Does anything refresh the palate after a nearby nuclear
explosion quite like a nice, cold beer? A 1955 test conducted by
the U.S. government suggested canned or bottled beer would be
safe to drink after a mushroom cloud subsided. But scientists
today question that thinking. Science historian Alex Wellerstein
recently alerted the world to the results of Operation Teapot, a
series of nuclear weapons tests conducted in Nevada in 1955
that, in part, tried to answer some practical questions about
what we would eat and drink if the bomb came down. Within
Operation Teapot was Project 32.2a, which examined "The Effects
of Nuclear Explosions on Commercially Packaged Beverages." As
the report on Project 32.2a explained, "packaged beverages, both
beer and soft drinks, are so ubiquitous and already uniformly
available in urban areas, it is obvious that they could serve as
important sources of fluids." During the tests, a wide range of
canned and bottled beverages were positioned at distances
between about 1,000 feet and