Nuclear explosion

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
nuclear test series
.
The Greenhouse George test early fireball.
Upshot–Knothole Grable test (film)
Nuclear weapons
Photograph of a mock-up of the Little Boy nuclear weapon dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in August 1945.
Background
Nuclear-armed states
NPT recognized
United States
Russia
United Kingdom
France
China
Others
India
Israel (undeclared)
Pakistan
North Korea
Former
South Africa
Belarus
Kazakhstan
Ukraine

A nuclear explosion is an

nuclear testing
.

Atmospheric nuclear explosions are associated with

radiation sickness, radiation-induced cancer and possible death depending on how far a person is from the blast radius.[1] Nuclear explosions can also have detrimental effects on the climate, lasting from months to years. In a 1983 article, Carl Sagan claimed that a small-scale nuclear war could release enough particles into the atmosphere to cause the planet to cool and cause crops, animals, and agriculture to disappear across the globe—an effect named nuclear winter.[2]

History

Main articles: Nuclear weapons testing, List of nuclear weapons tests, and History of nuclear weapons

The beginning (fission explosions)

The first manmade nuclear explosion occurred on July 16, 1945, at 5:50 am on the

atomic bomb. In a memorandum to the U.S. Secretary of War, General Leslie Groves describes the yield as equivalent to 15,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT.[5] Following this test, a uranium-gun type nuclear bomb (Little Boy) was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, with a blast yield of 15 kilotons; and a plutonium implosion-type bomb (Fat Man
) on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945, with a blast yield of 21 kilotons. Fat Man and Little Boy are the only instances in history of nuclear weapons being used as an act of war.

On August 29, 1949, the USSR became the second country to successfully test a nuclear weapon. RDS-1, dubbed "First Lightning" by the Soviets and "Joe-1" by the US, produced a 20 kiloton explosion and was essentially a copy of the American Fat Man plutonium implosion design.[6]

Thermonuclear Era (fusion explosions)

The United States' first thermonuclear weapon,

Alarm Clock", in that the nuclear device was a two-stage weapon: the first explosion was triggered by fission and the second more powerful explosion by fusion
. The Sloika core consisted of a series of concentric spheres with alternating materials to help boost the explosive yield.

Proliferation Era

In the years following

Limited Test Ban Treaty, pledging to refrain from testing nuclear weapons in the atmosphere, underwater, or in outer space. The treaty permitted underground tests. Many other non-nuclear nations acceded to the Treaty following its entry into force; however, France and China (both nuclear weapons states) have not.[citation needed
]

The primary application to date has been military (i.e. nuclear weapons), and the remainder of explosions include the following:

  • Nuclear pulse propulsion, including using a nuclear explosion as asteroid deflection strategy.
  • Power generation; see
    PACER
  • Peaceful nuclear explosions

Nuclear weapons

Main articles:
Nuclear weapons and History of nuclear weapons

slave laborers. The second event occurred three days later when the United States Army Air Forces dropped a plutonium implosion-type device, code-named "Fat Man", on the city of Nagasaki. It killed 39,000 people, including 27,778 Japanese munitions employees, 2,000 Korean slave laborers, and 150 Japanese combatants. In total, around 109,000 people were killed in these bombings. Nuclear weapons are largely seen as a 'deterrent' by most governments; the sheer scale of the destruction caused by nuclear weapons has discouraged their use in warfare. [citation needed
]

Nuclear testing

Main articles:
Nuclear testing and List of nuclear weapons tests

Since the

nuclear weapons states publicly declared their nuclear status by means of a nuclear test. Nuclear tests have taken place at more than 60 locations across the world; some in secluded areas and others more densely populated.[9] Detonation of nuclear weapons (in a test or during war) releases radioactive fallout that concerned the public in the 1950s. This led to the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963 signed by the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. This treaty banned nuclear weapons testing in the atmosphere, outer space, and under water.[10]

Effects of nuclear explosions

Main article: Effects of nuclear explosions

Shockwaves and radiation

The dominant effect of a nuclear weapon (the blast and thermal radiation) are the same physical damage mechanisms as conventional

megakelvin
. Nuclear weapons are quite different from conventional weapons because of the huge amount of explosive energy that they can put out and the different kinds of effects they make, like high temperatures and ionizing radiation.

The devastating impact of the explosion does not stop after the initial blast, as with conventional explosives. A cloud of nuclear radiation travels from the

genetic mutations and cancer across many generations.[13]

Nuclear winter

Another potential devastating effect of nuclear war is termed nuclear winter. The idea become popularized in mainstream culture during the 1980s, when Richard P. Turco, Owen Toon, Thomas P. Ackerman, James B. Pollack and Carl Sagan collaborated and produced a scientific study which suggested the Earth's weather and climate can be severely impacted by nuclear war.[14] The main idea is that once a conflict begins and the aggressors start detonating nuclear weapons, the explosions will eject small particles from the Earth's surface into the atmosphere as well as nuclear particles. It's also assumed that fires will break out and become widespread, similar to what happened at Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the end of WWII, which will cause soot and other harmful particles to also be introduced into the atmosphere.[15] Once these harmful particles are lofted, strong upper-level winds in the troposphere can transport them thousands of kilometers and can end up transporting nuclear fallout and also alter the Earth's radiation budget. Once enough small particles are in the atmosphere, they can act as cloud condensation nuclei which will cause global cloud coverage to increase which in turn blocks incoming solar insolation and starts a global cooling period. This is not unlike one of the leading theories about the extinction of most dinosaur species, in that a large explosion ejected small particulate matter into the atmosphere and resulted in a global catastrophe characterized by cooler temperatures, acid rain, and the KT Layer.[16]

See also

References

  1. ^ "CDC Radiation Emergencies | Frequently Asked Questions About a Nuclear Blast". www.cdc.gov. 2019-04-22. Retrieved 2021-04-29.
  2. S2CID 153883165
    .
  3. ^ U.S. Department of Energy. "Trinity Site - World's First Nuclear Explosion". Energy.gov Office of Management. Retrieved 23 December 2016.
  4. ^ Taylor, Alan (July 16, 2015). "70 Years Since Trinity: The Day the Nuclear Age Began". The Atlantic. Retrieved 23 December 2016.
  5. ^ Groves, General Leslie (July 18, 1945). "The First Nuclear Test in New Mexico: Memorandum for the Secretary of War, Subject: The Test". United States War Department. PBS.org. Retrieved 23 December 2016.
  6. ^ "VENONA Dated Documents". www.nsa.gov. Retrieved 2021-04-30.
  7. ^ "The Soviet Nuclear Weapons Program". nuclearweaponarchive.org. Retrieved 2021-04-30.
  8. ^ Yang, Xiaoping; North, Robert; Romney, Carl; Richards, Paul G. (August 2000), Worldwide Nuclear Explosions (PDF), retrieved 2013-12-31
  9. ^ "The legacy of nuclear testing". ICAN. Retrieved 2021-04-29.
  10. ^ "Our Documents - Test Ban Treaty (1963)". www.ourdocuments.gov. 9 April 2021. Retrieved 2021-04-29.
  11. ISBN 978-0-309-09673-7
    .
  12. ^ "Effects to the Human Body From Nuclear Fallout". large.stanford.edu. Retrieved 2021-04-29.
  13. ^ Malcolm Fraser and Tilman Ruff. 2015 is the year to ban nuclear weapons, The Age, February 19, 2015.
  14. S2CID 45515251
    .
  15. ^ "Radiation Dose Reconstruction: U.S. Occupation Forces In Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 1945-1946" (PDF). 2006-06-24. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2006-06-24. Retrieved 2021-04-30.
  16. ^ "The KT extinction". ucmp.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 2021-04-30.

External links

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