Topic: The Big Bad Nuke

egoz · November 6th, 2004

Nuc Effects Calculator That should answer your questions about damage.
For starters you can use the largest nuc ever tested, which was 60 megatons, and was used by the Soviets. But you have to remember that as weapons became more accurate they scaled down the size of the weapons. The goal was to make nuclear war more "humane" by doing less collateral damage to the society and more to military targets. This also meant that there were more warheads.

There are different types of nucs. Each one having it's own way of detonation. For example, to detonate an H-bomb you have smaller a-bombs that will start the nuclear fission process. When the core explodes it will force the uranium casing to undergo nuclear fusion which will cause more fission and result in a very very large explosion. A neutron bomb is exactly like the H-bomb except that it releases less radiation because it doesn't have a uranium casing. There were some other details that I learned in chemistry but I doubt you really need to know them, it's boring anyway. Btw, the same process is being investigating to get cold fusion.

The biggest threat by terrorists isn't seeing an a-bomb in our backyard, but a dirty bomb. It's a lot easier to make and doesn't require a lot of that crazy nuclear science stuff. That is just a regular old block of C4 or TNT wrapped with radioactive material. In most cases the device would cause more panic than danger to the civilian population because the amount of radiation released is minimal. Now if they were to use weapons grade plutonium or spent nuclear fuel, then there could be an issue. But that is harder to acquire and handle. Medical supplies that contain radioactive material would cause little damage. But that is a lot more common and easy to get a hold of.

November 6th, 2004
egoz Primus Pilus	Nuc Effects Calculator That should answer your questions about damage. For starters you can use the largest nuc ever tested, which was 60 megatons, and was used by the Soviets. But you have to remember that as weapons became more accurate they scaled down the size of the weapons. The goal was to make nuclear war more "humane" by doing less collateral damage to the society and more to military targets. This also meant that there were more warheads. There are different types of nucs. Each one having it's own way of detonation. For example, to detonate an H-bomb you have smaller a-bombs that will start the nuclear fission process. When the core explodes it will force the uranium casing to undergo nuclear fusion which will cause more fission and result in a very very large explosion. A neutron bomb is exactly like the H-bomb except that it releases less radiation because it doesn't have a uranium casing. There were some other details that I learned in chemistry but I doubt you really need to know them, it's boring anyway. Btw, the same process is being investigating to get cold fusion. The biggest threat by terrorists isn't seeing an a-bomb in our backyard, but a dirty bomb. It's a lot easier to make and doesn't require a lot of that crazy nuclear science stuff. That is just a regular old block of C4 or TNT wrapped with radioactive material. In most cases the device would cause more panic than danger to the civilian population because the amount of radiation released is minimal. Now if they were to use weapons grade plutonium or spent nuclear fuel, then there could be an issue. But that is harder to acquire and handle. Medical supplies that contain radioactive material would cause little damage. But that is a lot more common and easy to get a hold of. __________________ Flavius Vegetius Renatus De Rei Militari - Let him who desires peace prepare for war. Hard work doesn't guarantee success, but without it you don't have a chance. - Alex Rodriguez (Go Yankees!)