8 ms·

The Radioactive Boy Scout (1998)

84 points by SQL2219 4y ago

mgkimsal 4y ago
Was just telling some friends about this story the other day. He want to the the same high school as I did, although he was a few years after me; I think he may have had a class with one of my siblings.
ncmncm 4y ago
This story makes me feel ill every time it surfaces.
zabzonk 4y ago
Are there any figures for how many people have being saved by so-called smoke detector positives?
watersb 4y ago
"The Scoutmaster’s wife noted that a typical kid working on this badge goes to a hospital and asks about x-rays. David decided to build a Breeder Reactor." .!!. I'm currently reading through the 1950s "Tom Swift Jr." stories... so maybe that's why I expected this HN post to be a great work of fiction. Like Charles Stross' "De-chlorinating the Moderator" http://www.antipope.org/charlie/fiction/moderator.html http://www.antipope.org/charlie/fiction/moderator.html The real world can be more delightful. And terrifying.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
macksd 4y ago
This is a very interesting story, but this article is pretty light on a lot of the details of his life. He got into a lot of mischief throughout his life and unfortunately died a few years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn. It's a real shame, because he was obviously bright and highly motivated and I feel like he was just never able to really put all that potential into action. My favorite part of the story is that he was arrested for stealing smoke detectors from his apartment building trying to collect radioactive material. One of my first jobs was shipping / receiving for an electronics manufacturer, and smoke / gas detectors were the lion's share of our business. I was told I always had to classify the products as "components for a nuclear reactor" on international shipping manifests, which I thought was silly. Until I read this story...
- sharkweek 4y ago
  If only you had met Nathan Fielder when he was attempting to rebrand smoke detectors as musical instruments to avoid these customs declarations. (If you haven’t watched the show Nathan For You, I can’t recommend it enough).
  - ortusdux 4y ago
    I've actually called the US Dept of Commerce to get help figuring out which Harmonized System code to use for some shipments. I managed to stump them and they had to give me a callback, but throughout they were extremely helpful.
  - jamal-kumar 4y ago
    Was that a new episode/season of that show? Huge fan I actually met the guy many years ago a few times before he was ever famous. First time he was SO OBNOXIOUS, like we had to be mean as possible and kick him out because he just wouldn't listen to us trying to tell him to shut the hell up with name-dropping Seth Rogen and some early hiphop comedy act he used to do on this website loadingreadyrun when we were trying to watch a movie... Second time he was a security guard at a parking lot next to a rave and we smoked a blunt with him Sometimes I wonder if he remembers any of that
    - sharkweek 4y ago
      LOL that's hilarious that you have those memories with him. I sort of imagine the show isn't a big stretch for who he is in real life. Yeah the smoke detector episode is from the most recent (and final) season. If you liked the first couple, the last season is the best imo.
  - shepherdjerred 4y ago
    https://youtu.be/X7odcV25sHg https://youtu.be/X7odcV25sHg
- mjevans 4y ago
  This is also the reason modern smoke detectors are all annoying BS. We can't have nice things because this one guy went through a whole lot of trouble to do something silly. Now they're all oversensitive steam sensing BS models. I'd rather have freaking IR cameras looking for too much heat (outside of kitchens).
dang 4y ago
The classic article is https://harpers.org/archive/1998/11/the-radioactive-boy-scout/ https://harpers.org/archive/1998/11/the-radioactive-boy-scou..., from 1998. Did this one just lift the title for a different piece on the same topic? Related: The Radioactive Boy Scout (1998) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23538908 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23538908 - June 2020 (1 comment) The Radioactive Boy Scout - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18396332 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18396332 - Nov 2018 (1 comment) The Radioactive Boy Scout (1999) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15466860 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15466860 - Oct 2017 (34 comments) “Radioactive Boy Scout” who tried to build a homemade nuclear reactor dead at 39 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12957768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12957768 - Nov 2016 (67 comments) The Radioactive Boy Scout: When a teenager attempts to build a breeder reactor - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9867739 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9867739 - July 2015 (5 comments) The Radioactive Boy Scout (1998) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6310748 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6310748 - Sept 2013 (1 comment) The radioactive boy scout: the teenager who attempted to build a breeder reactor - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=611583 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=611583 - May 2009 (18 comments) Also related, a little less directly: Middle school student achieved nuclear fusion in his family playroom - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24705563 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24705563 - Oct 2020 (82 comments) Boy, 12, said to have created nuclear reaction in playroom lab - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19472076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19472076 - March 2019 (14 comments) 12-Year-Old Claims to Have Achieved Nuclear Fusion at Home (2018) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19229433 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19229433 - Feb 2019 (92 comments) “I built a fusion reactor in my bedroom – AMA” - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12118525 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12118525 - July 2016 (127 comments) The Fusioneers, who build nuclear reactors in their back yards - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11777553 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11777553 - May 2016 (54 comments) Nobody builds nuclear reactors for fun anymore - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867072 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867072 - Dec 2013 (102 comments) The Nuclear Scientist Who Skipped College - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4762449 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4762449 - Nov 2012 (50 comments)
- stordoff 4y ago
Trouble_007 4y ago
FYI: David Charles Hahn (October 30, 1976 - September 27, 2016), sometimes called the "Radioactive Boy Scout" or the "Nuclear Boy Scout" : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn The Nuclear Boy Scout - A Short Documentary : https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WyFktKBGfIA https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WyFktKBGfIA The Nuclear Boy Scout (TV Short 2003) - IMDb : https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0378468/ https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0378468/
- JoeDaDude 4y ago
  See the 2003 film about him, made while he was still alive, at link below. This film has some details about his homemade reactor at about 17:24 minutes in. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBuOJn03QVo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBuOJn03QVo
CoastalCoder 4y ago
> The Scoutmaster’s wife noted that a typical kid working on this badge goes to a hospital and asks about x-rays. David decided to build a Breeder Reactor. This was perfectly logical to someone with a rather naive social awareness, accompanied by a passion for collecting all the Periodic Table Elements. Can someone explain the logical connection between "naive social awareness" and "choosing to go way above and beyond for this merit badge"? As someone with Asperger syndrome (very mild) and the parent of a kid with it (more so), I may be overly sensitive to stereotyping on the topic. So in that excerpt above, what I hear is a neuro-typical adult dismissing the kid's amazing accomplishment here, just because he's socially awkward. I'm sure she's actually a lovely person, so I'm hoping someone can give me a better explanation.
- zitterbewegung 4y ago
  From my limited background in psychology what really separates him is the drive to execute on his goals and not the social awkwardness. But, creating the device would obviously have a large amount of time invested which would be the same for whoever would build the device .
- peterburkimsher 4y ago
  The Gervais principle of management hierarchy: Sociopaths (friends with everyone) Management (clueless) Losers (actually do the homework) I'm trying to be the biggest loser and outsmart the system, but thank God, I failed. The sociopaths want to copy the homework. Whatever good ideas you and your kid have, please type them and share! There's no intellectual property here. We're not afraid to ask "What if?" Welcome to the community of the Internet, we love you.
- otomoaoe 4y ago
  It sounds like he was hyper-focused to the detriment of his health and others around him at several steps in the story (lying to nuclear scientists, performing dangerous experiments in a residential area, it goes on). I agree with you that he did amazing things, but those things are tainted by his disregard for others. I think that's what they mean by social naivete.
- 4y ago
lifefeed 4y ago
This story always reminds me of the Nth Country Experiment, from 1964, where the United States wondered how long it would take a country to design a nuclear weapon, starting from no particular expertise or classified access. One answer, they learned, was three new physics PhDs and two and half years. I don't know if that's when the US started focusing on enriched uranium, but that is really the only limiting factor in the whole deal.
- kergonath 4y ago
  There are a lot of difficulties in creating modern, highly effective thermonuclear weapons. But building a primitive fission bomb like Little Boy is not very difficult. As you say, enrichment is the limiting step. All the science is in university textbooks.
rob74 4y ago
I couldn't help but notice that he looks a bit... unhealthy on the 2007 mugshot (https://talesfromthenuclearage.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/david_hahn-mugshot.jpg https://talesfromthenuclearage.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/d...) - is that just a bad case of acne (unusual at 31), or is that somehow connected to exposure to radiation? Ah, ok, Wikipedia to the rescue: > In his mug shot, his face was covered with sores, which investigators believed could have been from exposure to radioactive materials, psoriasis, or possible drug use.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
jamal-kumar 4y ago
This happened again in Sweden [1] with another guy who didn't seem to think he was doing anything wrong until he called the radiation authorities there and ended up getting raided. His old blog is pretty funny [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Handl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Handl [2] https://richardsreactor.blogspot.com/ https://richardsreactor.blogspot.com/
- kergonath 4y ago
  There was also this Nivenhbro guy on the Ars forum about 15 years ago. That was horrifying to see unfold. Like a giant radioactive slow-motion car crash. https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=155929 https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=155929
  - jamal-kumar 4y ago
    "My tesla coils will keep me safe!"

84 points by SQL2219 4y ago

Was just telling some friends about this story the other day. He want to the the same high school as I did, although he was a few years after me; I think he may have had a class with one of my siblings.

ncmncm 4y ago

This story makes me feel ill every time it surfaces.

zabzonk 4y ago

Are there any figures for how many people have being saved by so-called smoke detector positives?

watersb 4y ago

"The Scoutmaster’s wife noted that a typical kid working on this badge goes to a hospital and asks about x-rays. David decided to build a Breeder Reactor." .!!. I'm currently reading through the 1950s "Tom Swift Jr." stories... so maybe that's why I expected this HN post to be a great work of fiction. Like Charles Stross' "De-chlorinating the Moderator" http://www.antipope.org/charlie/fiction/moderator.html http://www.antipope.org/charlie/fiction/moderator.html The real world can be more delightful. And terrifying.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

macksd 4y ago

This is a very interesting story, but this article is pretty light on a lot of the details of his life. He got into a lot of mischief throughout his life and unfortunately died a few years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn. It's a real shame, because he was obviously bright and highly motivated and I feel like he was just never able to really put all that potential into action. My favorite part of the story is that he was arrested for stealing smoke detectors from his apartment building trying to collect radioactive material. One of my first jobs was shipping / receiving for an electronics manufacturer, and smoke / gas detectors were the lion's share of our business. I was told I always had to classify the products as "components for a nuclear reactor" on international shipping manifests, which I thought was silly. Until I read this story...

sharkweek 4y ago
If only you had met Nathan Fielder when he was attempting to rebrand smoke detectors as musical instruments to avoid these customs declarations. (If you haven’t watched the show Nathan For You, I can’t recommend it enough).
- ortusdux 4y ago
  I've actually called the US Dept of Commerce to get help figuring out which Harmonized System code to use for some shipments. I managed to stump them and they had to give me a callback, but throughout they were extremely helpful.
- jamal-kumar 4y ago
  Was that a new episode/season of that show? Huge fan I actually met the guy many years ago a few times before he was ever famous. First time he was SO OBNOXIOUS, like we had to be mean as possible and kick him out because he just wouldn't listen to us trying to tell him to shut the hell up with name-dropping Seth Rogen and some early hiphop comedy act he used to do on this website loadingreadyrun when we were trying to watch a movie... Second time he was a security guard at a parking lot next to a rave and we smoked a blunt with him Sometimes I wonder if he remembers any of that
  - sharkweek 4y ago
    LOL that's hilarious that you have those memories with him. I sort of imagine the show isn't a big stretch for who he is in real life. Yeah the smoke detector episode is from the most recent (and final) season. If you liked the first couple, the last season is the best imo.
- shepherdjerred 4y ago
  https://youtu.be/X7odcV25sHg https://youtu.be/X7odcV25sHg
mjevans 4y ago
This is also the reason modern smoke detectors are all annoying BS. We can't have nice things because this one guy went through a whole lot of trouble to do something silly. Now they're all oversensitive steam sensing BS models. I'd rather have freaking IR cameras looking for too much heat (outside of kitchens).

dang 4y ago

The classic article is https://harpers.org/archive/1998/11/the-radioactive-boy-scout/ https://harpers.org/archive/1998/11/the-radioactive-boy-scou..., from 1998. Did this one just lift the title for a different piece on the same topic? Related: The Radioactive Boy Scout (1998) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23538908 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23538908 - June 2020 (1 comment) The Radioactive Boy Scout - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18396332 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18396332 - Nov 2018 (1 comment) The Radioactive Boy Scout (1999) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15466860 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15466860 - Oct 2017 (34 comments) “Radioactive Boy Scout” who tried to build a homemade nuclear reactor dead at 39 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12957768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12957768 - Nov 2016 (67 comments) The Radioactive Boy Scout: When a teenager attempts to build a breeder reactor - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9867739 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9867739 - July 2015 (5 comments) The Radioactive Boy Scout (1998) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6310748 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6310748 - Sept 2013 (1 comment) The radioactive boy scout: the teenager who attempted to build a breeder reactor - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=611583 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=611583 - May 2009 (18 comments) Also related, a little less directly: Middle school student achieved nuclear fusion in his family playroom - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24705563 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24705563 - Oct 2020 (82 comments) Boy, 12, said to have created nuclear reaction in playroom lab - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19472076 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19472076 - March 2019 (14 comments) 12-Year-Old Claims to Have Achieved Nuclear Fusion at Home (2018) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19229433 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19229433 - Feb 2019 (92 comments) “I built a fusion reactor in my bedroom – AMA” - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12118525 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12118525 - July 2016 (127 comments) The Fusioneers, who build nuclear reactors in their back yards - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11777553 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11777553 - May 2016 (54 comments) Nobody builds nuclear reactors for fun anymore - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867072 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6867072 - Dec 2013 (102 comments) The Nuclear Scientist Who Skipped College - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4762449 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4762449 - Nov 2012 (50 comments)

stordoff 4y ago

Trouble_007 4y ago

FYI: David Charles Hahn (October 30, 1976 - September 27, 2016), sometimes called the "Radioactive Boy Scout" or the "Nuclear Boy Scout" : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn The Nuclear Boy Scout - A Short Documentary : https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WyFktKBGfIA https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WyFktKBGfIA The Nuclear Boy Scout (TV Short 2003) - IMDb : https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0378468/ https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0378468/

JoeDaDude 4y ago
See the 2003 film about him, made while he was still alive, at link below. This film has some details about his homemade reactor at about 17:24 minutes in. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBuOJn03QVo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBuOJn03QVo

CoastalCoder 4y ago

> The Scoutmaster’s wife noted that a typical kid working on this badge goes to a hospital and asks about x-rays. David decided to build a Breeder Reactor. This was perfectly logical to someone with a rather naive social awareness, accompanied by a passion for collecting all the Periodic Table Elements. Can someone explain the logical connection between "naive social awareness" and "choosing to go way above and beyond for this merit badge"? As someone with Asperger syndrome (very mild) and the parent of a kid with it (more so), I may be overly sensitive to stereotyping on the topic. So in that excerpt above, what I hear is a neuro-typical adult dismissing the kid's amazing accomplishment here, just because he's socially awkward. I'm sure she's actually a lovely person, so I'm hoping someone can give me a better explanation.

zitterbewegung 4y ago
From my limited background in psychology what really separates him is the drive to execute on his goals and not the social awkwardness. But, creating the device would obviously have a large amount of time invested which would be the same for whoever would build the device .
peterburkimsher 4y ago
The Gervais principle of management hierarchy: Sociopaths (friends with everyone) Management (clueless) Losers (actually do the homework) I'm trying to be the biggest loser and outsmart the system, but thank God, I failed. The sociopaths want to copy the homework. Whatever good ideas you and your kid have, please type them and share! There's no intellectual property here. We're not afraid to ask "What if?" Welcome to the community of the Internet, we love you.
otomoaoe 4y ago
It sounds like he was hyper-focused to the detriment of his health and others around him at several steps in the story (lying to nuclear scientists, performing dangerous experiments in a residential area, it goes on). I agree with you that he did amazing things, but those things are tainted by his disregard for others. I think that's what they mean by social naivete.
4y ago

lifefeed 4y ago

This story always reminds me of the Nth Country Experiment, from 1964, where the United States wondered how long it would take a country to design a nuclear weapon, starting from no particular expertise or classified access. One answer, they learned, was three new physics PhDs and two and half years. I don't know if that's when the US started focusing on enriched uranium, but that is really the only limiting factor in the whole deal.

kergonath 4y ago
There are a lot of difficulties in creating modern, highly effective thermonuclear weapons. But building a primitive fission bomb like Little Boy is not very difficult. As you say, enrichment is the limiting step. All the science is in university textbooks.

rob74 4y ago

I couldn't help but notice that he looks a bit... unhealthy on the 2007 mugshot (https://talesfromthenuclearage.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/david_hahn-mugshot.jpg https://talesfromthenuclearage.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/d...) - is that just a bad case of acne (unusual at 31), or is that somehow connected to exposure to radiation? Ah, ok, Wikipedia to the rescue: > In his mug shot, his face was covered with sores, which investigators believed could have been from exposure to radioactive materials, psoriasis, or possible drug use.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

jamal-kumar 4y ago

This happened again in Sweden [1] with another guy who didn't seem to think he was doing anything wrong until he called the radiation authorities there and ended up getting raided. His old blog is pretty funny [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Handl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Handl [2] https://richardsreactor.blogspot.com/ https://richardsreactor.blogspot.com/

kergonath 4y ago
There was also this Nivenhbro guy on the Ars forum about 15 years ago. That was horrifying to see unfold. Like a giant radioactive slow-motion car crash. https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=155929 https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=155929
- jamal-kumar 4y ago
  "My tesla coils will keep me safe!"