Questions Regarding The Aging 15000 Nuclear Warhead Arsenals.

a reply to: carewemust
If your ever in New Mexico visit the www.nuclearmuseum.org...

originally posted by: SuperDave90
a reply to: carewemust

1. Not possible for one of these to "accidentally" go off.

2. First part is classified second part see above.

3. Classified but not hard to figure out.

4. Google NNSA LEP

5. Google Pantex.

Excellent post. I would add to #1 that there have been numerous cases of aircraft carrying nuclear weapons crashing, and even as violent as a plane crash is, none of those cases resulted in an accidental detonation. This list includes such incidents, along with other types of military nuclear accidents. I'm not sure if there's a list of just the plane crashes, I'm not inclined to look that hard, but for anyone interested in the subject the whole list may interest you.

Just to expand a little, the original "gun-type" bomb which was one of the 2 types we dropped on Japan, could absolutely go off accidentally. Basically it had 2 sub-critical masses of uranium separated on either end of a tube. To detonate the bomb, a conventional explosive was used to propel one sub-critical mass down the tube (hence the similarity to a gun) and bringing it in contact with the other sub-critical mass. Together, they were above the critical mass to initiate the chain reaction, and a nuclear explosion occurred. This design was so simple they didn't even bother to test it before using it on Japan. It just works. The downside is, all that has to happen for it to blow is the 2 sub-critical masses need to come in contact with each other. Anything that caused the conventional explosive to detonate would trigger this. Modern weapons don't use this design, and failsafes have been built into the designs so even if they are exposed to a conventional explosion, shock, or other types of external stimuli, the fissile material still won't go critical. The exact failsafes depend on the type of warhead, and of course much of the fine details are classified.

a reply to: face23785

There have been close calls though..very close, in the days of bombs in planes.
I think it was in Georgia, no North Carolina..one or even 2 devices hit the ground after a refueling accident(have to check on that) 1 was lost and 1 had 5 out of 6 failsafes triggered, only one step away from a real bad time there. One bomb is still in the ground I believe.

Ok this is the one
en.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: vonclod

Yeah that's on the list I linked to. And as I pointed out, modern bombs have much better safeties, in part from learning due to accidents like that.

a reply to: vonclod

There are several still missing. They went into the water, or somewhere you can't get to them easily, and weren't recovered. At least 8 are missing.

mentalfloss.com...

a reply to: Zaphod58

Yes as I recall the one in NC is buried in a marsh; even with heavy equipment and large pumps they couldn't keep a hole opened up long enough to get down deep enough to retrieve it. I wonder if it would be retrievable with today's technology.

a reply to: face23785

It might be. They'd have to find the thing first. They know about where it was, but never located exactly where it was at. They went down to 50 feet, but never located the exact location.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Oh wow, I knew of a few but 8 surprises me, I know the one in NC and one or two in the ocean.
Crazyiness..so lucky none have detonated..will check out your link.

a reply to: SolAquarius


That UFO was careless. The warhead looked like it was still intact and armed, according to that simulation. Did that really happen in 1964? Maybe that's where Gene Roddenberry got the idea for Star Trek's "Assignment Earth" episode.

a reply to: vonclod

Some reports say it's as high as 17, but 8 seems to be the consensus as to the actual number. Several were dropped in accidents that were being carried as training devices, and didn't have the core installed with them.

originally posted by: vonclod
a reply to: Zaphod58

Oh wow, I knew of a few but 8 surprises me, I know the one in NC and one or two in the ocean.
Crazyiness..so lucky none have detonated..will check out your link.

They cannot detonate.

Nearly every nuclear device is armed by removing some sort of "filler" medium which blocks premature detonation.

originally posted by: dantanna
do you remember when they first tested out the nukes, some scientists theorized it could ignite the atmosphere, killing everyone. so the scumbag einstein and his cronies, of course they hit the button.

did anyone ever see the john ritter- john belushi movie real men? in it, aliens offer us a bomb or a gift. half the people want the bomb, which would kill everyone, so they could 'kill the russians' in the movie lol. but the bomb would have killed everyone, but they did not care.

that was einstein (creator of many weapons of mass destruction) and his scumbag scientist friends.

ANYONE who created a nuclear bomb is a soci0path, and is a POS.

It is not as simple and clear cut as that.

The facts are kept from the people involved in the process.

I personally quit one of my previous lobs when I realised that I was manufacturing bomb components. It was only due to my knowledge of physics that I was able to identify that I was not making standard "aircraft components". When I went to my bosses, even they did not know know what we were making (and I suspect, they thought I was deluded).

The clincher was that the assembly section of the company had several cruise missiles, complete with radiation hazard logos, in their racks which were in a hanger across from the lab..