Formation
In 2005 it was theorized by Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist Robert Hermes and independent investigator William Strickfaden that much of the mineral was formed by sand which was drawn up inside the fireball itself and then rained down in a liquid form.
A number of different types of Trinitite have been identified. Green is the most common form. Black contains iron from the tower structure. Red contains copper from the device used in the blast or from the communications cables that led away from the site. Both black and red specimens are extremely rare. Rounded "pearls" also are found, which come from melted silica that returned to solid form before hitting the ground.
The glass has been described as "a layer 1 to 2 centimeters thick, with the upper surface marked by a very thin sprinkling of dust which fell upon it while it was still molten. At the bottom is a thicker film of partially fused material, which grades into the soil from which it was derived. The color of the glass is a pale bottle green, and the material is extremely vesicular with the size of the bubbles ranging to nearly the full thickness of the specimen."
Occasionally, the name trinitite is broadly applied to all glassy residues of nuclear bomb testing, not just the Trinity test. An analog of Trinitite found in Semipalatinsk Test Site in Kazachstan at ground zeroes of Soviet atmospheric nuclear tests is called Kharitonchik. Black vitreous fragments of fused sand that had been solidified by the heat of the explosion were described from French test site in Algeria (Reggane site). There are many known fakes in circulation among collectors. These fakes use a variety of means to achieve the glassy green silica look as well as mild radioactivity, however, only trinitite from a nuclear explosion will contain certain neutron activation products that are not found in naturally radioactive ores and minerals. Gamma spectroscopy can narrow down the potential nuclear explosions from which the material formed.
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