The mayor of a small New Zealand town has started a nuclear fight with Donald Trump, after the newly inaugurated US president praised American scientists for splitting the atom.
Mr. Trump’s inauguration speech compiled a list of major American feats such as ending slavery, launching into space, and when they “split the atom.”
The mayor of Nelson, in New Zealand’s South Island, has taken up the subatomic subject, pointing out that work to split the atom was actually started by Kiwi-born physicist Ernest Rutherford .
“I was a little surprised by the new President Donald Trump, in his inauguration speech on the greatness of the United States, saying that today the Americans have “split the atom” when that honor belongs to the Nelson’s most famous and favorite son, Sir Ernest Rutherford,” Mayor Nick Smith said. wrote on social networks.
Credited with splitting the nucleus of an atom in experiments conducted at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom in 1917, Rutherford was “the first to artificially induce a nuclear reaction by bombarding nitrogen nuclei with alpha particles ” Smith said.
He added that he would invite the new US ambassador to visit the Rutherford memorial in Nelson, a town of 50,000, “so that we can maintain the accuracy of the historical record of who first split the atom.” .
Ben Uffindell, editor of a New Zealand satirical news site called The Civilian, also disputed Mr Trump’s claims.
“Okay, I have to call time. Trump just claimed America split the atom. THAT’S THE ONLY THING WE DID,” Uffindell said. wrote on social networks.
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Widely considered the “father of nuclear physics”, Rutherford was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1908 for his earlier work on radioactivity.
While Rutherford is credited with the initial splitting of the atom, Englishman John Cockcroft and Irishman Ernest Walton later performed the first controlled experiment to split an atomic nucleus, according to the US Department of Energy.
Rutherford remains one of New Zealand’s most famous sons and his face still adorns the country’s $100 note.