Encore

Operation Upshot-Knothole

May 8, 1953 · Nevada Test Site (NTS) · Airdrop · 27 kt

A nuclear device dropped from an aircraft and exploded in the atmosphere.

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Atomic Energy Commission (U.S.A.E.C.)

Printed in 1953

Silver gelatin print

8x10 in (20.3x25.4 cm)

Stamp

Mushroom cloud of Shot Encore, tenth nuclear detonation of Operation Upshot-Knothole, B-50 airdrop at 739 metres, Area 5, Nevada Proving Ground, 8 May 1953. Mk-6D bomb, weapons effects test, 27 kt. Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory. AEC-53-4702.
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Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory (LASL)

Printed in 1953

Silver gelatin print

8x10 in (20.3x25.4 cm)

Serial number, Stamp

Shot Encore was the tenth nuclear detonation of Operation Upshot-Knothole, dropped by a B-50 bomber on 8 May 1953 from an altitude of approximately 5,800 metres over Area 5 of the Nevada Proving Ground. The Mk-6D bomb detonated at 739 metres altitude — 5 metres west and 286 metres south of the designated ground zero — producing 27 kilotons against a predicted yield of 30–35 kt. It was a weapons effects test, the shot name Encore following the DOD convention of using abbreviation mnemonics: E for Effects. Total device weight was 3,779 kg. Operation Upshot-Knothole, of which Encore was part, released approximately 35,000 kilocuries of iodine-131 into the atmosphere — the most of any continental test series — producing civilian thyroid exposures projected to result in approximately 28,000 cases of thyroid cancer and 1,400 deaths.