National Ignition Facility Ignites! Apparently an absent minded professor forgot to turn off the switch to the world's most powerful laser. He was rushing home to turn off the bathtub water, which he suddenly remembered he had left on.
The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is part of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which studies nuclear processes and forgetfulness. Several colleges commented it's a good thing the professor was able to make it home before his floor was ruined, although the lab was completely destroyed.
The NIF commented it produced the world's most powerful LASAR, capable of producing temperatures and pressures that of the sun. A temperature of 16MK was being produced at the time of the incident. When asked if the general public was endangered, the spokesmen for the NIF were quoted as saying "only a little." And," a miscalculation may have caused the atmosphere to fuse at .87% or people to fuse at 10.6%. That's a temperature of 139,200K (250,100.33F); 1,696,000K (3,052,340.33F) respectively, which of course would be bad as it would promote global warming: of course the economic situation would no longer be a concern."
When president Obama was asked about the incident, he stated briefly, "The situation at NIF was only a miner setback, as billions of dollars would be liberated from taxpayers to return the lab to original condition, and that he too was glad the professor made it home before his floor was ruined.
