As Bud hurried to comply, Tom glanced quickly at a radiation-level indicator.
“Thank heavens!” he muttered. Evidently the reaction products had been safely confined within the test booth.
Tom snatched up the telephone and dialed Ames at Security. “Bud and I are okay,” he reported, “but an atomic reaction got out of hand. Get the decontamination squad here pronto!”
The next few hours were spent in harried efforts to cope with the disaster.
Tom finally organized a procedure to draw off the radioactive residue safely from the booth after the reaction had cooled. This would take several days. Then the booth itself would have to be dismantled and construction materials carefully disposed of.
It was late afternoon when Tom finally slumped into a chair in his office to relax over a pot of hot cocoa with Bud.
“Tough luck, skipper,” Bud sympathized. “Did you expect this might happen?”
Tom shrugged. “I knew the risk was there. But I thought I had the pressure problem licked. I used the strongest suitable metal I could find for the capsule casing-the Lunite alloy we discovered on the phantom satellite.”
“And still the capsule blew up.”
“Right,” Tom said gloomily. “Hang it all, Bud, I’m afraid there is no metal that’s strong enough
34 TRIPHIBIAN ATOMICAR
and yet light enough to contain my power-plant reaction process.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll lick it yet!” Bud said, patting his pal on the shoulder. “Bet you have a new schedule of experiments all figured out.”
Tom plowed his fingers through his crew cut and grinned ruefully. “Wish I did.