http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/21/4755600/us-atomic-bomb-north-carolina-accident-1961
That is quite shocking although with the amount of arms around at the time, shouldn't be surprising so many accidents could happen.
US almost nuked itself in 1961
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http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/21/4755600/us-atomic-bomb-north-carolina-accident-1961
That is quite shocking although with the amount of arms around at the time, shouldn't be surprising so many accidents could happen.
Soldato
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Wasn't there another one, where a nuclear bomb was accidentally released? I want to say it was somewhere near Spain, but I'll have to check.
EDIT: It wasn't accidentally released, the BUFF hit the tanker during mid-air refuelling and exploded, which caused it to shed it's payload of nukes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1966_Palomares_B-52_crash
EDIT: It wasn't accidentally released, the BUFF hit the tanker during mid-air refuelling and exploded, which caused it to shed it's payload of nukes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1966_Palomares_B-52_crash
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Yeah, read about this earlier. Amazing to think that only the failure of a single switch prevented one of the bombs detonating. Would have changed the modern world completely.
Yeah another B52 crashed in the Med as well.
Just one of a string of accidents over years involving nuclear weapons.
Edit
There was another one over the US where the Bomb was lost into some mud flats. As far as I know to this day it has still not been recovered.
Edit #2:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1958_Tybee_Island_mid-air_collision
Edit
There was another one over the US where the Bomb was lost into some mud flats. As far as I know to this day it has still not been recovered.
Edit #2:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1958_Tybee_Island_mid-air_collision
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You think thats bad, over the last 60 years theyre have been multiple nuclear bombs been lost... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_nuclear_accidents
Or it could have gone the other way with the Americans not bothering to fully investigate and just ordering retaliation strikes starting WW3.
I was watching a documentary a while back which covered the early days of SAC.
It featured and interview with a Junior Officers who served in the US Air force during the 1950s as part of SAC. At the time the US was starting to develop plans for what it would do in case of an nuclear attack and how it would respond. This was the period in which what is known as the 'Nuclear Football' started to develop, with the order to retaliate coming from the President / whoever was the highest ranking government official still alive.
The commander of SAC during this time was Curtis LeMay, who didn't exactly agree with the idea, he believed it could cause a fatal delay in launching a retaliatory strike. So although parts of it were implemented it was not taken very seriously by those in charge of SAC. This led to a situation where a group of Junior Officers knew the attack codes, and could have used them, to launch and all out nuclear attack on the Soviet Union.
If it was not rather scary it would be rather funny in a Doctor Strangelove sort of way.
It featured and interview with a Junior Officers who served in the US Air force during the 1950s as part of SAC. At the time the US was starting to develop plans for what it would do in case of an nuclear attack and how it would respond. This was the period in which what is known as the 'Nuclear Football' started to develop, with the order to retaliate coming from the President / whoever was the highest ranking government official still alive.
The commander of SAC during this time was Curtis LeMay, who didn't exactly agree with the idea, he believed it could cause a fatal delay in launching a retaliatory strike. So although parts of it were implemented it was not taken very seriously by those in charge of SAC. This led to a situation where a group of Junior Officers knew the attack codes, and could have used them, to launch and all out nuclear attack on the Soviet Union.
If it was not rather scary it would be rather funny in a Doctor Strangelove sort of way.
Hmm simulations of a 4MT nuke airburst or ground detonation at Goldsboro has in most scenarios no significant immediate effect from the detonation itself on Baltimore, Washington DC, Philadelphia, and New York city - estimated casualties (from the immediate area) are between 6K and 60K depending on environment conditions and whether it exploded on the ground or in the air. In freak wind conditions Washington DC would see some moderate to high levels of long term health implications.
Soldato
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actually thats not as big as you would think -
http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/ says about a 50km circle of destruction / radiation burns
edit : although thats big enough to wipe out everything inside the m25
the two japan nukes were actually very small
They were dropped as a safety precaution as the plane carrying them got into trouble - one correctly disengaged itself but the other incorrectly went through its arming sequence but didn't go off due to a switch failing.
The devestation would have been comparable to chernobyl (purely) in terms/scope of the size of area directly effected - but with a lot higher immediate casualties and less long term longer range effects.
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Someone will start inventing something more destructive / accurate. Like a laser that can pinpoint individuals or a whole country and kill with a button press - like this but for offense instead of defense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative
Soldato
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I thought that bombs had to be armed before they'll do anything? I.E. you could smack a truck into one, but if it's not armed it'll do nowt.
Sad as any loss of life would have been from such an accident, it probably would have made the world a better place.
I doubt that in 1961 (especially on the test one) there was such safety