Craters of the Moon & EBR-1 Museum JULY 2019
Craters of the Moon is a national monument and presser in the Snake River Plain in Central Idaho. It an enormous lava flow with scattered cinder cones. It was formed 15000 to 20000 years ago when lava erupted from the Great Rift. It has some of the best examples of open rift cracks in the world. In fact it has the deepest rift crack on earth over 800 feet deep. Also are lava tubes (a type of cave). We traveled here with Shantel and the grandkids. This was Shanny's first "solo" road trip - over 3300 miles without Adam. We met here and explored the caves. Tom and I joined the kids on 2 of the caves - Beauty and Indian, but we passed on the Boy Scout cave. It was fairly steep and rocky and once in the bottom the floor was wet and covered in ice in some areas......so it was a little slippery for us. But the kids had fun and Shany didn't want to leave as it was so cool inside (and was hot above ground). Of course the kids completed another Jr. Ranger Badge. At night they have star gazing programs, had we known we could have RVed here and spent the night.
On the way back to our home base of Ashton, we stopped at the Experimental Breeder Reactor 1 -(EBR-1). . On 12-20-1951 it was the worlds first Electricity generating nuclear power plant. It produced enough electricity on that day to power 4 - 200 Watt light bulbs. Eventually it generated enough electricity to powers it's own building and the nearby town of Arco. Unfortunately it was decommissioned in 1964.
It is a hands on museum. The kids tried their hand at the mechanical arms that used to hold radioactive materials (now move wood blocks) and used the special glove tank used for same purpose of moving radioactive materials. We also stoop on top of placed where nuclear fuel rods were placed. Fascinating science but difficult to really comprehend and understand. But what a talented group of scientists in the early 50's that developed and discovered this power source.
EBR-1 is located outside the city of Arco an across from the current INL (Idaho National Laboratories) The INL is continuing to develop uses for nuclear power - has has it's own life size nuclear submarine - not exactly what you would expect to find in Idaho.
On the way back to our home base of Ashton, we stopped at the Experimental Breeder Reactor 1 -(EBR-1). . On 12-20-1951 it was the worlds first Electricity generating nuclear power plant. It produced enough electricity on that day to power 4 - 200 Watt light bulbs. Eventually it generated enough electricity to powers it's own building and the nearby town of Arco. Unfortunately it was decommissioned in 1964.
It is a hands on museum. The kids tried their hand at the mechanical arms that used to hold radioactive materials (now move wood blocks) and used the special glove tank used for same purpose of moving radioactive materials. We also stoop on top of placed where nuclear fuel rods were placed. Fascinating science but difficult to really comprehend and understand. But what a talented group of scientists in the early 50's that developed and discovered this power source.
EBR-1 is located outside the city of Arco an across from the current INL (Idaho National Laboratories) The INL is continuing to develop uses for nuclear power - has has it's own life size nuclear submarine - not exactly what you would expect to find in Idaho.
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