Fifty-nine years ago today was the first time a television audience got to watch an atomic blast broadcast live as it happened. KTLA in Los Angeles hid a crew on the roof of a hotel in Las Vegas, waiting for the top secret Ranger Easy bomb test in Frenchman Flats, Nevada. The blast went off at 5:30AM on February 1st, 1951. Viewers got up early to see their TV screens go white.
A year later, all the networks carried live coverage of nuclear tests. Link
Wired also has a collection of nuclear bomb videos. Link
We stayed on the air, they waited for the right time, and all of a sudden there was the flash. The people watched it, Gil described it, Lane talked about it, and that was our telecast. That one flash. You just see this blinding white light. It didn’t seem real. We didn’t have videotape. You couldn’t say, “Let’s look at it again.”
A year later, all the networks carried live coverage of nuclear tests. Link
Wired also has a collection of nuclear bomb videos. Link