The History of Heavy Water — Water Worth Sinking a Ferry For

The History of Heavy Water — Water Worth Sinking a Ferry For Heavy water was a Norwegian fertilizer byproduct, yet it lets natural uranium chain-react, and a ferry carrying it sank with 18 dead. The video traces who fought over this water in occupied Norway and who came looking for it after 1945, from Israel to India. Harold Urey found deuterium in 1931, and George de Hevesy drank enriched water to measure how long water stays in the body. Norsk Hydro's Vemork plant made heavy water from 1934, and Jacques Allier carried its 185 kg stock to France in 26 cans. After Operation Freshman left 41 of 48 men dead, Joachim Rønneberg's team destroyed the Vemork cells with nobody killed. After 1945, heavy water ran Chalk River's NRX reactor, went secretly from Norway to Israel and filled India's CIRUS reactor. Heavy water now runs Ontario's CANDU reactors. ⏱ TIMESTAMPS 0:00 Sinking the Ferry Hydro 1:00 Harold Urey Discovers Deuterium 2:48 Hevesy and Hofer Drink It 4:07 Vemork's Fertilizer Byproduct 5:13 Jacques Allier's 26 Cans 7:39 Walther Bothe's Graphite Measurement 9:02 Jomar Brun's Castor Oil Sabotage 10:16 Operation Freshman Glider Crashes 11:35 Poulsson's Christmas Eve Reindeer 13:22 Rønneberg's Raid Through the Cable Shaft 14:57 US Bombers Attack Vemork 16:52 Leif Tronstad Shot Dead 18:11 Haigerloch Pile and Farm Hall 20:51 Jimmy Carter at Chalk River 23:18 Norway's Heavy Water to Israel 24:52 India's 1974 Pokhran Test 26:38 Sudbury Neutrino Observatory 27:31 Arak Reactor and Hydro Barrels Subscribe for more hidden histories behind the objects you use every day. #history #documentary #HeavyWater #Vemork #NuclearReactor