The Day We Lost the H-Bomb

between them. He attached a dynamometer to measure the total lifting stress.

Both lines were wound around one capstan, ensuring that the ship would hoist both at the same speed. Moody made sure that the capstan was smooth, free from any imperfections that might cut the lines. A second capstan would wind CURV’s umbilical cable. CURV, though hopelessly tangled in the chute, was slightly buoyant and didn’t pose much of a lifting problem. But to keep it neutral during the lift, it had to be raised at the same speed as the weapon.

Harrell positioned the Mike boats that would hold Petrel steady for the lift. Looking at the weather, he knew that today would prove particularly difficult. April 7 dawned with little breeze and a calm sea, beautiful for a spring picnic but less than ideal for ship control. It was easiest to judge and hold position when a breeze or surface current offered a force to work against. With neither of these, Harrell’s difficult job would be that much harder.

Guest and his staff gathered in the wardroom to watch the lift on CURV’s video monitor.

Meanwhile, Moody cleared all nonessential personnel—“tourists,” he called them — off the Petrel’s stern, or fan-tail. The only people allowed on deck were those actually recovering CURV or the bomb. Moody wanted to give the recovery team space to work, not necessarily protect the men who hustled belowdecks. Moody was certain the bomb wouldn’t explode. But if it somehow did, it wouldn’t matter if a man were abovedecks or below. As one EOD diver put it, there’d be nothing left but a greasy stain.

At 5:50 a.m., the Petrel began to raise the weapon. Guest worried most about the bomb lifting off the bottom. He had been told that when the bomb was within 100 feet of the bottom and 100 feet of the surface, vibrations in the nylon line could reduce its strength by as much as 75 percent. The admiral was not the only man in the wardroom worried about this possibility; one scientist paced back and forth with such a scowl that Red Moody and Herman Kunz had to take him outside and tell him to cheer up. Guest, powerless to do anything but wait, looked sick to his stomach. He turned to the man next to him and said, “I’d prefer combat any day to this.” As it turned out, the weapon came up so smoothly that they hardly noticed it leaving the bottom. For an hour and forty-five minutes, the capstans turned slowly, gently raising the weapon. Finally, the top of the parachute broke the surface. Two of Red Moody’s divers jumped into the water to inspect the bomb. The weapon, they found, wasn’t dangling below the chute but remained tangled about a third of the way up. The fact that they saw the weapon was a huge relief; for the first time, Guest knew he really, truly had the bomb.

The divers attached metal straps and hoisting lines to the bomb. Boatswain mates rigged the lines to the cargo boom on the Petrel’s fantail. Then the divers cut CURV free from the chute, and the signal was given to lift. The Petrel hoisted the weapon clear of the water and swung it inboard.

Immediately, the EOD team swarmed the waterlogged weapon with radiation monitors. The readings were negative. The boom swung the bomb over the back of the ship and set it down. It was 8:46 a.m.

Nobody breathed easy yet. The Navy EOD team, joined by Air Force and Sandia experts, inspected the bomb as it sat on a pair of wooden chocks. The rough ride had battered the weapon. The tail section was torn and jagged, the parachute twisted and fouled, the nose dented as if punched by a giant fist. But the rest had remained intact, with a portion of the bomb rack still attached and little corrosion from its stay in the salty sea.

The EOD team began to render the bomb safe, dismantling key components to make sure it couldn’t explode or release radiation. Carefully, they removed covers and disconnected cables in a specific sequence. The job went smoothly until about 10 a.m., when they tried to remove the thermal battery.

The pressure of the deep water had squeezed the battery into place, and it stuck stubbornly inside the bomb. The EOD diver in charge of the render-safe, Walter Funston, consulted the manual, which included instructions for this contingency. The manual said to drill a hole in the battery, insert a wood screw, and use the screw to yank the battery out. Funston turned to the Sandia expert standing nearby and asked if the battery configuration had changed. He was about to drill a hole into a hydrogen bomb and wanted to hit the mark. Getting the go-ahead, the team drilled a small hole in the center of the battery and inserted a three-inch wood screw. Several men tried to pull the battery clear, but it refused to budge. Funston had an idea. He hooked a short nylon strap to the wood screw and attached it to a shackle on the ship’s bulwark. As he twisted the strap, the battery slowly eased out. At 10:15 a.m. the bomb was declared safe.

On the fantail, there were no shouts of joy, no claps on the back. Everyone was too tired. In the wardroom, the staff applauded, more with relief than excitement. Guest, nearly sick with exhaustion, said simply, “Thank God we finally did it.”

Someone cut up the parachute, handing out small strips as souvenirs. For the next two hours, the members of the task force congratulated one another and autographed the little pieces of parachute.

Then all those who could headed to their bunks.

As Brad Mooney walked toward his quarters, Herman Kunz leaned out of a doorway and beckoned to him. Mooney followed Kunz to his room and watched, goggle-eyed, as Kunz opened a folding desk and displayed his fine collection of alcohol. Kunz offered Mooney a drink, but the young lieutenant demurred. He told the diver that he had never drunk alcohol aboard a Navy ship before, and he wasn’t about to start now. That’s fine, said Kunz. You’re tired. Go to bed.

A short time later, after Mooney was in bed, the ship’s doctor paid him a visit. “Guest tells me you’ve been up for three days,” said the doctor. “You really need to have some medication.” He handed Mooney some clear liquid. “Here,” he said. “This is yours. Take your time drinking it.” Mooney took a couple of sips. It was pure gin. Somehow, Herman Kunz had convinced the doctor to give him a prescription for booze. Mooney, just following orders, found Kunz, joined him in a celebratory dose of medicine, then returned to his quarters and fell asleep.

The next day, April 8, was Good Friday. That morning, approximately a hundred newsmen and photographers, following the plan that the embassy, Navy, and Air Force had finally agreed upon, gathered at a dock in Garrucha and were ferried to the USS Albany. From the deck of the flagship, under a warm spring sun, they watched Alvin, Aluminaut, and Cubmarine sail by in a multicolor minisub review. They also watched the Petrel sail back and forth along the starboard side of the Albany, about thirty-five yards away. Ambassador Duke posed for photos with his wife and various Spanish and American officials. For about twenty minutes, the press had a clear view of bomb number four, still resting on its wooden chocks on the Petrel’s fantail.

It was the first time the United States had ever displayed a nuclear weapon in public, and pictures of the bomb appeared in television stories and on front pages around the globe. Bernard Kalb, reporting for CBS, noted how innocent the bomb seemed. It lay, he said, “under the Mediterranean sun as if it were a bathing beauty posing for photographers.” “For a multimegaton monster,” he added, “it looks extremely dull.”

The embassy had drafted a press release to be given to reporters at this event. Part of the release stated that the weapon had been found “in 2,500 feet of water, approximately five miles off shore by the submersible Alvin.” The Navy said this made it look as if Alvin had done all the work alone. It asked the embassy to change the sentence, and it complied. The statement released to the press read:

“The weapon was located on March 15 in 2,500 feet of water, approximately five miles off shore by units of Task Force 65.”

After the bomb display, Guest, flanked by Wilson, Duke, and Spanish dignitaries, held a press conference aboard the Albany. He gave a detailed explanation of the search and recovery operations, then opened the floor for questions. One reporter asked him how much the operation had cost. Guest refused to estimate. But regardless of the cost, he said, the Navy had learned more about deepwater operations from Task Force 65 than from any previous mission.

Guest had hardly slept in days, and, as the press conference wore on, he sounded steadily more testy and exhausted. He praised the Alvin crew but couldn’t remember their names. At one point, he apologized for asking a reporter to repeat a question, saying “I’m just about out on my feet.” Finally, before the admiral collapsed, Duke stepped in and commandeered the mike. “Admiral,” he said,

“you have the gratitude of grateful countrymen, a grateful host country, and in fact the gratitude of the world. Thank you very much.” With that Guest thanked the crowd and signed off.

Palomares invites superlatives. It involved the greatest striking force in military history, the worst nuclear weapons accident, the largest sea search. The magnitude of the accident forced Americans to confront their