Nuclear explosion effects....

[silver_pilate]

I was surfing around for some pictures, and I ran across a great deal of information which I found sardonically interesting on nuclear tests and results.

The largest bomb ever detonated by the United States was the Bravo test detonated in the Operation Castle series. It yielded approximately 15 megatons and was detonated over the Bikini Atoll in February of 1954. It actually produced about 2.5 times greater yield than anticipated. The surface blast (7 ft. above the surface) of the 23,500 lb bomb created a crater 6510 ft in diameter and over 250 ft deep. The mushroom rose to 50,000 ft in just a minutes time, eventually topping at over 130,000 ft (40km). The stem of the cloud was 7 km in thickness.

The largest bomb ever detonated in the world was done so by Russia and was known as the Tsar Bomba. It was a test device designed to produce up to 100 megatons of yield. In actuallity, the Russians opted to change the uraniam tampers in the tertiary (and possilby the secondary stage) with ones made of lead. This decreased the yield by about 50% resulting in a 50 megaton device. It weighed about 26 tons and was air dropped from a Tu-95 Bear A. It detonated at a high 4000 meters, and the results were phenomenal.

The fireball itself rose to nearly 10,000 meters and descended to consume the ground beneath it. The shock wave produced air pressures of over 300 psi at ground level beneath the bomb, and the flash was visible for over 1000 km despite cloudy skies. The shockwave traveled around the earth three times and wooden houses were destroyed several hundred kilometers away. The mushroom cloud rose above 210,000 ft (64 km). The area under the blast was later described as a skating rink. Everything perfectly leveled and swept/burned away. The blast was capable of producing 3rd degree burns over 100 km away.

If the Tsar Bomba had been at full yield, it is estimated that it would have increased the world's total fission fallout since the invention of the atomic bomb by 25% all by itself.

All this was done without even pushing the envelope. Everything was standard science and fabrication (standard for a super-power, anyway).


I also found this article about the effects of a 20 megaton explosion above a city with a population of 2.8 million published in the New England Journal of Medicine in May of 1962. In short, the effects are scary. The article is long, so I highlighted some interesting statistics:


Within 1/1000th of a second, a fireball would form enveloping downtown and reaching out for two miles in every direction from ground zero, the point where the bomb went off. Temperatures would rise to 20 million degrees Fahrenheit, and everything--buildings, trees, cars, and people--would be vaporized.

Out to a distance of 4 miles, the blast would produce pressures of 25 pounds per square inch and winds in excess of 650 miles per hour. These titanic forces would rip buildings apart and level everything, including reinforced concrete and steel structures. Even deep underground bomb shelters would be crushed.

As far as six miles from the center of the explosion, the heat would vaporize automobile sheet metal. Glass would melt. Out to a distance of ten miles in all directions, the heat would still be intense enough to melt sheet metal. At this distance, the blast wave would create pressures of 7 to 10 pounds per square inch and winds of 200 miles per hour. Reinforced concrete buildings would be heavily damaged and all other buildings--masonry and wood frame--would be leveled.

At a distance of 16 miles from the center, the heat would ignite all easily flammable materials--houses, paper, cloth, leaves, gasoline, heating fuel--starting hundreds of thousands of fires. Fanned by blast winds still in excess of 100 miles per hour, these fires would merge into a giant firestorm more than 30 miles across and covering 800 square miles. Everything within this entire area would be consumed by flames. Temperatures would rise to 1400 degrees Fahrenheit. The death rate would approach 100%.

Firestorms of this type, though on a smaller scale, developed in Hamburg and Dresden and in parts of Tokyo after conventional bombing attacks during World War II. The information gained from these experiences has particular relevance to the question of fallout shelters. In these earlier firestorms only those who left their bomb shelters had any chance of surviving. Those who remained in underground shelters were killed, roasted as their bunkers were turned into ovens and suffocated as the fires consumed all of the oxygen in the air.

Beyond Sixteen Miles:

At 21 miles from ground zero, the blast would still produce pressures of two pounds per square inch, enough to shatter glass windows and turn each of them into hundreds of lethal missiles flying outward from the center at 100 miles per hour. At 29 miles away from the center the heat would be so intense that all exposed skin, not protected by clothing, would suffer third degree burns. To a distance of 32 miles second degree burns. Even as far as 40 miles from ground zero anyone who turned to gaze at the sudden flash of light would be blinded by burns on the retina at the back of their eyes.

Major Injuries Caused by a Nuclear Explosion:

Casualties:

Within minutes after the bomb exploded 1,000,000 people would die. Among the 1,800,000 survivors more than 1,100,000 would be fatally injured. Another 500,000 would have major injuries from which they might recover if they received adequate medical care. Less than 200,000 people would remain without injuries.

Burn Wounds:

In the immediate post attack period, burns would constitute the most common and serious medical problem. Hundreds of thousands of people would have sustained major second and third degree burns, some from the direct effects of the heat flash on exposed skin, others injured in the thousands of fires that would rage on the periphery of the great firestorm. These people would need urgent and intensive medical therapy. It would not be available.

Facilities for Treating Burn Wounds:

In the entire United States, there are only 2000 special beds for burn patients. In most major metropolitan areas there are only 100 burn beds and most of these would have been destroyed by the bomb. At best, a tiny fraction of the hundreds of thousands of burn patients would receive appropriate medical care. The rest would die.

Other Types of Injuries:

In addition to these burn patients there would be many thousands of other injuries. People blinded by the blast flash or deafened when the pressure wave ruptured their ear drums. People with lungs collapsed by the tremendous pressures. People with stab wounds of the head chest and abdomen who had been struck by flying debris. People with bones broken when they had been hurled through the air by the hurricane force winds or trapped under collapsing buildings.

The Effects of Radiation Sickness:

The Effects of Fall-Out:

Shortly after the explosion, there would be added to this list of casualties tens of thousands of others suffering from a unique form of injury: radiation sickness. The precise extent of radiation injuries would depend to a great deal on weather conditions; particularly the direction and speed of the wind at the time of the explosion. These factors would determine how far, and in what direction, the fallout would spread.

Effects of High Doses of Radiation Sickness:

People who were exposed to very high doses of radiation, 4000 to 5000 Rads, would suffer what is known as the central nervous system syndrome. Their brain tissue, damaged by the radiation, would swell, causing nausea, vomiting, explosive diarrhea, and progressive difficulty walking talking and thinking clearly. They would develop convulsions and pass into a coma and die, usually within the first day or two after the bomb. Once someone had been exposed to doses in this range, there would be no effective treatment.

Effects of Medium Doses of Radiation Sickness:

People exposed to lesser doses of radiation, down to about 400 to 600 Rads, would suffer a gastrointestinal form of radiation sickness. They would experience nausea, vomiting and diarrhea soon after exposure which would last for several days and then seem to improve. But, after a few days to a week, the symptoms would return and become worse. The diarrhea and vomit would become bloody as the lining of their stomachs and intestines, damaged by the radiation, began to shed. The majority of these patients would also die, despite the most intensive medical therapy.

Effects of Low Doses of Radiation Sickness:

People with even smaller radiation exposure, in the 100 to 300 Rad range, would suffer from the hematologic radiation syndrome. They also would suffer nausea, vomiting and diarrhea for a few days, but these symptoms would resolve. About three weeks after exposure, their bone marrow would stop producing normal numbers of blood cells. As their white blood cell count fell, they would become prey to infection. Sores would form in their mouths. Burns and other wounds suffered in the initial attack would become infected and fail to heal. They would also have a fall in the number of platelets, the cell fragments that help blood to clot. They would hemorrhage into their skin, and new bleeding would begin in the intestines and stomach.

Chances For Survival From Radiation Sickness:

Those who had received doses in the lower end of this range would have a very great chance of surviving if they received adequate care. Those at the upper end of the exposure scale would have a much worse prognosis, even if they received intensive therapy. Unfortunately it would be impossible to tell how much radiation a given patient had received. Except at the very highest doses, the initial symptoms would be the same. The already overwhelming problem of caring for the wounded would be complicated by an inability to decide who might benefit from therapy and should receive whatever resources might be available.

The Effects of a Nuclear Explosion on Medical Care :

Effects of a Nuclear Explosion on Health Care Professionals:

There would be only the most limited medical resources available to care for the million and a half casualties. Doctors, who tend to live and work in and near big cities, would be killed and wounded at rates even higher than the general population. Nearly 70 percent of the doctors in the metropolitan area would be killed outright or fatally wounded, and another 15 percent would suffer from lesser wounds. Less than 1000 doctors would survive uninjured. That would mean more than 1500 seriously injured patients for each doctor.

Ability of Health Care Professionals to Treat the Wounded:

If each of these doctors spent only 10 minutes with each patient, and worked 20 hours each day, it would take 2 weeks before each injured person was seen for the first time. Even this grim picture is extremely optimistic. It assumes that all of the wounded were efficiently brought to medical facilities, a near impossible task in the twisted wreckage that would remain after the blast, where even roads would have been torn up or filled with rubble. It assumes that the available doctors would have the strength, both physical and emotional, to work 20 hours a day caring for these horribly injured patients. That they would be willing to abandon their family responsibilities and to expose themselves to continued radioactive contamination in order to meet their professional responsibilities. That they would spend no time caring for pre-existing medical problems, or for new acute problems --heart attacks, strokes-- that would occur, independent of the bomb, at the usual expected rates. That they would spend no time comforting, or even talking to the bereaved. That they would not have to take time to see people who were not actually physically injured, but thought they were. That their would not be interrupted by frantic parents demanding more attention for their wounded and dying children.

Resources Available to Health Care Professionals Following a Nuclear Explosion:

But even assuming that each patient did receive ten minutes of medical care, what difference would it make? Doctors would be working without any of the supplies and equipment that are essential to modern medicine. There would be fewer than 200 general hospital beds left in the entire metropolitan area. There would be few X-ray machines and no electricity to run those that were not destroyed. Whatever stocks of medicine were not consumed in the initial blast and fire would be rapidly exhausted. There would be no antibiotics to treat infection, no sterile surgical instruments to debride the wounds. There would be no blood, plasma, or intravenous solutions to maintain those who were bleeding or unable to drink. In fact, there would be almost no water for those who could drink, and what scant supplies remained would be contaminated with radioactive debris, and probably also with bacteria. There would be no bandages to dress the burns and no plaster to set the broken bones. There would not even be narcotics to ease the pain. And so this ten minutes of medical care would matter very little to those who were seen.

But, of course, most would not find their way to care. They would suffer alone, trapped in the wreckage, and untended. And they would die. Even among the half million wounded whose injuries were not necessarily fatal, most would die. During all of World War II some 400,000 Americans were killed. One bomb, dropped on one American city of 2.8 million people, would kill more than six times as many Americans as killed in WWII. The total toll, including those killed outright and those who died of their wounds within the first month, would be greater than 2,500,000.

Source The New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 266, Number22,May31, 1962,pages 1127-1155: Frank R. Ervin, John B Glazier, Saul Aronow, David Nathan, Robert Coleman, Nicholas Avery, Stephen Shohet, Cavin Leeman, Vic Sidel, Jack Geiger, Bernard Lown, Herbert Leiderman, and Jack H. Mendelson.

That, my friends, is some scary stuff. Thankfully, a bomb of this yield would be excedingly difficult to engineer and construct because of the precision required, but bombs of thousands of kilotonnes could foreseeably be aquired by those willing to use them. You see why we have to make sure Saddam Hussein must be prevented from developing nuclear capabilities?

Food for thought.

--nathan