one else knows and he can name his price.

    • @straighttothepoint2717
      @straighttothepoint2717 Рік тому

      @@jacobfreeman5054 as a result greed has destroyed the medical system once again

    • @praevasc4299
      @praevasc4299 Рік тому +7

      This is how we lost knowledge of napalm about 500 years ago. And we're still not 100% sure it was the same thing as what we rediscovered. It was called Greek Fire, used by the Byzantines, and it worked very similarly to how modern napalm works. But its recipe was a closely guarded secret, so it was lost. We still don't know for sure how it was made and what it contained.

    • @imEden0
      @imEden0 Рік тому +6

      It does, another famous example is the F-1 engine from NASA. Moon landing conspiracies claim we just forgot how to build them, and that's half right, but what people actually mean when we say we "lost" the technology is that we have all the technical documents, but adjustments made by engineers have been lost that were necessary to get the engines to function as intended. Those handwritten notes and memories are long gone, which is why we can't replicate those engines, without significant funding, today.

  • @theily1724
    @theily1724 Рік тому +5112

    You’re actually allowed to talk about this material but a friendly fellow in a suit will come to your door and hold out his pinky for you to swear not to reveal this information.

    • @zach11241
      @zach11241 Рік тому

      The guy that came to my door made me suck on his pinky.....

    • @monkeypie8701
      @monkeypie8701 Рік тому +1

      That would actually be a cool way for a government to scarily prove they're in control, like, I could arrest you right now, but I won't

    • @Swaxol
      @Swaxol Рік тому +14

      a

    • @JayVal90
      @JayVal90 Рік тому +182

      And by “pinky” I think you’re referring to the caliber of the… tool that he’s holding.

    • @ForkLefts
      @ForkLefts Рік тому +42

      ​@@JayVal90 which one? 😳

  • @Jay-ln1co
    @Jay-ln1co Рік тому +57

    Reminds me of the WW2 tank gun stabilizer that was considered so great they kept all info about it a secret and barely trained the crews, resulting in crews not knowing how to use it properly and just disabling it instead. Sometimes it's good for the left hand to know what right one is doing.

    • @mistertagnan
      @mistertagnan 8 місяців тому +3

      Same happened for the magnetic detonators on the Mk 14 torpedo. They produced a manual for how to operate the thing, and then locked it away so sailors couldn’t access it due to the classified nature of the tech (tech which was in wide use in most navies and was taken from the Germans originally).
      The Bureau of Ordinance also refused to acknowledge the issues in the Mk 14 and claimed that the sailors were using it wrong, while also having their experts get corrected on the torpedo’s use by said sailors. (They also tried to get any sailor who modified the torpedos so that they actually worked court martialed, the naval command was quite unhappy with BuOrd at this point though, so they didn’t)

  • @Pining_for_the_fjords
    @Pining_for_the_fjords Рік тому +1554

    The first rule of fogbank is you do not talk about fogbank.
    The second rule of fogbank is you do not write down fogbank.
    The third rule of fogbank is you forget about fogbank.

    • @mrrio2200
      @mrrio2200 Рік тому +14

      i dont think you did this right

    • @MichaelDavis-mk4me
      @MichaelDavis-mk4me Рік тому +43

      The fourth rule is that we need fog bank, so we need you to make it again even if you forgot about it.

    • @埊
      @埊 Рік тому +7

      The 5th rule is that the Fogbank is an union of fogs

    • @aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-ffs
      @aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-ffs Рік тому +8

      the 6th rule: whats fogbank

    • @samsunguser3148
      @samsunguser3148 Рік тому +5

      The 7th rule?
      What is bogf***

  • @MrTmac9k
    @MrTmac9k Рік тому +112

    I totally understand how this happened. Documentation is that last thing done on a project, if it's ever done at all.

    • @hamsterfromabove8905
      @hamsterfromabove8905 Рік тому +19

      To be fair to them this wasn't really a documentation problem. This was an overuse of classification problem. The knowledge was so heavily classified so it was illegals to properly document it. It was only years later that they noticed it was so classified they accidently didn't keep an unclassified copy of the records. Nobody "forgot" to write the documentation. Everyone just thought someone with a different security clearance had it written down.
      Everyone was told not to make documentation for security purposes. And if they asked who had it written down they were probably told that someone else they couldn't know the name of had it covered. Just a circle of everyone thinking someone else was the "trusted one" to write things down. And because it was so classified you can't really speak up and ask around to find out who's job it was to keep the unclassified record.

    • @cara-seyun
      @cara-seyun Рік тому +15

      Me retroactively writing down my lab procedures a week later:

    • @VVayVVard
      @VVayVVard Рік тому

      @@hamsterfromabove8905 Kind of like when you have a great new idea, and you decide to encrypt it to protect it from prying eyes, but then forget the password.

    • @Between_Scylla_and_Kharybdis
      @Between_Scylla_and_Kharybdis 8 місяців тому

      They obviously tried to remove one tedious part right away: you can’t RTFM if there’s no FM

    • @yakopc6600
      @yakopc6600 7 місяців тому

      @@cara-seyun x'D

  • @felixjochems1238
    @felixjochems1238 Рік тому +2589

    With how much of the ulam-teller design is known it's remarkable that it's not public knowledge at this point.
    Also the NNSA should have just asked the warthunder forums, they would have found it in no time.

    • @scottanno8861
      @scottanno8861 Рік тому +89

      It's likely just a modified aerogel

    • @Swaxol
      @Swaxol Рік тому +2

      a

    • @WaleedbinKamran
      @WaleedbinKamran Рік тому +21

      ​@@hunterwyeth yeah we are

    • @jamesmcjamesington631
      @jamesmcjamesington631 Рік тому +4

      Lmao

    • @lukeonuke
      @lukeonuke Рік тому +88

      step one : make underpowered w-72 (?)
      step two : wait for someone to piss off that they paid cash to use a crap weapon
      step three : wait for someone even stupider to leak military secrets in hopes that they will fix the missile (who knows where it is by knowing where it isnt it now is).

  • @lukashavlak671
    @lukashavlak671 Рік тому +32

    There were two bellmaker brothers that developed the perfect bell profile for carillons in the beggining of the 17th century and they were so secretive about it, that when they died there was nobody left that knew the formula. It was then rediscovered more than 200 years later.

  • @iliketrains0pwned
    @iliketrains0pwned Рік тому +706

    "The short answer is a series of nuclear oopsie-doopsies..."
    Ah, just like my time in engineering school

    • @csweezey18
      @csweezey18 Рік тому +16

      HOL UP

    • @danieldeitrick7947
      @danieldeitrick7947 Рік тому +8

      What engineering school did YOU go to? Is it for mad scientists? 🧑‍🔬

    • @iliketrains0pwned
      @iliketrains0pwned Рік тому +18

      @@danieldeitrick7947 nah worse: aerospace engineers

    • @Attaxalotl
      @Attaxalotl Рік тому +3

      @@iliketrains0pwned Any advice for someone trying to get into that field?

    • @lau4893
      @lau4893 Рік тому +13

      @@Attaxalotl Be sure you like maths and not sleeping

  • @salt-emoji
    @salt-emoji Рік тому +38

    One time my brother was in an abandoned military rocket propulsion lab in Wyoming with some pals and they found a note card from probably the 70s that had a bunch of math on it that turned out to be classified rocket engine data for optimization and launch force.

  • @deleted-something
    @deleted-something Рік тому +3098

    Imagine if they found a better version of fogbank by trying to reverse engineer fogbank

    • @MrDoItNice
      @MrDoItNice Рік тому +427

      The issue was that they can't test any alternatives because of nuclear testing bans so they needed the exact material.

    • @MischaKavin
      @MischaKavin Рік тому +59

      ​@@MrDoItNice but if they can't test nuclear weapons, what did they want the FOGBANK for? 🤔

    • @MischaKavin
      @MischaKavin Рік тому +60

      And how did they find out they needed the impurities without testing? 🤔🤔🤔

    • @Comeyd
      @Comeyd Рік тому +274

      @@MischaKavin to maintain the already existing nuclear weapons

    • @Fixer_Su3ana
      @Fixer_Su3ana Рік тому +130

      I would hazard a guess that Fogbank was an accidental discovery in the first place, and that they have no idea how or why it works.

  • @aidanatkinson7717
    @aidanatkinson7717 Рік тому +10

    As someone who’s a mechanical engineer and In charge of documenting manufacturing process and following certain specifications its amazing how much shit isn’t documented. Looking for work instructions, travelers, interchangeable parts lists, rev changes, or even design history has always been a nightmare. This is partly because no one does their fucking job, people do their job wrong, or someone who isn’t trained/qualified to do their job is in charge and doesn’t do their fucking job. This results in things being recorded wrong, saved in the wrong area, accidentally deleted, or just assumed that the next person will figure it out. Combine this with bad management, no money to do the job right which means it’s rushed, and other manufacturers your working also having the same problem. Suddenly you have 20 people all looking for now somethin was made 8 years ago and no one remembers. Then you spend so much time trying to figure it out you get chewed out at your superiors for not figuring it because they already did it how hard could it be. All the while no one else was able to figure it out either so their just placing blame on the workers lower down for not doing their job when they didn’t have the right people doing it in the first place 8 years ago.

    • @Uncle_Neil
      @Uncle_Neil 10 місяців тому

      Agreed, often have the experience of pleading with an engineer to add information to their drawings only to achieve a puzzled look on their face. Like showing a card trick to a dog, they just don't get it.

  • @Rongmario
    @Rongmario Рік тому +303

    Me coming back to code that I wrote a week ago after not commenting any of it.

    • @General12th
      @General12th Рік тому +34

      "I have no memory of this place."

    • @realname689
      @realname689 Рік тому +38

      _Complicates the code even further without commenting any of it_
      _Leaves_

    • @MrScorpianwarrior
      @MrScorpianwarrior Рік тому +12

      @@realname689 "God this is so broken. I had to spend weeks learning how it works just to fix it because there are no docs.
      Anyway."
      I feel that

    • @andrewharrison8436
      @andrewharrison8436 Рік тому +17

      I have a theory that hot shot coders should be forced to take a 6 month break and then be forced to maintain their own code. It might encourage clarity of code, comments and, dare I say it, documentation.

    • @yitzakIr
      @yitzakIr Рік тому +24

      * Spends 92 million dollars removing the bugs
      * It doesn’t work
      * Put the bugs back
      * It works

  • @wesleywalker4709
    @wesleywalker4709 Рік тому +29

    I am SO using this story when explaining my engineers WHY they have to document what the hell they designed.

  • @AzureGreatheart
    @AzureGreatheart Рік тому +380

    Imagine accidentally classifying something out of existence.

    • @AI_Overlord
      @AI_Overlord Рік тому +35

      SCP Foundation agents wish it was this easy :P

    • @brodriguez11000
      @brodriguez11000 Рік тому +5

      *jedi handwave* These are not the UFOs you are looking for.

    • @leftyeh6495
      @leftyeh6495 Рік тому +13

      They did the same thing with titanium machining. When it was near unobtainable, they were using it to make the SR71s. Years later they have to pay stupid money to old machinists to come out of retirement and teach the kids how to cut, weld, and machine it.

    • @anewstarttoabrokenlife8662
      @anewstarttoabrokenlife8662 10 місяців тому

      It wasn't an accident. The beginnings of atomic and nuclear development weren't controlled by any current agency. The AEC or atomic energy commission was in control of state secrets back then.
      Ironically, which had more classification than the CIA and FBI, handfuls of classified agencies pre - and Cold War era were instructed to destroy documentation for projects for national security.

  • @moonshade99
    @moonshade99 Рік тому +88

    It reminds me of my peculiar habit of secretly storing something so secret to me that i forgot where i had stored it

    • @jacquesverhaeghe7543
      @jacquesverhaeghe7543 Рік тому +10

      Heh, it's the main reason we sometimes find treasures and archeological valued items in drywalls, cellars, towers and the like. Used to that, here in France !
      You'll be an unknown celeb in a millenium, maybe, with your prized items shown in a museum

    • @Hhhh22222-w
      @Hhhh22222-w Рік тому +2

      Or hide something so well you forgot you even hid it

    • @jacquesverhaeghe7543
      @jacquesverhaeghe7543 Рік тому +1

      @@Hhhh22222-w like squirrels🐿

    • @empath69
      @empath69 Рік тому +1

      fun fact: before I watched this video, I helped my wife with the vacuuming - she needed that nozzle you stick on the end, and couldn't remember what convenient, out-in-the-open, obvious and CANNOT be overlooked place she'd put it.
      I pointed out that the black plastic object she wanted was sitting on a black hall table right behind her, virtually invisible where it was, despite being something we constantly walked past.
      The old compromise between security and convenience...and we'd managed to hit the sweet spot without knowing it. :D

  • @nezzee
    @nezzee Рік тому +331

    Gotta love how impurities makes it better, similar to how roman concrete after years of study finds out that because they weren't as good at mixing, that is what made it self healing.

    • @RAFMnBgaming
      @RAFMnBgaming Рік тому +41

      it's essentially the secret behind one of the signature materials of the modern day world, Steel, and yet we're still IG just sorta not remembering that lesson.

    • @QuantumHistorian
      @QuantumHistorian Рік тому +32

      Not necessarily better. More like the original. Which might not be the best design, but as changes in design can't be test, it's better to keep things exactly the same than risk side effects.

    • @J.C...
      @J.C... Рік тому +6

      I just watched that about Roman concrete last night 🤣🤣🤣
      Wait. That was Mark Robers vid, huh?

    • @hamsterfromabove8905
      @hamsterfromabove8905 Рік тому +14

      It might not be better objectively. The with the impurities gone it might be possible to make a more efficient variant. However a different variant would require alterations down the line to the process of creating nuclear weapons. And the US would have to test those new form of nuclear weapons in order to add them to the arsenal. In the current political climate of the world it would be a really bad idea for the US to announce they plan on doing a bunch of new nuclear bomb tests.
      So instead of upgrading or improving any part of the process the scientists were ordered to replicate the work that had already been tested. In order to avoid having to do live explosion tests they were ordered to attempt to precisely recreate past work, so they could rely on past tests.
      There is every chance that those scientists could have improved the weapons. However they were ordered to recreate exact replicas of the past weapons to avoid upsetting the world order by the US testing new nukes.

    • @bezbezzebbyson788
      @bezbezzebbyson788 Рік тому

      @@RAFMnBgaming tell me more about the steel thing

  • @VitaeLibra
    @VitaeLibra Рік тому +50

    I made up a sci fi world in my head once as a thought experiment. They were so far into the future that a lot of advanced military tech had all records warped to the end of the universe to be disposed of as soon as it was completed since not knowing was better than everyone knowing your secrets and you not knowing anyone else's. It was a very rough "sketch" but I found it interesting. Just wanted to share. Probably won't matter to anyone

    • @shahdeen-en5qn
      @shahdeen-en5qn Рік тому

      Like how people constantly lie to themselves so much that they start believing it?🥴🥴

    • @shahdeen-en5qn
      @shahdeen-en5qn Рік тому

      @@VitaeLibraa person has people that like him/her. But another person constantly tells him/her that s/he is worthless. This eventually convinces the victim to accept that view and act accordingly towards the people that like him/her.
      Get it?😀

    • @shahdeen-en5qn
      @shahdeen-en5qn Рік тому

      @@VitaeLibra warping military records to the end of the universe can't be a good solution to a military problem. But in your sketch since everyone believes it they're doing it. Like how people constantly lie to themselves so much that they start believing it.🙃

  • @drjamespotter
    @drjamespotter Рік тому +108

    I used to work with a nuclear specialist (also a professor) who had worked at Oak Ridge and even pressed the button on some of the underground tests, including one that identified the Fogbank problem (it went bang, but nowhere near enough). Fascinating guy and the lunch time presentation he did on this and decommissioning the pit facility had the audience enthralled.

    • @terranhealer
      @terranhealer Рік тому +3

      Whatever button you think is at oak ridge isn’t the button you’re thinking of.

    • @Evan_Bell
      @Evan_Bell Рік тому

      No explosive test was responsible for the identification of the Fogbank problem. It wasn't encountered until over a decade after the US ceased nuclear testing.

  • @jimmiller5600
    @jimmiller5600 11 місяців тому +14

    Here's another --- we manufactured armored vehicles. The drive wheel of a tank is called a sprocket (roughly the size of a washing machine and solid steel). They are wildly tough since they have to propel and brake very heavy tracked vehicles. One year-end our supplier replaced their heat treat bath. Picture a small swimming pool. And it had been in service since the start of the Cold War. The sandy-salty material had been contaminated with countless layers of ambient dirt, dust, cigarettes, half-eaten lunches, paint, piss, hydraulic oil, birds that got too close, spit, etc. Picture chemical witches' brew. Especially since the production parts often had various chemicals on them before they were dropped in. To upgrade the process they removed it and replaced it with industry standard material. Guess what? They sent us a run of parts. Snap-crackle-pop is not what you want to hear the first time you start moving a tank. Took weeks of engineering trial and error to tweak the heat-treat bath. After three weeks of no useful production they removed the new materials and dumped the haz-mat containers of witches' brew back in. Worked like a charm.

    • @Not_interestEd-
      @Not_interestEd- 10 місяців тому +1

      Factory: "this water is dirty and stinks, best to clean it"
      Buyer: "why am I hearing small explosions?"
      Factory: "uhhh.... idk... _jerry piss in the pool, don't ask why-_ yeah we'll deal with it sorry."

  • @Kukaak
    @Kukaak Рік тому +486

    When you first mentioned that they managed to replicate it without the impurity and it still didn't work, I thought to myself "haha imagine if the purity was the problem". 25 seconds and 69 million dollars later it turns out that was exactly the problem. How did they not think of it lol

    • @circuit10
      @circuit10 Рік тому +111

      Well we could only guess because he specifically emphasised it, that purity difference probably wouldn’t have seemed important at the time

    • @vastowen4562
      @vastowen4562 Рік тому +15

      @@circuit10 yeah it's more likely that nobody thought about it.. they knew they needed to clean the chemical or whatever, so they did. they just did it using new tools that weren't available before and did it a little too well lol

    • @brodriguez11000
      @brodriguez11000 Рік тому

      Who wants an "imperfect" anything? Our detergents are "new and improved" not "old and imperfect".

    • @tictacman1000
      @tictacman1000 Рік тому +5

      @@vastowen4562 Still though, when dealing with such extreme forces you would expect any engineer to consider that changing anything, even the impurities, could have a drastic effect down the road. This is basic shit that people take into account when doing something as simple as mixing concrete.

    • @danmacgowan8242
      @danmacgowan8242 Рік тому +2

      The chemical impurity likely does not effect the physical quality of FOGBANK, but the radiation interactions of it.

  • @anthonyburke5656
    @anthonyburke5656 Рік тому +5

    If this wasn’t true it would be hilarious. My nephew is a “Corporate Saviour”, he goes into failing businesses to try to save them and restructure them to “save” what could be saved. Time after time he has found that critical “corporate knowledge” has been “lost” usually by firing “surplus old employees”. In some instances he has had to hire back old employees, usually at much higher pay. Sometimes he couldn’t find the old employee or rediscover the knowledge. In some instances he found the old employees had been fired, gone out to work for competitors or started their own businesses and thrived. He still does the same job, now days one of his first steps is to find all employees who have been “let go” in the last 2 years and do a proper exit interview, he says it gives him a comprehensive overview of the business much faster.

  • @trainsonpickles
    @trainsonpickles Рік тому +205

    "*Please Do Not Try It
    **Please Do Not Let Him Know"
    💀💀💀

  • @ThorsMartell
    @ThorsMartell Рік тому +4

    They took 11 years and several people in the project passing away to forget how to make it.
    It takes me 11 days to forget what my programm-code does, which I considered so obvious what it does, that I decided not to comment it.

    • @theairstig9164
      @theairstig9164 10 місяців тому

      Do you now tell people to comment their code?

  • @tomblaise
    @tomblaise Рік тому +886

    Interestingly enough, the fogbank alternatives they created are likely superior to the original fogbank they created. They couldn’t actually test this though, as the US testing nuclear weapons again all of a sudden wouldn’t go unnoticed, so the only solution was to remake the tested, (probably) inferior quality aerogel.

    • @themathhatter5290
      @themathhatter5290 Рік тому +29

      And how exactly do you know which of two nuclear weapons chemicals is better?

    • @tomblaise
      @tomblaise Рік тому +89

      @@themathhatter5290 Spell corrected “like superior” to “likely superior”.
      I say that because modern manufacturing processes have the capacity to be much more precise, and we have decades more of experience with aerogels since the original fogbank. We have no way of testing these new materials though, so there’s a chance that although in theory new methods should have higher efficiency and work better, there’s no way to actually know without detonating a fission bomb! Perhaps if there’s a nuclear war we can test some new materials, but I hope not.

    • @desi_bhai_
      @desi_bhai_ Рік тому +4

      @@tomblaise yeah, like its ovbiously superior, we have things like simulations and so much data on chemistry compared to 1980, its ovbious the materials are very advance and better

    • @tomblaise
      @tomblaise Рік тому +33

      @Pronto Its likely chemically and structurally identical. I have no idea how, but apparently they do have tests to see if everything matches up.

    • @Rhiawhyn
      @Rhiawhyn Рік тому +45

      There are multiple labs which can test the material in the same conditions in a nuke. One of the fusion reactor test facilities can do it on small samples with the laser arrays. And in fact that specific facility is used for defense testing, not power plant testing. There are ways to test without nuking things now, so blowing things up isn't needed any longer thanks to tech advancements

  • @michaelrooney3133
    @michaelrooney3133 Рік тому +21

    It's basically styrofoam. When the conventional warhead explodes it releases massive amount of x-rays and gamma radiation, that turn the intermediate into plasma. This plasma is an intetegral part of fusion and fission of the secondary device.

    • @osdever
      @osdever Рік тому +3

      Knock knock

    • @Takyodor2
      @Takyodor2 Рік тому +1

      @@osdever Who's there..?
      *oh shiet!*

    • @Evan_Bell
      @Evan_Bell Рік тому +3

      No. Fogbank is not Styrofoam.
      At least one H bomb from the 50s used polyurethane foam as the interstage material. I've seen no evidence of Styrofoam ever being used. Fogbank is likely rather different. There's indication that beryllium oxide is used in the interstage of the W76 (which uses fogbank). Whether that means fogbank is some form of BeO such as beryllia aerogel, or whether BeO and fogbank are two different materials used in the W76 interstage is hard to tell. There's also come confusion as to whether interstage material and channel filler are synonymous terms.
      SeaBreeze, the predecessor to Fogbank, which was used in the B61 was chemically related to Diallyl phthalate.

    • @thomasmount7388
      @thomasmount7388 11 місяців тому

      Interesting thread. Conceptually, it is just a filler like styrofoam, but the exact formula made it a particularly 'clean' bomb. The bomb would fission successfully with tonnes of different fillers, but they knew there is a danger of a lot more 'dirt' with an untested filler.

    • @edwardwood6532
      @edwardwood6532 11 місяців тому

      Is it some sort of advanced moderator, like tritium was the the performance of 'the shrimp'?

  • @edolnx
    @edolnx Рік тому +129

    "Potential Train Money" absolutely slayed me 🤣🤣🤣

    • @MUrules2014
      @MUrules2014 Рік тому +9

      We need more money for the trains!!

    • @70M45-c9r
      @70M45-c9r Рік тому +3

      It's the US, we know it's probably not going to go the trains anyway 😂

    • @timothyodonnell8591
      @timothyodonnell8591 Рік тому +3

      He should have said potential brick money.

    • @dannypipewrench533
      @dannypipewrench533 Рік тому +1

      ​@@MUrules2014 I think so. But I also think we should continue developing the roads. A good system has the best roads AND the best trains.
      The roads are already really good, but introducing trains should actually make them better. Then, we can further improve the roads based on how the trains helped them.
      The trains really work best in cities and connecting cities. However, they tend to get a bit tricky in lower density areas. They work, but the roads really hold up well in these low density conditions. So, I think we should use the trains to supplement the existing system, not to compete with or replace it.
      Using toll roads, we limit the number of cars entering cities. This should help limit the cars in the city to just the ones that are supposed to be there. Anybody driving to work or from one point to another in the city is supposed to be there. Somebody just passing through the city should take another route. So, to accommodate that, we shall upgrade existing highways that bypass cities to proper freeway standards and build new ones as necessary.
      The freeways shall be modified to allow overhead railroads to be built over them. The roads are already clear strips of land that connect cities, so they sound like perfect places to put railroads. High-speed passenger trains will be run on these new rails, and the existing railroad network will be just for freight. In each city we can run light rail over the urban freeways, and these intercity trains over the primary arteries. Because freeways and railroads will follow each other, rail interchanges can be placed at highway interchanges, allowing intercity travelers to switch to light rail in the city. The light rail will run over the urban freeways and have stops at each exit or wherever is practical. From there, street cars could be used on large streets within the cities.
      Ultimately, the way to make roads more efficient is to minimize traffic. Traffic is chaos. Large trucks are necessary for the last leg of the delivery process, but they tend to be problematic in traffic. Truck routes help ease this problem, but cars can usually still go on the truck routes. Trucks just have to take them. I think we should build truck-only highways within cities. The trucks will be separated from the regular cars, hopefully making it easier for travelers. The trucks, in addition, will not have to deal with the chaos of cars coming into or leaving the city as much as before.
      From a more practical standpoint, I think stacked highways are probably going to be useful. Essentially, we run a bridge deck over an existing freeway, allowing us to expand the road quickly and without needing more land. We take out the median on the bottom and run either direction on just one level. Each level would effectively add however many lanes are on the ground.

    • @cpfs936
      @cpfs936 Рік тому

      Especially with the implication that the cash would somehow be more effectively spent on trains. Not bloody likely, considering almost all of the history of light rail in the U.S.

  • @Tenajeh
    @Tenajeh Рік тому +7

    As soon as you mentioned that the material was "even purer than the vintage stuff", my first thought was literally "That's probably the issue here." How long did it take the engineers from finding out about the purity differences and coming to the conclusion of needing impurities?

  • @bighossjohnson625
    @bighossjohnson625 Рік тому +195

    As a Chinese government spy this really tickles my fancy! I knew I’d learn something from this channel! Thanks Sam from HAI!

    • @heidirabenau511
      @heidirabenau511 Рік тому +2

      😂

    • @d.b.cooper1
      @d.b.cooper1 Рік тому +25

      Given the Chinese knack for revesese enegineering literally anything they probs could've done it for $900k instead of $90m

    • @ohyeahwhat5387
      @ohyeahwhat5387 Рік тому

      @@d.b.cooper1 We have leverse engineered fogbank. We sell to you , speciul plice. Onry $1,000,000 per pound, not $50,000,000 rike you spend. Oh and we have dis killer virus from Wuhan, all new, not rike dat rast batch.

    • @yitzakIr
      @yitzakIr Рік тому +1

      Haha! Blueberry hawk lao-tzu alliance! Please advise. Isn’t saying random words fun?

    • @JohnDoe-my5ip
      @JohnDoe-my5ip Рік тому

      🙄
      This info has been in the public domain and unclassified for 20 years at this point…

  • @DrakiniteOfficial
    @DrakiniteOfficial Рік тому +13

    Hey, cool seeing a shoutout about Oak Ridge! I worked at the national lab last summer and visited the graphite reactor. One of my friends worked at Y-12 and it was insane the amount of security checks he had to go through before being approved to work there. Apparently, he's had a background check so thorough and his security clearance is now so high that he can work at pretty much any other place in the country. (though that's just what he told me, so maybe he was exaggerating 🤷‍♂️)

    • @TheRadconranger
      @TheRadconranger Рік тому

      I was a nuke for long awhile....(you have no idea how deep they look at you)... Just tell the truth...about EVERYTHING they ask about, even the embarrassing stupid shit you did while drunk as a pirate lord...because if you lie ,trust me ,they will find out ,and you will not be cleared.

    • @johnjudge239
      @johnjudge239 Рік тому

      No He is right once you have a clearance. They will have you go to other projects to help out .

    • @BobHoughtonProductions
      @BobHoughtonProductions 10 місяців тому

      en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q_clearance

  • @RoastMePls
    @RoastMePls Рік тому +53

    Contender for "Most stock images squeezed in a 6 min video" world record.

    • @Kelly_C
      @Kelly_C Рік тому +12

      you must be new here

    • @rfichokeofdestiny
      @rfichokeofdestiny Рік тому +4

      I rarely watch HAI because of that. They’re quite annoying.

    • @mastick5106
      @mastick5106 Рік тому +1

      I usually scroll down and browse the comments while I'm listening. Like now.

  • @JonathonV
    @JonathonV Рік тому +7

    Now it’s time for “spot the intentional mistake we can put into our yearly mistakes video”: At 0:54, “Tennessee” is misspelled “Tennesse”.

  • @saahiliyer11
    @saahiliyer11 Рік тому +112

    Reminds me of Greek Fire, the medieval napalm. The Byzantines used it to devastate their enemies but kept it so secret we don’t know how they made it anymore.

    • @sion8
      @sion8 Рік тому +13

      We know how to, we just don't need to make it as it's no longer useful to us today.

    • @ezonplays2260
      @ezonplays2260 Рік тому +1

      Or like the imperium of man, in general.

    • @brodriguez11000
      @brodriguez11000 Рік тому

      @@sion8 Napalm.

    • @sion8
      @sion8 Рік тому +9

      @@brodriguez11000
      Not exactly the same thing.

    • @thomasmount7388
      @thomasmount7388 11 місяців тому +3

      It is factually incorrect to say we know how Greek fire was made.

  • @zackyezek3760
    @zackyezek3760 Рік тому +8

    That diagram means they do have detailed records now.
    The components- e.g. “Process V”- are almost certainly defined in detail within a series of additional classified documents, each with its own access control. That’s why you have a chain of steps with names like that. This lets anybody see the overview diagram you showed, but only a top official like the NNSA head has clearance to see the info for all of the components. The issue now would be idiocy like not having any person with SCI access to all the pieces or losing track of some if those documents, because the only thing more incompetent than the US government you see is some of the parts you don’t.

    • @klausstock8020
      @klausstock8020 Рік тому +1

      Like modern software development. Some guy has the "grand picture", and hundreds of programmers work on separate pieces of code. Everyone uses work products from someone else but doesn't know how these were made or what they actually do. And most contributors are not even part of the project and are probably unaware of what their work is being used for.
      At least there's often documentation nowadays, even if it's all over the place.
      Ah, yes. "Documentations is like sex. If it's good, it's very very good. If it's bad, it's still better than none."
      But back to the military, because they have additional "special issues". Even with a pretty high security clearance, it's still all on "need to know" basis. If you work on "process W", you don't need to now about "process V" and "process X". As the manager, you just know that the processes exist, not any details. There is no single person who could leak the complete process. Documentation may be stored in different facilities, where no one knows what the documents are about.
      Some day, a few decades later, someone might open a safe to find documentation for "process W". One of possibly hundreds of different processes with the generic cover name "process W" (like "K-Stoff"). The documents are marked to belong to a department which no longer exists. Usually, the safe gets closed again and no one the wiser.
      Arguably, this works very well to keep information from falling into enemy hands. It also is very effective against your own people. But, in typical military paranoia, everyone's the enemy anyway.

  • @RTOF
    @RTOF Рік тому +112

    As someone who had issues with extremely quick forgetting (For example: when I am about to make a Google search or when I forget a crucial thing I studied in a school textbook) This tale of the NNSA makes me feel a little better about myself

    • @jakobr_
      @jakobr_ Рік тому +27

      You’re not forgetful, it’s just that your memories are so important that they’re classified above your clearance level!

    • @RTOF
      @RTOF Рік тому

      @Jakob Roggy I wonder why they would be doing that

    • @sion8
      @sion8 Рік тому +1

      ​@@RTOF
      *THE MENTAL NSA WANTS TO KNOW YOUR LOCATION!*

    • @SudetenlandMan
      @SudetenlandMan Рік тому +2

      I once used to forget where I put my phone a few minutes later, so I just memorised the locations I used most of the time

    • @RTOF
      @RTOF Рік тому

      @Lamster 66 Well I am only 16 (Turning 17 this June) so this sounds bad

  • @prototypesarmy5743
    @prototypesarmy5743 Рік тому +1

    If my grandma had only written down the brownie recipe i wouldn't have exploded like nine ovens and a blender.

  • @madcow3417
    @madcow3417 Рік тому +233

    I don't document every secret at work, some things are word-of-mouth, backed up by telling a lot of people. This way if someone steals the documentation they still won't be able to make our stuff.

    • @dougerrohmer
      @dougerrohmer Рік тому +52

      Except the more people you tell, the less secret it is. Someone once said that the maximum number of people who can keep a secret is 3, if 2 of them are dead,

    • @madcow3417
      @madcow3417 Рік тому +42

      @@dougerrohmer true, but a Chinese or Russian hacker would have a way harder time getting such specific information from someone's head in addition to having to get the majority of the information from a mostly offline server.

    • @mpf1947
      @mpf1947 Рік тому +30

      @@madcow3417 "mostly offline" So, not properly airgapped.

    • @RedStripeMedia
      @RedStripeMedia Рік тому +13

      @@mpf1947 this companys info sec is clearly awful lmao

    • @migueldelmazo5244
      @migueldelmazo5244 Рік тому +15

      The biggest secret, poorly kept is that "it's just ketchup, mustard and mayo mixed together".

  • @TitusRex
    @TitusRex Рік тому +5

    One day, when they forget how to make it again, they'll use this video as a primary source on how to do it.

  • @bipbapboop1140
    @bipbapboop1140 Рік тому +356

    I feel like some of the "forgetting" was probably intentional. The people who worked on this project lived through the cold war, knew what it was like to be afraid of a nuclear bomb dropping on your head at any moment. Then, years later, once life was finally peaceful some government operative shows up at their doors asking "Hey could you tell us how to make a compound for this weapon of mass murder?" I'd probably "forget" as well.

    • @greenoftreeblackofblue6625
      @greenoftreeblackofblue6625 Рік тому +29

      I doubt it. Possible though.

    • @dasy2k1
      @dasy2k1 Рік тому +110

      The answer would be
      "im sorry that's classified"
      And when they say they have the top level clearance the answer would be
      "with respect you are not on the list of people who I can divulge that information to, and the only person with the authority to add you to that list is dead"

    • @Not_a_Lizard_
      @Not_a_Lizard_ Рік тому +39

      The people who worked on this project probably understand that having their nukes working properly is kind of important. Forgetting isn't going to make nukes go away, it's just going to make the government waste more money trying to fix or replace them.

    • @K..C
      @K..C Рік тому +9

      Your reason makes almost no sense brother

    • @d.b.cooper1
      @d.b.cooper1 Рік тому +30

      In many industries skilled employees close to retirement often never pass things/procesess on cause it's common to be called in when retired as consultants paid large fees to 'fix' things when they inevitably break/have issues. Common in engineering, oldest trick in the book. Comes down to management in the end to forsee such things, which I imagine was the case here was overlooked due to time constraints/pressures & confidential nature.

  • @Kikilang60
    @Kikilang60 Рік тому +17

    They didn't forget everything, but they used research that wasn't sited, so they just thought they would do what they did before. When they tried to make it again, they had a general idea, but not the specifics. They also didn't know the basic research that was the foundation. When they figured it out again, they changed the formula a little. The impurities that made Fogbank work, also made the material break down over time. They altered it just enought that the new Fogbank would last longer, they hope. You never really know for sure.

  • @DCfreerunner
    @DCfreerunner Рік тому +39

    The people who worked there were probably super proud of not taking records and notes after the fact because that's exactly what they were told to do 😂

  • @AlexandarHullRichter
    @AlexandarHullRichter Рік тому +2

    Honestly, the idea of having forgotten how to make nukes, and being unable to test what we have to see if it works, is kind of beautiful.

  • @sdf_96
    @sdf_96 Рік тому +10

    2:47 thanks for the tutorial, really needed it ❤❤

  • @The_Blazement
    @The_Blazement Рік тому +2

    My favorite part is when Sam says "it's fusion time" and starts fusioning all over the place

  • @verbinatorkhanna2635
    @verbinatorkhanna2635 Рік тому +47

    Spoiler: it was Sam's sense of comedy

  • @TheWinjin
    @TheWinjin Рік тому +1

    "Potential train money" jab was *chef's kiss*

  • @williamfarley3794
    @williamfarley3794 Рік тому +47

    We should definitely let sam know how making fogbank works

  • @ralphwiggum3134
    @ralphwiggum3134 Рік тому +2

    Fun fact: you can also create Fogbank by eating a hard boiled egg and Taco Bell burrito and go to cash a check at your local bank. You won't be the most popular person there, but you got some Fogbank.

  • @cerjmedia
    @cerjmedia Рік тому +9

    The teachers who told those engineers to "show your work" are probably laughing now.
    Or dead.
    Probably dead actually.

  • @Sinred1
    @Sinred1 Рік тому +7

    there is a similar case regarding the imperfection mentioned here. The holes in the swiss cheese stopped occurring and they were unsure why. But later found out it was due to there no longer being any particles in the milk. The particles were from sawdust and other stuff occurring in farms, and these particles would add the holes in the cheese. Thus to create the holes again they added sawdust themselves during the cheese making process.

    • @edwinhuang9244
      @edwinhuang9244 6 місяців тому

      That's partially the case.
      The other problem with the bacteria.

  • @worldanvilbild3980
    @worldanvilbild3980 Рік тому +34

    So what I got out of this is that you can make a mini thermonuclear bomb at my high school lab. Upon further research I have found that I was not the first person to get this idea and there is a guide online on how to make civilian grade nuclear bombs.

    • @hk74654
      @hk74654 Рік тому +19

      Welp, you're on a list now.

    • @PetrukStarker
      @PetrukStarker Рік тому +5

      @@hk74654 welp im also on a list now

    • @redfailhawk
      @redfailhawk Рік тому +4

      Ah yes, the Anarchist's Cookbook.

    • @kersplody7435
      @kersplody7435 Рік тому +16

      Low grade nuclear bombs are not hard to make -- you just need to obtain around 115lb of purified uranium 235 and rapidly assemble it into a single mass in your lab, which is now a radioactive crater.
      Obtaining and purifying the materials is the limiting factor -- separating u-235 from u-237 at the required scale is basically impossible to accomplish undetected. Thermonuclear and implosion fission bombs are too complicated for the high school lab.

    • @worldanvilbild3980
      @worldanvilbild3980 Рік тому +5

      @@hk74654 but I used a VPN!!!

  • @christopherleubner6633
    @christopherleubner6633 Рік тому +6

    Fogbank is the interstage neutron delay material. It does two things, it converts the hard gamma energy to soft x rays the bomb can use, but at the same time it absorbs neutrons until it saturates and allows the neutrons to then start the reaction in the secondary fission plug. Not gonna say whats in it but if you wonder what it looks like, it is a porus rigid foam very similar to hard antistatic foam material. 🤓😎

    • @rfichokeofdestiny
      @rfichokeofdestiny Рік тому

      One thing I’ve always wondered is how it wouldn’t be destroyed by the detonation of the fission primary before it could serve its purpose.

    • @Evan_Bell
      @Evan_Bell Рік тому +2

      There's no evidence fogbank is a neutron shield.
      The primary already emits most of it energy as x-rays, not gammas. Their energy is decreased by expansion of the photon gas.

    • @Evan_Bell
      @Evan_Bell Рік тому +1

      ​@@rfichokeofdestinyBy the detonation of the primary or the HE of the primary? There's standoff gaps to protect structures from the HE.
      The Fogbank is "destroyed" (vapourised) by the fission explosion of the primary. That's what it's meant to do.

    • @rfichokeofdestiny
      @rfichokeofdestiny Рік тому

      @@Evan_Bell Yes, the HE. I know they fire inwards but I assumed there would also be some collateral damage in the general vicinity. So if there’s a gap, I’m guessing it would have to be sized based on the time it takes the HE to compress the fission core and start the reaction vs. the time it takes for the shockwave from the HE to expand outward.

    • @Evan_Bell
      @Evan_Bell Рік тому +1

      @@rfichokeofdestiny Precisely.

  • @HeisenbergFam
    @HeisenbergFam Рік тому +25

    3:22 "even tho NASA invested 23 mil into FOGBANK alternative, nobody could conclude such thing could work" FOGBANK clearly caused foggy memory

  • @thatotherperson2
    @thatotherperson2 Рік тому +17

    I really di chuckle at 5:20 when he reveals that his motivation for trimming spending waste was "Do it for trains." Someone please build this autistic man more railways!

  • @Florkl
    @Florkl Рік тому +8

    Strong Mechanicus Vibes. Don’t lose track of those STCs!

  • @exMuteKid
    @exMuteKid 11 місяців тому

    I really like inventing and making stuff in my free time, this video has inspired me to keep documentation of the changes I make between my sketches/drawings and the actual final thing I make. Since one day my memory isn’t going to be so good

  • @brianholmes1812
    @brianholmes1812 Рік тому +4

    I am now replacing the phrase "Tax Dollars" with "Potential Train Money" forever more

  • @dannypipewrench533
    @dannypipewrench533 Рік тому +2

    0:48 Nice of you to include that disclaimer.
    That way, somebody like me does not yell at you about how the HGM-25A Titan I carried a W-38 3.75 megaton warhead, not the W-76 100 kiloton warhead.

  • @sliftyy
    @sliftyy Рік тому +9

    Reminds me of how the Kriegsmarine's battleships were equipped with 11' guns, which were weaker than their older predecessors in the Kaiserliche Marine which had 15' guns because the knowhow of how to manufacture the guns were lost in the interwar years

    • @axelkolle9994
      @axelkolle9994 Рік тому

      A very interesting tidbit. Could you point me at some reading. I was always very interested in WW2 german military

    • @sliftyy
      @sliftyy Рік тому

      @@axelkolle9994 I have mainly read books about the Eastern front because that is what interests me most, and my knowledge of German operations in the West, Scandinavia, North Africa and the Kriegsmarine is very limited. If anyone else has books to recommend, feel free to do so aswell! Here are some good books:
      "The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy" by Adam Tooze
      "Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War 1941-1945" by Evan Mawdsley
      "When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler" by David Glantz
      "Ostkrieg: Hitler's War of Extermination in the East" by Stephen Fritz
      “Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945” by Catherine Merridale

    • @axelkolle9994
      @axelkolle9994 14 днів тому

      @@sliftyy Thanks for coming back to me with these recommendations

  • @JoseTorres-ry9qe
    @JoseTorres-ry9qe 10 місяців тому +1

    This is some straight up Warhammer 40k type shenanigans. On the bright side, if we didn't know how to make this seemingly crucial component, our adversaries probably don't either. Maybe.

  • @r5LgxTbQ
    @r5LgxTbQ Рік тому +5

    not to be confused with Spankbank, something most of us will never forget

  • @exMuteKid
    @exMuteKid 11 місяців тому

    1:09 seeing the level of engineering from back then makes me realize how late to the party I was born (2002)
    Like I’ll see the engineering they did in the mid 60’s and actually be super impressed, it makes you realize how not that long ago it was. Or maybe it’s just because the 60’s was a time when so many new engineering innovations were made, same with the 70’s honestly it feels like 1960’s to mid 2000’s was the time of peak innovation and now we’re just trailing

  • @nevisstkitts8264
    @nevisstkitts8264 Рік тому +14

    The loss of the process has nothing to do with weapons developers not being detail oriented. It has everything to do with clueless administrators being unwilling to preserve important records as required by law. They did this in order to save a small amount of funding and get an award. Since the information is highly classified, it was most likely maintained at the facility, and possibly a second site. When the gov plays musical chairs with facilities closures, it costs money to preserve records. Since they are closing facilities to "save" money, no money shows up to preserve highly classified technical records. The reasoning is production is complete, no justification for records retention (the records are not needed anymore), so destroy. Don't ask me how I know. Remember when Nancy Pelosi destroyed a Presidential Records Act document on live TV? that kinda stuff.

    • @brodriguez11000
      @brodriguez11000 Рік тому

      Don't ask you how you know? Well there's another record lost.

    • @1pcfred
      @1pcfred Рік тому +1

      Now we know what was in Joe's garage. It was the recipe for fogbank.

  • @WaffleSandwich4
    @WaffleSandwich4 Місяць тому +2

    0:51 “And the United States is cooking” 🗣️🗣️

  • @tomalator
    @tomalator Рік тому +20

    What a wonderful video about bricks!
    Don't worry, Sam, I'm helping to cover for you

  • @darthhodges
    @darthhodges Рік тому +6

    I took an Intro to Business Law class in college that I could summarize in one sentence: "If it's not in writing it doesn't count". This video is proof that the application of that sentence goes way beyond business law.

  • @enderblazex2718
    @enderblazex2718 Рік тому +9

    If only they had listened to SpongeBob to "WRITE THAT DOWN!" they wouldn't have forgotten.

    • @tappajaav
      @tappajaav 10 місяців тому

      DON'T WRITE THAT DOWN!

  • @RockyPeroxide
    @RockyPeroxide Рік тому +1

    So, the secret to making FOGBANK is putting a tortilla in the oven at 200°C for 10 minutes.
    I even got to show it to the fire department!

  • @Sarahbryson321
    @Sarahbryson321 Рік тому +7

    You [REDACTED] the [REDACTED] at [REDACTED].

    • @Masterhitman935
      @Masterhitman935 Рік тому +2

      Welcome for the SPC - Special Procurement Censorship.

  • @traviscecil3903
    @traviscecil3903 Рік тому +1

    I tried baking some brownies like that. Now my oven glows green, and some nice men in suits from the NRC are drinking coffee in the den and asking questions.

  • @sophiaisabelle027
    @sophiaisabelle027 Рік тому +29

    We appreciate your effort and hard work on this channel. God bless you.

  • @scott2696
    @scott2696 Рік тому +1

    Ironically, this the same way they found out how to make roman concrete.
    It was the modern way of using finely crushed limestone that prevented them from making roman concrete.

  • @joemerino3243
    @joemerino3243 Рік тому +30

    We are surrounded by examples of this. In a societal collapse, much knowledge is lost. Who knows which of our current technologies will be thought of as mythical in the future we are sliding into?

    • @brodriguez11000
      @brodriguez11000 Рік тому +4

      Strange handheld rectangular slabs resistant to disassembly with a picture of an apple stamped into the back.

    • @arandomcommenter412
      @arandomcommenter412 Рік тому

      None

    • @joemerino3243
      @joemerino3243 Рік тому +1

      @@arandomcommenter412 That was a great example of the decline in IQs that are causing progress to stall in every area except computers.

    • @Mulmgott
      @Mulmgott Рік тому +4

      @@joemerino3243 Or maybe it is because we have hit a barrier of complexity that can be hardly conceived of by the human brain. Quantum Mechanics is very very counterintuitive and super hard to grasp so we acutally need the progress in computing power to solve those equations in a timely manner. But what do I know I am just a Biochemistry student.

    • @joemerino3243
      @joemerino3243 Рік тому +2

      @@Mulmgott As a biochemistry student you should be well-placed to see the tragic collapse of the sciences. Look how long ago we bioengineered the production of insulin. Look how much promise bioengineering has, how relatively simple it is compared to quantum mechanics or modern chip design, and how dreadfully little has been done since the development of restriction enzymes, site directed mutagenesis, gene silencing, and even crispr. We have every tool needed to do virtually anything we want, from decimating cancer by introducing supernumerary copies of p53 to making trees grow bacon by introducing fatty acid synthesis enzymes into moringa trees. And yet it takes us 10 years to approve salmon that grow slightly faster, and in the meantime we are wasting time with GFP cats and other nonsense.

  • @pauljs75
    @pauljs75 Рік тому +10

    The stuff also has one or two materials that could be worth creating a superfund hazmat site if not handled properly in large quantities. Rumors one part of the process is something where they use a fluorine compound, and if you know how reactive or toxic that can be in some cases - it's normally not worth messing around with. (In a way some scientists were wanting to forget about it? Hoping it was a one-and-done thing due to the mess involved in making it, not considering that some aerogels will turn brittle/crumbly over time.)

  • @Palemagpie
    @Palemagpie Рік тому +5

    This is some 40k dark age of humanity logic right there.

  • @namesurname5911
    @namesurname5911 Рік тому

    Just a quick note - as a chemist I can assure you, "acetonitrile was used in the process" in no way, shape or form points to aerogel specifically. It is one of the most commonly used organic solvents in chemistry.

  • @brandong1350
    @brandong1350 Рік тому +6

    The infographic at 5:00 made me laugh. Its clearly top secret, yet they explain the process through a High School text book style picture.
    Very nerdy, very funny, very existentially concerning....

  • @CaesarSaladin7
    @CaesarSaladin7 Рік тому +1

    Best joke in the video: "I don't want them wasting my potential train money on this". Implying that it would get used on a train.

  • @jiskithehusky9094
    @jiskithehusky9094 Рік тому +8

    Can you imagine being the guy who figured out why the cleaner Fogbank wasn't working? Think how frustrating it would be to figure out THAT was the problem.

    • @isekaiexpress9450
      @isekaiexpress9450 Рік тому

      Imagine if humans forgot how semiconductors were made and the only thing they remembered that a highly pure silicon was somehow involved. The only way to breakthrough would be to mess up

  • @tw8464
    @tw8464 10 місяців тому

    It might have been be kind of nice if everyone in world had also simultaneously forgotten how to make nuclear weapons when forgot fogbank.

  • @BlackMesa322
    @BlackMesa322 Рік тому +5

    I knew it! They forgot the secret ingredient, MSG

    • @ericg7044
      @ericg7044 Рік тому

      MSG really does make everything taste better.

    • @DavidCowie2022
      @DavidCowie2022 Рік тому

      I thought everyone had forgotten about the Michael Schenker Group.

  • @SLU2MOVIES
    @SLU2MOVIES Рік тому +2

    Fun fact
    Shrek had better backups then FOGBANK

  • @Iamthelolrus
    @Iamthelolrus Рік тому +5

    I just read a 3 year old article on this 2 days ago. I've never heard of it before that. Neat.

  • @Me-da-Ghost
    @Me-da-Ghost Рік тому

    Swiss cheese was actually losing its holes because the milk was too clean, and didn't have any impurities on which bubbles could form. Cheese-makers ended up having to manually add a tiny bit of hay dust to bring back the holes.

  • @wowomatic
    @wowomatic Рік тому +5

    I couldn’t reverse engineer fogbank at home, but I did make some bomb-ass brownies.

  • @joeylewis1121
    @joeylewis1121 Рік тому

    I appreciate how you delivered the facts no need for ads when you don’t need money for vews

  • @ManuelBTC21
    @ManuelBTC21 Рік тому +11

    Hey, look at it this way. There's no higher top secret rating, than the info literally not even existing. Top notch security 👌

  • @jordankull4295
    @jordankull4295 Рік тому +1

    Did we even try a Peter Tordenskjold approach? Like just email the Russians, congratulate them on a great duel, and ask for the recipe for fog bank?

  • @Pico_444
    @Pico_444 Рік тому +4

    3:27 she fr playing Osu in the workplace

  • @Quadrolithium
    @Quadrolithium Рік тому +1

    One of the examples of "do well, but not perfect." Because you went above and beyond you missed the point why that flaw was there in the first place.

  • @bowez9
    @bowez9 Рік тому +3

    As my Grandfather was at Y12 then, you didn't mention some DIED to purposeful exposure to Beryllium without PPE.

  • @milomateer6565
    @milomateer6565 Рік тому +1

    This is why I believe in lost knowledge and more advanced civilizations than we were taught about in school because this story shows how things can be forgotten so easily