The Plutonium Sphere That Killed Its Own Scientists

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]Did you know scientists once nicknamed a plutonium sphere the demon core because it kept trying to kill them? In 1945, Los Alamos had a problem. They needed to test how close they could bring nuclear material to criticality without triggering a chain reaction. The experiments were simple. Bring two pieces of file material together. See how close you could get before the atom started splitting uncontrollably. What they created was a sixlb sphere of plutonium that would claim two lives in 8 months. The first victim was Harry Daglian. Working alone at night, he accidentally dropped a tungsten brick onto the core. The room filled with blue light as radiation flooded his body. He died 25 days later. 8 months later, Louis Slotton was showing off. He used only a screwdriver to separate two burillium shells around the demon core.

[00:00:49]The screwdriver slipped. Another flash of blue light. Another dead scientist.

[00:00:54]Both men knew the risks. Both continued anyway. The demon core had lived up to its name.