1.
Semipalatinsk Test Site
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The Semipalatinsk Test Site, also known as The Polygon, was the primary testing venue for the Soviet Unions nuclear weapons. It is located on the steppe in northeast Kazakhstan, south of the valley of the Irtysh River, the Soviet Union conducted 456 nuclear tests at Semipalatinsk from 1949 until 1989 with little regard for their effect on the local people or environment. The full impact of exposure was hidden for many years by Soviet authorities and has only come to light since the test site closed in 1991. The site has been described as The worlds worst radiation hotspot, from 1996 to 2012, a secret joint operation of Kazakh, Russian, and American nuclear scientists and engineers secured the waste plutonium in the tunnels of the mountains. The site was selected in 1947 by Lavrentiy Beria, political head of the Soviet atomic bomb project, gulag labour was employed to build the primitive test facilities, including the laboratory complex in the northeast corner on the southern bank of the Irtysh River. The first Soviet bomb test, Operation First Lightning was conducted in 1949 from a tower at the Semipalatinsk Test Site, the same area was used for more than 100 subsequent above-ground weapons tests. Later tests were moved to the Chagan River complex and nearby Balapan in the east of the STS, after the closure of the Semipalatinsk labour camp, construction duties were performed by the 217th Separate Engineering and Mining Battalion. Between 1949 and the cessation of atomic testing in 1989,456 explosions were conducted at the STS, the lab complex, still the administrative and scientific centre of the STS, was renamed Kurchatov City after Igor Kurchatov, leader of the initial Soviet nuclear programme. The location of Kurchatov city has been shown on various maps as Konechnaya or Moldary. The Semipalatinsk Complex was of acute interest to foreign governments during its operation, several U-2 overflights examined preparations and weapons effects, before being replaced with satellite reconnaissance. The US Defense Intelligence Agency is said to have been convinced that the Soviets had constructed an enormous beam weapon station at a research station located on the testing site. This smaller research station, known to the Department of Defense as PNUTS, after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, it was discovered that the mysterious URDF-3 was tasked with researching a nuclear thermal rocket similar to the USs NERVA. The site was closed by the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev on 29 August 1991. The Soviet Union conducted its last tests in 1989, after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the site was neglected. Unguarded fissile material was left behind in mountain tunnels and bore holes, virtually unguarded and vulnerable to scavengers, rogue states, after some of the tests, radioactive material remained on the now abandoned area, including significant amounts of plutonium. The risk that material might fall into the hands of scavengers or terrorists was considered one of the largest nuclear security threats since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The operation to address the problem involved, in part, pouring concrete into test holes. In other cases, horizontal mine test holes were sealed and the entrances covered over, the anti-nuclear movement in Kazakhstan, Nevada Semipalatinsk, was formed in 1989 and was one of the first major anti-nuclear movements in the former Soviet Union
2.
Underground nuclear weapons testing
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Underground nuclear testing is the test detonation of nuclear weapons that is performed underground. When the device being tested is buried at sufficient depth, the explosion may be contained, the extreme heat and pressure of an underground nuclear explosion causes changes in the surrounding rock. The rock closest to the location of the test is vaporised, farther away, there are zones of crushed, cracked, and irreversibly strained rock. Following the explosion, the rock above the cavity may collapse, if this chimney reaches the surface, a bowl-shaped subsidence crater may form. From then until the signing of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996, most nuclear tests were performed underground, although public concern about fallout from nuclear testing grew in the early 1950s, fallout was discovered after the Trinity test in 1945. Intense fallout from the 1953 Simon test was documented as far as Albany, the fallout from the March 1954 Bravo test in the Pacific would have scientific, political and social implications that have continued for more than 40 years. The multi-megaton test caused fallout to occur on the islands of the Rongerik and Rongelap atolls, prior to this test, there was insufficient appreciation of the dangers of fallout. The test became an international incident and it becomes a big issue in the media. Theyre very concerned about, first of all, why the United States even has the right to be carrying out those kinds of tests in the Pacific, theyre also concerned about the health and environmental impact. The Prime Minister of India voiced the heightened international concern when he called for the elimination of all nuclear testing worldwide, knowledge about fallout and its effects grew, and with it concern about the global environment and long-term genetic damage. Talks between the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, and the Soviet Union began in May 1955 on the subject of an agreement to end nuclear tests. Agreement was facilitated by the decision to allow underground testing, eliminating the need for on-site inspections that concerned the Soviets, following analysis of underwater detonations that were part of Operation Crossroads in 1946, inquiries were made regarding the possible military value of an underground explosion. The Joint Chiefs of Staff thus obtained the agreement of the Atomic Energy Commission to perform experiments on both surface and sub-surface detonations. The island of Amchitka was initially selected for tests in 1950, but the site was later deemed unsuitable. The first underground nuclear test was conducted on 29 November 1951 and this was the 1.2 kiloton Buster-Jangle Uncle, which detonated 5.2 m beneath ground level. The test was designed as an investigation of the effects of a 23 kiloton ground penetrating gun-type device that was then being considered for use as a cratering. The explosion resulted in a cloud that rose to 3,500 m, the resulting crater was 79 m wide and 16 m deep. The next underground test was Teapot Ess, on 23 March 1955, the 1 kiloton explosion was an operational test of an atomic demolition munition
3.
TNT equivalent
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TNT equivalent is a convention for expressing energy, typically used to describe the energy released in an explosion. The ton of TNT is a unit of energy defined by convention to be 4.184 gigajoules. The convention intends to compare the destructiveness of an event with that of conventional explosives, the kiloton is a unit of energy equal to 4.184 terajoules. The megaton is a unit of equal to 4.184 petajoules. The kiloton and megaton of TNT have traditionally used to describe the energy output. The TNT equivalent appears in various nuclear weapon control treaties, and has used to characterize the energy released in such other highly destructive events as an asteroid impact. A gram of TNT releases 2673–6702 J upon explosion, the energy liberated by one gram of TNT was arbitrarily defined as a matter of convention to be 4184 J, which is exactly one kilocalorie. The measured, pure heat output of a gram of TNT is only 2724 J, alternative TNT equivalency can be calculated as a function of when in the detonation the value is measured and which property is being compared. A kiloton of TNT can be visualized as a cube of TNT8.46 metres on a side, the RE factor is the relative mass of TNT to which an explosive is equivalent, the greater the RE, the more powerful the explosive. This enables engineers to determine the proper masses of different explosives when applying blasting formulas developed specifically for TNT. For example, if a timber-cutting formula calls for a charge of 1 kg of TNT, then based on octanitrocubanes RE factor of 2.38, using PETN, engineers would need 1. 0/1.66 kg to obtain the same effects as 1 kg of TNT. With ANFO or ammonium nitrate, they would require 1. 0/0.74 kg or 1. 0/0.42 kg, *, TBX or EBX, in a small, confined space, may have over twice the power of destruction. The total power of aluminized mixtures strictly depends on the condition of explosions, guide for the Use of the International System of Units. National Institute of Standards and Technology, nuclear Weapons FAQ Part 1.3 Rhodes, Richard. The Making of the Atomic Bomb, cooper, Paul W. Explosives Engineering, New York, Wiley-VCH, ISBN 0-471-18636-8 HQ Department of the Army, Field Manual 5-25, Explosives and Demolitions, Washington, D. C. Pentagon Publishing, pp. 83–84, ISBN 0-9759009-5-1 Explosives - Compositions, Alexandria, VA, thermobaric Explosives, Advanced Energetic Materials,2004. THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS, nap. edu, retrieved September 2004
4.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states
5.
Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy
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Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy was a Soviet program to investigate peaceful nuclear explosions. It was analogous to the US program Operation Plowshare, one of the better-known tests was Chagan of January 15,1965. Radioactivity from the Chagan test was detected over Japan by both the U. S. and Japan in apparent violation of the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty, the United States complained to the Soviets, but the matter was dropped. He said, However the USSR did not immediately follow the U. S. lead in 1958 in establishing a program, presumably, their position in support of a comprehensive nuclear testing ban stalled any efforts to establish such a program until the mid-1960s. When Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy was finally established, Alexander D. Zakharenkov. Initially, the Soviet program was focused on two applications, nuclear excavation and petroleum stimulation, similar to the U. S. program. Once underway the Soviets conducted a more vigorous program than the Americans Operation Plowshare, consisting of some 156 nuclear tests, some with multiple devices. As part of the program,124 tests with 135 devices were conducted, primary objectives of the program were water reservoir development, dam and canal construction, and creation of underground cavities for toxic waste storage. Peaceful Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy, also referred to as Program 7, the Program numbers come from the USSRs classification system of nuclear explosions, the first five programs designating various phases of nuclear weapon development. All together, the Program 7 conducted 115 nuclear explosions, there were two large explosions of 140 kilotons and 105 kilotons, all others were relatively small with an average yield of 12.5 kilotons. The last nuclear explosion by the Program 7, codenamed Rubin-1, was performed in Arkhangelsk Oblast on September 6,1988, the explosion was a part of a seismic program for geological exploration. The Soviets agreed to stop their PNE program at the end of 1988 as a result of then president Mikhail Gorbachevs disarmament initiative, there are proponents for continuing the PNE programs in modern Russia. They state that the program has already paid for itself and saved the USSR billions of rubles and can save even more if it would continue. They also allege that the PNE is the only way to put out large fountains and fires on natural gas deposits. Their opponents, including Alexey Yablokov, state that all PNE technologies have non-nuclear alternatives, among the catastrophes was the Kraton-3 explosion in Vilyuy, Yakutia in 1978, that was supposed to unearth diamond-rich ores. Instead, the amount of diamonds was insignificant but the pollution of water was much higher than predicted. According to Yablokov, the level of plutonium in the water of Vilyuy region 20 years after the explosion is ten thousand times higher than the maximal sanitary norm. Another catastrophe resulted from the Globus-1 explosion near the village of Galkino,40 kilometers from Kineshma city on September 19,1971 and it was a small underground explosion of 2.5 kilotons that was a part of the seismological program for oil and gas exploration
6.
Peaceful nuclear explosion
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Peaceful nuclear explosions are nuclear explosions conducted for non-military purposes, such as activities related to economic development including the creation of canals. During the 1960s and 1970s, both the United States and the Soviet Union conducted a number of PNEs, six of the explosions by the Soviet Union are considered to have been of an applied nature, not just tests. Subsequently the United States and the Soviet Union halted their programs, definitions and limits are covered in the Peaceful Nuclear Explosions Treaty of 1976. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty of 1996 prohibits all nuclear explosions, regardless of whether they are for purposes or not. The parties also reaffirmed their obligations to comply fully with the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963, articles IV and V of the PNE Treaty set forth the agreed verification arrangements. The agreed statement that accompanies the treaty specifies that an application of an underground nuclear explosion would not include the developmental testing of any nuclear explosive. Operation Plowshare was the name of the U. S. program for the development of techniques to use explosives for peaceful purposes. The name was coined in 1961, taken from Micah 4,3, twenty-eight nuclear blasts were detonated between 1961 and 1973. It was never carried out due to concerns for the native populations, there was also talk of using nuclear explosions to excavate a second Panama Canal. The largest excavation experiment took place in 1962 at the Department of Energys Nevada Test Site, three tests were conducted in order to stimulate natural gas production, but the effort was abandoned as impractical because of cost and radioactive contamination of the gas. There were many negative impacts from Project Plowshare’s 27 nuclear explosions, for example, the Gasbuggy site, located 55 miles east of Farmington, New Mexico, still contains nuclear contamination from a single subsurface blast in 1967. Other consequences included blighted land, relocated communities, tritium-contaminated water, radioactivity and these were ignored and downplayed until the program was terminated in 1977, due in large part to public opposition, after $770 million had been spent on the project. Its aims and results were similar to those of the American effort, with the exception that many of the blasts were considered applications, not tests. The best known of these in the West was the Chagan test in January 1965 as radioactivity from the Chagan test was detected over Japan by both the U. S. and Japan, the United States complained to the Soviets, but the matter was dropped. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union started the Deep Seismic Sounding Program, compared to the usage of conventional explosives or mechanical methods, nuclear explosions allow the collection of longer seismic profiles. There are proponents for continuing the PNE programs in modern Russia and they state that the program already paid for itself and saved the USSR billions of rubles and can save even more if continued. They also allege that the PNE is the only way to put out large fountains and fires on natural gas deposits. Their opponents, including the discredited Alexey Yablokov, state that all PNE technologies have non-nuclear alternatives, germany at one time considered manufacturing nuclear explosives for civil engineering purposes
7.
Project Plowshare
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Project Plowshare was the overall United States term for the development of techniques to use nuclear explosives for peaceful construction purposes. It was the US portion of what are called Peaceful Nuclear Explosions and this became the first crater on Earth definitely proven to be from an impact event. Negative impacts from Project Plowshare’s 27 nuclear projects generated significant public opposition and these consequences included Tritiated water and the deposition of fallout from radioactive material being injected into the atmosphere before underground testing was mandated by treaty. A similar Soviet program was carried out under the name Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy, at the peak of the Atomic Age, the United States Federal government initiated Project Plowshare, involving peaceful nuclear explosions. Other proposals involved blasting underground caverns for water, natural gas, serious consideration was also given to using these explosives for various mining operations. One proposal suggested using nuclear blasts to connect underground aquifers in Arizona, another plan involved surface blasting on the western slope of Californias Sacramento Valley for a water transport project. At the end of the program, an objective was to develop nuclear explosives. In the 1960s, a proposal was suggested for a modified in situ shale oil extraction process which involved creation of a rubble chimney using a nuclear explosive, however, this approach was abandoned for a number of technical reasons. It was never carried out due to concerns for the native populations, the shot, Sedan, displaced more than 12 million short tons of soil and resulted in a radioactive cloud that rose to an altitude of 12,000 ft. The radioactive dust plume headed northeast and then east towards the Mississippi River, the first PNE blast was Project Gnome, conducted on December 10,1961 in a salt bed 24 mi southeast of Carlsbad, New Mexico. The explosion released 3.1 kilotons of energy yield at a depth of 361 meters which resulted in the formation of a 170 ft diameter,80 ft high cavity, the most public of these involved the generation of steam which could then be used to generate electricity. Another objective was the production of radioisotopes and their recovery. Another experiment involved neutron time-of-flight physics, a fourth experiment involved geophysical studies based upon the timed seismic source. Only the last objective was considered a complete success, the blast unintentionally vented radioactive steam while the press watched. The partly developed Project Coach detonation experiment that was to follow adjacent to the Gnome test was then canceled, over the next 11 years 26 more nuclear explosion tests were conducted under the U. S. PNE program. The radioactive blast debris from 839 U. S. underground nuclear test explosions remains buried in-place and has been judged impractical to remove by the DOEs Nevada Site Office, Costs for the program have been estimated at more than $770 million. Three nuclear explosion experiments were intended to stimulate the flow of gas from tight formation gas fields. The final PNE blast took place on 17 May 1973, under Fawn Creek,76.4 km north of Grand Junction, three 30 kiloton detonations took place simultaneously at depths of 1,758,1,875, and 2,015 meters
8.
Sedan (nuclear test)
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The radioactive fallout from the test contaminated more US residents than any other nuclear test. The Sedan Crater is the largest man-made crater in the United States, Sedan was a thermonuclear device with a fission yield less than 30% and a fusion yield about 70%. The device had a diameter of 43 cm, length of 96.5 cm, the explosive device was lowered into a shaft drilled into the desert alluvium 194 m deep. The resulting crater is 100 m deep with a diameter of about 390 m, a circular area of the desert floor five miles across was obscured by fast-expanding dust clouds moving out horizontally from the base surge, akin to pyroclastic surge. The blast caused seismic waves equivalent to an earthquake of 4.75 on the Richter scale, the radiation level on the crater lip at 1 hour after burst was 500 R per hour, but it dropped to 500 mR per hour after 27 days. Within 7 months of the excavation, the bottom of the crater could be walked upon with no protective clothing. The Sedan shot resulted in a cloud that separated into two plumes, rising to 3.0 km and 4.9 km. The two plumes headed northeast and then east in parallel paths towards the Atlantic Ocean. Nuclear fallout was dropped along the way, narrowly dispersed in a small number of United States counties. Detected radioactivity was especially high in eight counties in Iowa and one county each in Nebraska, South Dakota and these four counties measured maximum levels higher than 6,000 microcuries per square meter. Of all the tests conducted in the USA, Sedan ranked highest in overall activity of radionuclides in fallout. The test released 880,000 curies of radioactive iodine-131, an agent of thyroid disease, Sedan ranked first in percentages of these particular radionuclides detected in fallout, 198Au, 199Au, 7Be, 99Mo, 147Nd, 203Pb, 181W, 185W and 188W. Sedan ranked second in these radionuclides in fallout, 57Co, 60Co, Sedan ranked third in the detected amount of 24Na in fallout. In countrywide deposition of radionuclides, Sedan was highest in the amount of 7Be, 54Mn, 106Ru and 242Cm, and second highest in the amount of deposited 127mTe. Although not detected in fallout, in part because the explosion was contained, gold was used in the W71 warhead. Sedans fallout contamination contributed a little under 7% to the amount of radiation which fell on the U. S. population during all of the nuclear tests at NTS. Sedans effects were similar to shot George of Operation Tumbler-Snapper, detonated on June 1,1952, if this test was conducted in 1965+, when improvements in device design were realized, a 100-fold reduction in radiation release was considered feasible. The Plowshare project developed the Sedan test in order to determine the feasibility of using nuclear detonations to quickly and economically excavate large amounts of earth and rock
9.
Nevada Test Site
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Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site began with a 1-kiloton-of-TNT bomb dropped on Frenchman Flat on 27 January 1951. Many of the images of the nuclear era come from the NTS. During the 1950s, the clouds from the 100 atmospheric tests could be seen for almost 100 mi. The city of Las Vegas experienced noticeable seismic effects, and the distant mushroom clouds, St. George, Utah, received the brunt of the fallout of above-ground nuclear testing in the Yucca Flats/Nevada Test Site. Winds routinely carried the fallout of these tests directly through St. George, the vast majority—828 of the 928 total nuclear tests—were underground. Those arrested included the astronomer Carl Sagan and the actors Kris Kristofferson, Martin Sheen, the Nevada Test Site contains 28 areas,1,100 buildings,400 miles of paved roads,300 miles of unpaved roads, ten heliports, and two airstrips. The Nevada Test Site was established as a 680-square-mile area by President Harry Truman on December 18,1950, within the Nellis Air Force Gunnery, the Nevada Test Site was the primary testing location of American nuclear devices from 1951 to 1992,928 announced nuclear tests occurred there. The site is covered with subsidence craters from the testing, the NTS was the United States primary location for tests in the 500-to-1,000 kt range. 126 tests were conducted elsewhere, including most larger tests, many of these occurred at the Pacific Proving Grounds in the Marshall Islands. During the 1950s, the clouds from atmospheric tests could be seen for almost 100 mi. The city of Las Vegas experienced noticeable seismic effects, and the distant mushroom clouds, the last atmospheric test detonation at the Nevada Test Site was Little Feller I of Operation Sunbeam, on 17 July 1962. Although the United States did not ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, it honors the articles of the treaty, subcritical tests not involving a critical mass continue. It created a crater 1,280 feet wide and 320 feet deep that can still be seen today, the site was scheduled to be used to conduct the testing of a 1, 100-ton conventional explosive in an operation known as Divine Strake in June 2006. The bomb is an alternative to nuclear bunker busters. After objections from Nevada and Utahs members of Congress, the operation was postponed until 2007, on 22 February 2007, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency officially canceled the experiment. On December 7,2012 the most-recent explosion was conducted, an underground sub-critical test of the properties of plutonium, NTS also performed piggyback testing of effects of nuclear detonation during the above-ground tests. Vehicles, shelters, utility stations, and other structures were placed at distances from the Ground Zero detonation point of each weapon. Homes and commercial buildings were built to typical of American and European cities
