Cheryl Rofer
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cherylrofer.bsky.social
Cheryl Rofer
@cherylrofer.bsky.social
22K followers 1.3K following 21K posts
Retired nuclear scientist. Worked in Estonia, Kazakhstan, and Los Alamos.

Posting on nuclear issues, war, nature, science, and women's issues. Also cats. She/her.

Blogs at Nuclear Diner and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Banner: The invincible summer within
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cherylrofer.bsky.social
"Does this chair make my butt look big?"

#Caturday
A view from the rear of Luca resting on the top of a chair with back feet splayed across it. Luca is a fluffy orange tabby. Yes, it does make his butt look big.
November 29, 2025 at 5:21 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Edwin the EMP Egret says
A common egret standing in water with land behind them is captioned "EMP! Drink!"
November 28, 2025 at 11:01 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
And this is the way it's likely to turn out.
The Wizard of Oz, a little man at his control panel, revealed by Toto.
November 28, 2025 at 2:20 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Happy Thanksgiving to all!

I'm thankful this year to be starting a new time in my life. It's going well so far. I love Oregon and my relatives here.
Shadowed green fields with illuminated brown trees behind, mountains further back with a bit of fog between. The right half of a rainbow comes down just behind the trees, and a V of geese flies across it.
November 27, 2025 at 4:18 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Zooey has been going outside the past two days with harness and leash, so he's decided to take his place as dominant cat.
Zooey, white cat with gray helmet sits on top of the kitchen cabinets. Brown wall behind him, light wood cabinets.
November 25, 2025 at 2:26 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Good morning!
Fluffy orange tabby Luca in a box, looking thoughtful.
November 24, 2025 at 1:38 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Good morning!

I heard perhaps a poor-will when I took this.
A row of dark trees against low mountains with a fog bank between. Mackerel clouds illuminated pink and purple.
November 23, 2025 at 3:18 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Jose
White Jose, with gray helmet and nose, lies on my lap with his head, which is most of the picture, pointed at me. His eyebrow whiskers are prominent, and his ears are rotated down so that they form a straight line. His eyes are closed.
November 22, 2025 at 4:33 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Boxes for all!
White and gray Zooey and orange tabby Luca each have a box to sit in before the boxes go to recycle.
November 21, 2025 at 4:15 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Witkoff is probably too ignorant to realize this should hurt. /2
Paragraph from the article: Meanwhile, one of the it pleasing revelations coming out of this incident is that Witkoff’s Washington nickname is ‘Dim Philby’, a play on Kim Philby, the notorious British double agent who worked for the KGB while a senior intelligence official. His amateurishness (for example meeting Putin without a note taker) and lack of deep knowledge of Russo-Ukrainian relations, has long been considered a liability.
November 20, 2025 at 8:49 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
For a while, Luca would sit on Jose when he wanted to sit on my lap and Jose would leave. But now Jose is hanging in there.
White and gray Jose lies stretched out on my legs. Orange tabby Luca sits close, looking up at me.
November 18, 2025 at 4:21 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Geese have been staging in the field next to us.
Green field, a row of brown trees, a gray sky with the right-hand part of a rainbow and a V of geese in flight.
November 16, 2025 at 1:50 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Good for MTG for saying this straight out!

Lisa Murkowski, here's a lesson!
Tweet from Marjorie Taylor Greene: I am now being contacted by private security firms with warnings for my safety as a hot bed of threats against me are being fueled and egged on by the most powerful man in the world. The man I supported and helped get elected. Aggressive rhetoric attacking me has historically led to death threats and multiple convictions of men who were radicalized by the same type rhetoric being directed at me right now. This time by the President of the United States. As a woman I take threats from men seriously.
November 15, 2025 at 8:44 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Requesting some sun, pls

#Caturday
White and gray Zooey sits on the piano, Jose on the bench, and orange tabby Luca on the windowsill. A painting of flowers is in the background, and Zooey's new bed is on the floor.
November 15, 2025 at 5:28 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Rainbow with and without geese
The right side of a rainbow against gray clouds. Green field in foreground, a row of illuminated brown trees, low mountains and a V of geese crossing the rainbow. Most of the rainbow against gray clouds are a bit of blue sky. Green field in foreground and a row of illuminated brown trees.
November 14, 2025 at 12:37 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
A wide view of merch featuring a cartoon whale holding a lit stick of dynamite, with "Exploding Whales" on some of it.
November 13, 2025 at 6:28 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Hey
Full face photo of orange tabby Luca. His yellow eyes are partly closed.
November 12, 2025 at 12:26 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
This tum is not a trap!
Orange tabby Luca is stretched out on the counter, his soft and luxurious tum prominently displayed. White and gray Zooey sits behind him.
November 9, 2025 at 4:10 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Luca wants to sit on my lap and just sits on Jose, who obligingly leaves.
Full face picture of orange tabby Luca. His yellow eyes are slightly narrowed.
November 8, 2025 at 4:33 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Jose is my evening lapcat.
Jose, white cat with gray helmet, spots, and tail lies on my blanketed legs. My feet are visible at the end of the blanket.
November 8, 2025 at 3:35 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
This is what the Republicans offer. Boring men in suits, with a very few others dropped in.
Aaron Rupar post: Mike Johnson: The economy and healthcare are two of the primary issues in the country clearly, and that's why we are delighted to run on our record." The picture is of Mike Johnson standing on steps (of the Capital?) with a group of 18 people behind him. Three are women, one hidden behind a taller man, and two might be black. It's hard to tell. All the rest are white men in boring suits.
November 5, 2025 at 6:35 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Terry Wallace's Facebook post continued.
Post continued (4): On October 28, President Trump announced that the U.S. would restart nuclear weapons tests: “Because of other countries’ testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our nuclear weapons on an equal basis. That process will begin immediately.” Although his statement lacked clarity regarding what “immediate testing” would entail, it was widely assumed he meant explosive testing of weapons, thus breaking the 33-year moratorium. This assumption stemmed from the first Trump administration’s suggestion in 2019 that such testing was necessary. In January 2025, the Heritage Foundation released a paper titled “America Must Prepare to Test Nuclear Weapons” (Figure 2 shows a screenshot of the report cover). It is important to note that the Heritage Foundation is behind Project 2025, which the Trump Administration has followed closely. The worldwide response to Trump’s announcement was uniform and best described as “outraged.” Moreover, U.S. experts stated that preparing for a safe underground test would require 18 to 36 months. However, this elicited a response from the Heritage Foundation, suggesting, “the President may order the above-ground testing of a nuclear weapon... And while the United States leaving the [Nuclear] Test Ban Treaty may not be optimal and may indeed have negative downstream effects, doing so may be necessary to stave off further adversarial escalation.” Today, the Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, attempted to downplay the idea of explosive testing but could not clearly define what Post conclusion (5): Today, the Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, attempted to downplay the idea of explosive testing but could not clearly define what “immediate testing” would entail beyond the current activities of the U.S. government. Nevertheless, given that public statements from the Trump administration continue to assert that Project 2025 is not necessarily “their” policy plan while simultaneously carrying out its implementation, there is growing concern about how even statements regarding testing will be perceived by Russia and China. Above-ground nuclear tests have been outlawed by international treaty since 1963, and even the suggestion of an atmospheric test is exceedingly troubling—such testing is unnecessary and presents a significant risk of radioactive fallout affecting U.S. citizens, not to mention the inevitable tit-for-tat responses from other nuclear nations. I cannot fathom the extent of harm the Trump administration has inflicted on the environment and science, but nuclear testing is beyond the pale. An atmospheric test of U.S. weapons would produce fallout three to ten times larger than that produced by Baneberry; however, this would not be an accident but an intentional contamination of our country. The implications of coal use, removal of EPA regulations on emissions, and radiation present a dystopian distain for America.
November 4, 2025 at 7:15 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
This needs to be shared more widely. It's on Facebook, which AFAIK doesn't allow direct links to its posts. Terry clearly wants it to be shared, so I don't feel bad about posting it in multiple screenshots.

Terry Wallace was the director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
A brown cloud arising from an underground nuclear test in Nevada. Dry Nevadan hills are in the background. The scientific encampment to control the test and take data is in the lower right. This is the Baneberry nuclear test, and it is not how underground nuclear tests should look. Screenshot of a Facebook post: Terry Wallace On December 18, 1970, a nuclear weapons test was conducted in an underground shaft at the Nevada Test Site. The test, code-named Baneberry, was detonated at a depth of about 900 feet. Baneberry was a relatively small weapons test and was conducted at Yucca Flats (a large playa) in alluvial soil derived from surrounding deposits of volcanic tuff. Within the alluvium, there were intermittent seams of montmorillonite clay that were saturated with water. The drill hole was filled with a concrete plug and sorted materials; the procedure for plugging the hole was consistent with previous tests at Yucca Flats, which aimed to fully contain the radioactive products within a cavity produced by the nuclear explosion. In the case of Baneberry, the detonation seemed normal until about 3 ½ minutes after the “boom,” when a large fissure opened up a few hundred feet from the test shaft, and a boiling cloud of radioactive debris rose above the Nevada desert (Figure 1 is an image of the Baneberry release). The cloud rose about 10,000 feet above the test and was visible in Las Vegas, 100 miles away. The cloud spread radioactive dust across a broad area, contaminating 86 workers at the test site. The total radioactive release was 6.7 megacuries (for comparison, Chernobyl released 200 megacuries), including 80,000 curies of iodine-131. Two of the workers who were contaminated died in 1974 from myeloid leukemia. The accident resulted in a six-month suspension of nuclear weapons testing, and a root cause analysis revealed three geological issues that combined to create the release: an unrecognized fault in the alluvium, a buried escarpment between the alluvium and limestone, and the structural weakness of the water-saturated clay. Post continues (2) the structural weakness of the water-saturated clay. The summary conclusion of the root cause analysis indicated that a thorough geological analysis was needed for all future nuclear tests, and it recommended the establishment of a containment evaluation panel (CEP) for the approval of any tests. This panel required that “successful containment means no radioactivity detectable offsite, and no unanticipated release of activity onsite.” Of the 200+ tests that occurred after the creation of the CEP, only four tests had releases—the worst of which was a test called Diagonal Line, detonated about a year after Baneberry, and resulting in a release of 6,000 curies. I started my career at Los Alamos National Laboratory as an undergraduate student in 1975 employed by the J Division, which was responsible for providing the containment package for LANL nuclear tests. My first project involved modeling the small earthquakes that occurred after an explosion. Once an explosion is detonated, it creates a cavity by vaporizing and compressing the surrounding materials. This cavity is expected to collapse over the following days or weeks to create a porous chimney that traps the gases produced in the explosion. This containment strategy is unique to the geology of the Nevada Test Site and is not applicable to other testing environments, especially crystalline rock (like the North Korean Test Site). Over the three years I worked as a student at LANL, I analyzed data from more than 70 tests, which initiated my career in forensic geophysics and eventually led to my becoming the 11th Director of LANL. On September 23, 1992, the U.S. conducted its final explosive nuclear Post continues (3): On September 23, 1992, the U.S. conducted its final explosive nuclear test, code-named Divider (a LANL test). Shortly after the test, President Bush announced a test moratorium that was extended indefinitely by President Clinton. This ushered in a new era in which nuclear weapons were evaluated not through explosions but by scientific tools that verified material properties through dynamic testing and advanced computer simulations that encapsulated the complex physics of nuclear reactions and explosions along with the material properties derived from non-explosive experiments. The Directors of Los Alamos, Livermore, and Sandia are required to write an annual stockpile assessment letter that assures the nuclear stockpile's reliability; this letter is finalized after a yearlong assessment of the safety, reliability, and performance of both the nuclear and non-nuclear components of all weapon types in the U.S. arsenal. The letters are highly classified and closely held, but no letter has indicated that the U.S. needs to return to nuclear testing. This is hugely significant not only for the U.S. but also for the world—the moratorium on testing represents a small step toward a world that recognizes that nuclear weapons are not weapons of war, but rather instruments of deterrence. On October 28, President Trump announced that the U.S. would restart nuclear weapons tests: “Because of other countries’ testing programs, I
November 4, 2025 at 7:15 PM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
Orange tabby Luca sits on a countertop by walking sticks and a copy of Sibley Birds. He looks at the camera.
November 3, 2025 at 5:46 AM
cherylrofer.bsky.social
People have been irritated by such things for a long time.
Excerpt from the Declaration of Independence: He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
November 1, 2025 at 9:18 PM