Ooooohh… So that’s how they became alicorns.

@Background Pony #2974  
“It’s hard to talk with a screwdriver in my mouth…”

@Einsman  
“Hey, what is everyone talking about?”  

@Background Pony #BFC3  
Ah yes, you are correct there, but that was the middle of an otherwise pair of solid hemispheres of plutonium. They are not thin-walled shells. They were pressed tightly together during manufacture.
 
The incident happened when someone was holding a neutron reflector hemisphere over the top of the core with just a screwdriver, instead of two wedges. They slipped and the neutron reflector fell over the core and it started going critical. Thankfully the guy got the reflector off before it went supercritical, but he’d already gained many, many times a lethal dose (his body did shield others in the room from a lethal dose).

@Damaged  
Was it? I thought the early plutonium cores were hollow and a small beryllium-polonium neutron emitter was placed in the center during assembly.

@laofuzi  
@Princess Luna  
IIRC it’s from a horror movie (about cannibals I think). It has been captioned in every way possible.
 
Unfortunately I can’t find a source for this, I only keep finding this image with different captions, but no fact checks.

The role of Louis Slotin was played by Princess Celestia.

I love she how is wearing safety goggles –Safety first!

@laofuzi  
I’ll be in the angry fallout shelter.

@laofuzi  
Do make sure to warn for stuff like this. Also, to my knowledge, that image is wrongly linked to radiation when it’s actually a burn victim.

@laofuzi  
and now know how look the pixel imagen of video

@Einsman  
By Celestia, this is an outrage! || I was going to eat that irradiated corpse! ||

@laofuzi  
Mmmm, beef jerky…

You keep f***ing around with the friendship core, you’re gonna end up like THAT guy!  
(WARNING: NSFL):  

@Einsman  
The tungsten block experiment was the first one. The screwdriver incident came later.
 
Here’s a good documentary on it.

@Damaged  
The reflectors were tungsten blocks, not a ring. The core itself was a sphere in two halves. The core halves were seperated by wedges and a screwdriver.

@Background Pony #0EDE  
No clue. The demon core itself was two solid hemispheres of plutonium. They were sandwiched together with a ring to keep them just far enough apart to remain subcritical. The screwdriver was used to hold a neutron reflector from closing fully around the sphere. The video is a bit odd in that it only shows the neutron reflector, not the actual demon core.

What could possibly go wrong?

@Einsman  

OH NOPE NOPE NOPE

Was just reading about the Tokaimura accident the other day, and going to hell because I laughed at the guy’s name.

Does demon core (object) need to be a tag? Maybe tickling the dragon's tail?

Things I never thought I’d see ponified: The demon core.  
Well not much left on that list after 10 years now, please carry on…

ITS THE MOTHER FUCKING DEMON CORE!