TULAROSA — Mary Riseley walked through glowing rows of luminarias looking for her mother’s name at a vigil for New Mexico downwinders Wednesday, 80 years to the day after the first nuclear bomb test.

(Corrections & Clarifications: This story previously misstated how far nuclear fallout from the government's atomic tests reached. Fallout from the initial Trinity Test reached 46 of the 48 contiguous ...

When the U.S. military detonated the world's first nuclear weapon near New Mexico’s Jornada del Muerto desert in 1945, people living in the nearby areas were exposed to harmful radiation. Weeks later, ...

A 100-ton explosive test occurred at Trinity Site on May 7, 1945, as a rehearsal for the atomic bomb test. The 100-ton test was largely unnoticed, unlike the July 16 atomic bomb test which was seen as ...

On July 16, 1945, the sky above the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico was illuminated by the explosion of the world's first atomic bomb, marking a pivotal moment in history and the culmination ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. David Bressan is a geologist who covers curiosities about Earth. Jul 16, 2025, 10:38am EDT Jul 16, 2025, 12:02pm EDT The mushroom ...

Congress earlier this month finally got around to making New Mexico fallout victims of the first test of an atomic bomb and the miners who dug up the uranium to fuel the weapon eligible for ...

The U.S. scientists who tested the first atomic bomb, July 16, 1945, took the ultimate gamble of setting the atmosphere on fire and destroying all life on Earth. Even after the renowned physicist Hans ...

A bright, blinding light flashed above New Mexico’s Jornada del Muerto desert at 5:30 a.m. on July 16, 1945. The thunderous roar that followed jolted 14-year-old Jess Gililland awake on the porch of ...

TOMORROW, 80 YEARS SINCE THE WORLD’S FIRST ATOMIC BOMB WAS DETONATED IN NEW MEXICO. CONSIDERED INSTRUMENTAL IN THE EFFORTS TO END WORLD WAR TWO, THE TRINITY TEST DEVASTATED LOCAL COMMUNITIES.