The Blue Flash: How a careless slip led to a fatal accident in the Manhattan Project

One day in Oppenheimer's Manhattan Project, a brief, casual moment of carelessness killed one scientist and severely injured another. In this specially illustrated story, the artist and writer Ben Platts-Mills recounts what happened to these atomic bomb-makers – and why their accident holds powerful lessons for today.
"...In the search for a harmonious attitude towards life, it must never be forgotten that we ourselves are both actors and spectators in the drama of existence." – Niels Bohr, physicist

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During World War Two, the US government formed the Manhattan Project, recruiting scientists and engineers from across the country to live and work at a secret research centre in Los Alamos, New Mexico. From this base in the desert, and under the leadership of Robert Oppenheimer, they developed the world's first atomic bombs.