This video reviews Project CANNIKIN, a nuclear test conducted on Amchitka Island, Alaska, at11:00 a.m., Bering Standard Time, on November 6, 1971. CANNIKIN, a slightly lessthanfivemegaton device, was the largest underground nuclear test conducted in the United States.
CANNIKIN was conducted to proof test a warhead for the Spartan missile, a Safeguard Ballistic Missile Defense Program.
The video shows the nuclear device and instrumentation canister being lowered into the shaft,detonation sequences, and test effects. A longrange view of water turbulence after the detonation is shown, but no tsunami or large ocean wave was observed or recorded. Numerous ground shock
waves are shown at normal speed and as seen by highspeed, slowmotion cameras located at various sites on the island. Surface effects at ground zero and other island locations were filmed one day after the test. Approximately 38 hours after the test, a subsidence crater, approximately 1.5
miles in diameter and 55 feet deep, began to form. Many scenes in the video have no sound intentionally; no material was deleted.