One of the emails I spotted whilst doing a quick scan of my email backlog was from the UK’s National Archives which has an exhibition called Secret State about the Cold War. It caught my eye because of this little gem.

Britain had the idea of building a 7 ton nuclear landmine, but there were worries about some of the delicate parts getting too cold, so some bright spark came up with the idea of keeping it warm with live chickens. Of course, there was no food or air supply for the chickens, so you could say the active parts of the device had two different half-lives… 🙁

The exhibition is open until the 31st October.