Nevada's nuclear blasted landscape.

[Belloc]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2558673/Out-world-Interactive-map-reveals-Moon-like-craters-blasted-Nevada-desert-decades-nuclear-weapons-tests.html

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/13/article-2558673-1B41EAC400000578-636_964x979.jpg

[chuckman]

That's a cool pic.

[Grand58742]

Pretty cool pictorial. I especially like the Sedan crater comment:


The Sedan Crater, above, is one of the largest holes and was created when the Army was testing whether nuclear bombs could be used to create reservoirs

Not sure if serious, but wouldn't surprise me in the least.

[skydivr]

I wonder what the radiation levels are there now...

[VIP3R 237]

In the 50's my grandfather drove cattle along the Utah-Nevada State line area and at night they could see the nuclear fireballs from the testing. Back then radiation wasnt a worry and unfortunately a lot of the fallout ended up in Southern Utah.

If you guys want to watch an awesome documentary watch Trinity and Beyond, its on Netflix and its worth the watch.

[montanadave]

Pretty cool pictorial. I especially like the Sedan crater comment:



Not sure if serious, but wouldn't surprise me in the least.

At one time, folks contemplated drilling into immature underground hydrocarbon deposits, detonating nuclear devices, and then sucking up the "cooked" oil from the subterranean cavern. Folks came up with some crazy schemes involving "the bomb."

[chuckman]

In the 50's my grandfather drove cattle along the Utah-Nevada State line area and at night they could see the nuclear fireballs from the testing. Back then radiation wasnt a worry and unfortunately a lot of the fallout ended up in Southern Utah.

If you guys want to watch an awesome documentary watch Trinity and Beyond, its on Netflix and its worth the watch.

I had a coworker whose grandfather was in the Army out there in the 50s and 60s...he said no one knew about or cared about local fallout or radiation at his level. His grandfather died pretty young from cancer and I have always wondered if there was causation.

[Slater]

The Russians had more practical applications in mind:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Explosions_for_the_National_Economy

[Grand58742]

The Russians had more practical applications in mind:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Explosions_for_the_National_Economy

Apparently we had the same idea...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Chariot_(1958)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Plowshare

Hydrogen bombs to create a harbor. No big deal...

[VIP3R 237]

Project Orion is pretty crazy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_%28nuclear_propulsion%29


I had a coworker whose grandfather was in the Army out there in the 50s and 60s...he said no one knew about or cared about local fallout or radiation at his level. His grandfather died pretty young from cancer and I have always wondered if there was causation.

Cancer is abnormally high in this area because of it, and many call themselves Downwinders.

[thopkins22]

One of my neighbors was a contractor on Christmas Island way back when. He's perfectly healthy.

A great story is that part of their contract stipulated that no cameras were to make the trip. What then was sold in the company store? Instant Polaroid style cameras. Several of the guys spent every shot taking pictures over their shoulder and selling them. He now has quite a few of them framed in his living room. Very cool.

[Moose-Knuckle]

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a144/AKS-74/thehillshaveeyes_zps0eb87767.jpg (http://s10.photobucket.com/user/AKS-74/media/thehillshaveeyes_zps0eb87767.jpg.html)

[SomeOtherGuy]

I was able to take an official DOE tour of the Nevada Test Site back in the 1990's, because my father worked on a contract relating to it. No cameras allowed, must be a US citizen with a background check, took a bus roundtrip from Las Vegas. Awesome experience, saw a lot of really crazy stuff on the tour. Like the bomb assembly building that was designed to collapse on the process if there was an accident... for those who haven't been there, it's hard to imagine the size of the NTS. It encompasses two large dry lake plains and some hills/mesas around and in between. It's something like 50 miles north-south and 30 miles east-west, and a very large part of that area is pockmarked. Just amazing. It looks like tours are still operating, and I highly recommend them to anyone who can get on one - just be advised that, when I went, you had to apply several weeks in advance, it was not a walk-up thing.

[Scoby]

Cool pic.

Wonder how, or if, the access road survived these blasts? Or, was it built or rebuilt after testing.

What about this bunker, raised trench looking feature? Doesn't seem like that could have survived a blast. Even the smaller one the trench is leading to.

http://i830.photobucket.com/albums/zz229/Scoby/NevadaBombCraters_zps9b328673.jpg (http://s830.photobucket.com/user/Scoby/media/NevadaBombCraters_zps9b328673.jpg.html)

[Heavy Metal]

I wonder what the radiation levels are there now...



Anymore? Background level unless you were underground hundreds of feet below one of those craters.

They haven't set off an above ground shot since the early 60's. How radioactive is downtown Hiroshima today?

[chuckman]

Anymore? Background level unless you were underground hundreds of feet below one of those craters.

They haven't set off an above ground shot since the early 60's. How radioactive is downtown Hiroshima today?

Yet Bikini Atoll and the surrounding area, including the sunken warships, remain radioactive. I am not a physicist but I find the whole thing fascinating...I don't know why Bikini Atoll would still be so dangerous but these areas of Nevada/New Mexico are not, unless it has something to do with yield levels or type of bomb.

[The_War_Wagon]

Cool pic.

Wonder how, or if, the access road survived these blasts? Or, was it built or rebuilt after testing.


No lie. Who builds a highway through the middle of nuclear potholes? :fie:

[DreadPirateMoyer]

With regards to radiation, it depends on if they're fission, boosted fission, or thermonuclear bombs. I believe as you move up the scale, the radiation left behind becomes greater since they more efficiently use the nuclear fuel they carry (hence, creating bigger explosions). Thus, much of the testing sites of fission bombs are safe, and maybe even some boosted or thermo bombs as well. This is why you see some places with nothing more than background radiation and others with a lot; it all depends on the size and type of bomb.

[Belloc]

I remember a video of someone walking around Chernobyl with a geiger counter. When he would put it an inch away from a sidewalk, it would read a little radiation, but when he would put it next to some weeds in that same sidewalk, the radiation level would spike. So the Nevada test site being a desert, while Bikini Atoll is teaming with vegetation, might also have something to do with it, along with the reasons given by DPM above.

[jmp45]

A high school buddie's pop was on Bikini Atoll. Story goes, he was told to move the jeep off the runway after they were foaming down a plane. Some of the foam was on the seat, he got radiation burns on his bum. Buddy should write a book on the family incidents, some of the most insane things that could happen to one family.

[chuckman]

With regards to radiation, it depends on if they're fission, boosted fission, or thermonuclear bombs. I believe as you move up the scale, the radiation left behind becomes greater since they more efficiently use the nuclear fuel they carry (hence, creating bigger explosions). Thus, much of the testing sites of fission bombs are safe, and maybe even some boosted or thermo bombs as well. This is why you see some places with nothing more than background radiation and others with a lot; it all depends on the size and type of bomb.

Kind of what I figured, bit my guess was only a SWAG.

Regarding Chernobyl, here's a site for tours:

http://www.tourkiev.com/chernobyltour/

...and pics:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/worldnews/9128776/Photographs-of-Chernobyl-and-the-ghost-town-of-Pripyat-by-Michael-Day.html

[Heavy Metal]

Yet Bikini Atoll and the surrounding area, including the sunken warships, remain radioactive. I am not a physicist but I find the whole thing fascinating...I don't know why Bikini Atoll would still be so dangerous but these areas of Nevada/New Mexico are not, unless it has something to do with yield levels or type of bomb.




"It is safe to walk on all of the islands...The Advisory Group reaffirmed: although the residual radioactivity on islands in Bikini Atoll is still higher than on other atolls in the Marshall islands, it is not hazardous to health at the levels measured. Indeed, there are many places in the world where people have been living for generations with higher levels of radioactivity from natural sources - such as the geological surroundings and the sun - than there is now on Bikini Atoll...By all internationally agreed scientific and medical criteria...the air, the land surface, the lagoon water and the drinking water are all safe. There is no radiological risk in visiting the lagoon or the islands. The nuclear weapon tests have left practically no cesium in marine life. The cesium deposited in the lagoon was dispersed in the ocean long ago.

"The main radiation risk would be from the food: eating locally grown produce, such as fruit, could add significant radioactivity to the body...Eating coconuts or breadfruit from Bikini Island occasionally would be no cause for concern. But eating many over a long period of time without having taken remedial measures might result in radiation doses higher than internationally agreed safety levels."


That was 1996. And nobody is going to be eating anything at the Nevada Test Range unless they brought it with them.

They set off the big bombs in the Pacific too.

The bigger the ground burst, the more Neutron Bombardment of the soil making radioactive Cesium.

Rad C is the bad actor in the above. I think your body will readily sub it for Potassium IIRC and incorporate it into its structure instead of eliminating it.

Even still, the latest I have seen indicates that the experts believe the Bikini Atoll is safe for long-term settlement now.

[chuckman]

My data comes from an hour-long show on National Geographic, and it's been a couple years. No argument from me with the SMEs.

[Suwannee Tim]

Yet Bikini Atoll and the surrounding area, including the sunken warships, remain radioactive. I am not a physicist but I find the whole thing fascinating...I don't know why Bikini Atoll would still be so dangerous but these areas of Nevada/New Mexico are not, unless it has something to do with yield levels or type of bomb.

The Bikini tests were mostly atmospheric and irradiated the target ships present with neutrons making them radioactive though this activity has no doubt diminished dramatically since that time they would still be somewhat radioactive. The rock underground near the explosions in Nevada would also be activated by neutrons and radioactive. Neutrons penetrate a few meters in rock and would not have reached the surface though venting dust laden gasses often did the dust being of course hotly radioactive.

[SteveS]

I wonder what the radiation levels are there now...
More so would be the down wind cancer rates.

[Hunter Rose]

Cool pic.

Wonder how, or if, the access road survived these blasts? Or, was it built or rebuilt after testing.

What about this bunker, raised trench looking feature? Doesn't seem like that could have survived a blast. Even the smaller one the trench is leading to.

http://i830.photobucket.com/albums/zz229/Scoby/NevadaBombCraters_zps9b328673.jpg (http://s830.photobucket.com/user/Scoby/media/NevadaBombCraters_zps9b328673.jpg.html)

These are just subsidence craters. The detonations were underground. The nuclear explosion vaporizes rock, creating a hollow chamber. If the blast is close enough to the surface, the "roof" of this chamber then collapses, forming a susidence crater.

Here's video of what it looks like when these craters form during detonations: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZHFK0vWKpU