Arrakis. LV-426. Tatooine. Have you ever noticed how much time science fiction movies spend on desert planets? It’s an interesting aesthetic choice—and one you can partially blame on the United States government.
Published in Vulcan: The Journal of the History of Military Technology.
Troops of the Battalion Combat Team, U.S. Army 11th Airborne Division, watch a plume of radio-active smoke rise after a D-Day blast at Yucca Flats, as the much prepared Exercise 'Desert Rock' reaches its peak.
Photo by Cpl. McCaughey, Las Vegas, Nevada, November 1, 1951
National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the Office of the Chief Signal Officer
(111-SC-389297) [VENDOR # 121]
https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/picturing_the_century/postwar/postwar_img78.html