The website Atom Central has posted never-before-seen HD footage from 1955 of atomic detonations filmed on behalf of Operation Teapot, as part of the U.S. nuclear program the Manhattan Project.

Atom Central's parent company VCE Films does work in historical image restoration, as well as services more common to the movie industry, like visual effects and title sequencing. The short films of atomic explosions were most likely restored by VCE and then posted via Atom Central.

After witnessing the Trinity Test – the first atomic test, which took place in New Mexico, 1945 – J. Robert Oppenheimer, one of the leaders of the Manhattan Project, uttered a now-infamous passage from the Sanskrit philosophical epic the Bhagavad Gita: "Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds."

Despite the fact that the rare HD footage of Operation Teapot is from more than half a century ago, the wondrous and devastating images it contains give the viewer a similar feeling.

Watch some of the footage in the video below, and view the rest of the atomic bomb clips here.

Via: Sploid

Photo: Marion Doss | Flickr