Driving back from the beach recently I saw this marker on the outskirts of Florence, SC, and did a double-take (…a mental one…so I wouldn’t wreck the car). Unbelievable!
The culprit:
The aftermath:
Here’s an aerial view (from wikimapia.com) from 2011 showing the crater’s size relative to the houses around it:
The following overview (again from wikimapia.com) shows the bomb site’s relative distance from local landmark Francis Marion University:
This is what the crater looks like in 2011; obviously, it has been greatly filled-in over time by natural forces:
And finally, something to ponder: “Only two nuclear bombs have been mistakenly dropped in the United States. Neither accident triggered a nuclear explosion. But if the nuclear rod had been installed in the bomb that fell on Gregg’s yard, it would have killed everything within 10 miles. The fallout would have killed thousands in Horry County and Wilmington, N.C. Though the mistaken bombing was one-of-a-kind in South Carolina, nuclear mishaps weren’t uncommon during the Cold War. Some nuclear weapons were lost and never recovered. Bombers have crashed, with their nuclear payloads, in several states, including North Carolina. However, none of these incidents resulted in a nuclear detonation. ’It’s certainly unusual,’ said David Coleman, a visiting professor of Cold War history at the University of Virginia. ‘But there were many examples of times when bombs were dropped or planes crashed. It’s not talked about very much.’ “ (from http://www.rense.com/general45/Manrec.htm)
Keep watching the skies!
