Mushroom Clouds

Mushroom clouds are often associated purely with atom bombs, the fact is that mushroom clouds are a result of convection, the movement caused by heat in a fluid.  Any explosion can create a mushroom shape.

Below is a photo of several concurrent gasoline explosions, you can see very clearly the mushroom shape of the fireball.

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/interviews/interview/1267/

First Musings

The other day I sat at lunch with my brother.  When the topic of Fukushima Diichi came up, we began to discuss what had, could, and would likely happen as a result.  Soon our discussion moved to the industry as a whole.  Eventually I brought up Liquid Metal Reactors, Breeder Reactors, and Gas Cooled Pebble Bed Reactors.  I explained the design configurations of these reactor types, it was wonderful to just talk, not argue, just talk about these fascinating devices, each with their own strengths, each with their own limitations.  He would ask questions, and I would talk for a bit, probably just barely answering his question, and giving him a whole bunch of information he didn't want to know, but none the less, it was nice.