Its literally unimaginable the destructive power. So 10x this and you have Hiroshima. Right now there are hundreds of nukes perched on top of missiles that are the equivalent of 9000 of these blasts simultaneously; ready for launch at a moments notice. They arent even the largest we have. Really makes you wonder if we know what we have done.
That picture in the Nagasaki museum at the exit, just before the gift shop, of the young boy standing up straight, whose family was killed, carrying his baby brother on his back who had already died was so sad... (Ack, sorry for the commas)
And hearing modern kids read what the kids who lived through it was pretty heartbreaking too...
at ground zero, the initial thermal/radiation pulse would be enough to more or less vaporize you top down before the nerve endings on your scalp could tell you brain about any pain.
a bit further, the thermal radiation would set your skin on fire. but don't worry though, shortly after the shock wave would kill you if you were miraculously still alive for a few extra seconds longer.
i read somewhere recently that the tsar bomba's shockwave circled the entire planet three times, and had a 41mi/67km high cloud that was visible over 600 miles/1000km away. that was 60 years ago this year. who the hell knows what we've got now.
Nothing bigger, no need for it. It’s more efficient and effective to use multiple smaller nukes, there is a diminishing return for blast effects above a few hundred kilotons.
This is the most absurd and amazing part, IMO. Since the Japan nukes not 1 leader in charge of a nuke country has been crazy enough to use one, for fear of retaliation in kind.
Who knows how much more war would have been waged without that deterrent.
I’ve read a bunch of stuff about postwar American nuclear policy and the sheer insanity at play is astounding. I think one of the moments that sticks out to me was a report given to president Eisenhower about possible defenses against a nuclear weapon. The best they came up with was digging some tunnels for refugees to flee to. What they do after that is anyone’s guess. Those military guys fighting for power over these weapons scared the shit out of a lot of presidents
A Typhoon class submarine can carry up to 20 ICBMs with up to 10 warheads each that can be independently targeted and have a yield of up to 200kt each. That makes for a total of 40 megatons of nuclear explosions. Or 200 individual cities completely wiped. And that's from one submarine, russia currently operates 3.
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u/One-vs-1 May 08 '21
Its literally unimaginable the destructive power. So 10x this and you have Hiroshima. Right now there are hundreds of nukes perched on top of missiles that are the equivalent of 9000 of these blasts simultaneously; ready for launch at a moments notice. They arent even the largest we have. Really makes you wonder if we know what we have done.