The U.S. will spend more than $750 billion over the next decade to revamp nearly every part of its aging nuclear defenses. Officials say they simply can't wait any longer — some systems and parts are more than 50 years old. The Associated Press was granted rare access to nuclear missile bases and weapons production facilities to see how technicians keep the arsenal working while starting the government's biggest nuclear overhaul since the Cold War.
In an ultra-sterile room at a secure factory in Kansas City, U.S. government technicians refurbish the nation’s nuclear warheads. The job is exacting: Each warhead has thousands of springs, gears and copper contacts that must work in conjunction to set off a nuclear explosion. Wearing radiation monitors, safety goggles and seven layers of gloves, they practice shaping new warhead plutonium cores — by hand.
The U.S. will spend more than $750 billion over the next decade to overhaul nearly every part of its nuclear defenses and replace systems that in some cases are more than 50 years old
KANSAS CITY NATIONAL SECURITY CAMPUS, Mo. (AP) In an ultra-sterile room at a secure factory in Kansas City, U.S. government technicians refurbish the nation’s nuclear warheads. The job is exacting: Each warhead has thousands of springs, gears and copper contacts that must work in conjunction to set off a nuclear explosion. Eight hundred miles […]