Country United Kingdom Period 1959-1963 Test type dry surface | Test site Maralinga Range, SAU Number of tests 13 Max. yield 0 | |
The Vixen series of nuclear tests were all safety experiments, in which a bomb mechanism with live core is subjected to abnormal conditions, such as fire, shock and electrical malfunctions to determine whether a nuclear criticality occurs. The obviously successful result is no nuclear criticality, but the high explosives that trigger the fission bomb may explode (in fact, are encouraged to), destroying the bomb and spreading the core material over a localized area.
References
Operation Vixen Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA