To a zeroth order approximation, the output of Little Boy was less than or similar to the energy cost of its HEU separation, so Little Boy merely enabled a WWII airplane to carry 15,000 kg of TNT in a 4,400 kg bag. This is a "compression ratio" of only 3.4:1. (I hope I got my units right!) It's one heck of a lot cheaper to get a bigger truck & some medical waste. In 1947, a fertilizer ship blew up in Galveston Bay in one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster At 06:14 PM 5/19/2016, Henry Baker wrote:
"Little Boy" had 64kg of HEU.
A basketball is 25cm in diameter, and has a volume of 8181 cm^3.
U has a density of 19.1 g/cm^3, so this U basketball weighs 156kg (~350#), or about 2.5x Little Boy. Little Boy's yield was ~15ktons, so Perry's basketball might yield 35-40 ktons.