Serious question about an EMP attack.

Why wasn't (or maybe it was) the electronic equipment filming and measuring the atomic bomb and later nuclear bomb tests affected by what I would assume to be EMP event resulting from the explosion?

The Bimini Atoll test had several ships relatively close to ground zero; I realize many of those were abandoned ships with goats and stuff chained to the decks but many were fully operational naval vessels.

What about the high altitude tests in the 50's and 60's or the underground tests once they realized they couldn't crack the dome? Should there not have been at least some areas affected by the resulting EMP?

Why are the Russians or you name the "enemy" able to engage our Country with an EMP resulting in a total breakdown of all things electronic; at least this is what many "prophets" are saying?

It was because of the testing and equipment failures we even know bout EMP to begin with.

The effects can be mitigated too.

By shielding, and can be as simple as making a faraday cage or makeshift one.

Simple metal box to throwing electronics in a microwave.

Older generators and vehicles made before the 80s I think are relatively immune.

Vaccum tubes are definitely.

originally posted by: scottobereal
Why wasn't (or maybe it was) the electronic equipment filming and measuring the atomic bomb and later nuclear bomb tests affected by what I would assume to be EMP event resulting from the explosion?

The Bimini Atoll test had several ships relatively close to ground zero; I realize many of those were abandoned ships with goats and stuff chained to the decks but many were fully operational naval vessels.

What about the high altitude tests in the 50's and 60's or the underground tests once they realized they couldn't crack the dome? Should there not have been at least some areas affected by the resulting EMP?

Why are the Russians or you name the "enemy" able to engage our Country with an EMP resulting in a total breakdown of all things electronic; at least this is what many "prophets" are saying?

If I am not mistaken, an EMP also is most effective in terms of range if the nuclear device is detonated far up in the atmosphere, not near ground level.

a reply to: Edumakated

Yes, we conducted numerous high altitude tests for several years, as did the Russians and I don't recall hearing about any areas impacted by EMP. Maybe only newer electronics are effected; as pointed out by neo96, older stuff is not effected.

EMP is a funny thing. Small electronics are actually less sensitive to it than you might expect, but with a few hundred million transistors in a cell phone, only a couple have to fry to brick the device.

The real danger is in cabling.

A long stretch of wire, like the wire running between telephone poles, will pick up a lot more energy from an emp- and that energy will find its way to anything connected to those power lines.

If the burst is strong enough, the wires themselves cook. The power runs in the walls of your home could, theoretically, catch fire from a proper EMP burst.

It would take the power grid down, for sure, and without power there's no water, communication, and the gas you've got is all you're going to get. Assuming your car starts, the gas pump at the station won't have power.


You can shield individual pieces of equipment against an EMP, the same way you can shield a safe from fire... but you can't really protect the power grid - and the US power grid is particularly sprawled out.

If there were a successful EMP attack on this country that managed to take down the power grid nation wide (Would likely take several high altitude bombs) you can expect a 90% death rate within the first two years.

a reply to: scottobereal

Just after 11 p.m. Honolulu time on July 9, the 1.45-megaton hydrogen bomb was detonated thirteen minutes after launch. Almost immediately, an electromagnetic pulse knocked out electrical service in Hawaii, nearly 1,000 miles away. Telephone service was disrupted, streetlights were down and burglar alarms were set off by a pulse that was much larger than scientists expected.

www.smithsonianmag.com...

www.dtic.mil...

a reply to: scottobereal

You should look harder.

Starfish Prime caused an electromagnetic pulse (EMP), which was far larger than expected, so much larger that it drove much of the instrumentation off scale, causing great difficulty in getting accurate measurements. The Starfish Prime electromagnetic pulse also made those effects known to the public by causing electrical damage in Hawaii, about 1,445 kilometres (898 mi) away from the detonation point, knocking out about 300 streetlights,[6] setting off numerous burglar alarms and damaging a telephone company microwave link. The EMP damage to the microwave link shut down telephone calls from Kauai to the other Hawaiian islands.[citation needed]

en.m.wikipedia.org...

Starfish Prime was the largest nuclear weapon detonation in space. Most of the high altitude tests were small enough, and far enough away from populated areas that the EMP was only measurable in the area of the explosion.

Starfish Prime also created a temporary radiation belt that knocked out something like a third of the satellites in low earth orbit.

Today our electronics are much more delicate than in the 1960's. I don't think anyone knows exactly what the damage of a nuc configured for maximum EMP would do.


Below is an a quote from Wikipedia.

Starfish Prime (July 9,1962) caused an electromagnetic pulse (EMP), which was far larger than expected, so much larger that it drove much of the instrumentation off scale, causing great difficulty in getting accurate measurements. The Starfish Prime electromagnetic pulse also made those effects known to the public by causing electrical damage in Hawaii, about 1,445 kilometres (898 mi) away from the detonation point, knocking out about 300 streetlights,[6] setting off numerous burglar alarms and damaging a telephone company microwave link. The EMP damage to the microwave link shut down telephone calls from Kauai to the other Hawaiian islands.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: scottobereal

You should look harder.

Just playing the role of question asker on a message board. Thanks for your knowledge of the subject.


Starfish Prime was the largest nuclear weapon detonation in space. Most of the high altitude tests were small enough, and far enough away from populated areas that the EMP was only measurable in the area of the explosion.

Starfish Prime also created a temporary radiation belt that knocked out something like a third of the satellites in low earth orbit.

I'm sure this made some people pretty upset!
I

a reply to: scottobereal

Caution, History!

gizmodo.com...



That's a big camera.

a reply to: grey580

One of my favorite history moments is the time five men stood at ground zero of an airburst.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: grey580

One of my favorite history moments is the time five men stood at ground zero of an airburst.

Never.

NEVER would I do that.

That is insane.

originally posted by: scottobereal
Why wasn't (or maybe it was) the electronic equipment filming and measuring the atomic bomb and later nuclear bomb tests affected by what I would assume to be EMP event resulting from the explosion?

Exactly. They were mechanical. No electricity required.

A modern repeat of the warhead detonated in the Starfish Prime test
may cause much more pronounced effects today
due to our common usage of microprocessor and satellite
technology.
in the 50's 60's and early 70's valve based tech still held sway
and it by it's nature is much more tolerant of transient spikes like emp
and due to the ongoing cold war many more
key systems were hardened as a matter of course.
today the cold war is history and modern systems and tech
is no longer built with emp in mind.
except for a very few military facility's
and the old systems are fast disappearing.

The use of fiberoptic cables and microwave links
for communications and data helps mitigate
but satellites are still vulnerable.
power grids are vulnerable as any long length of wire sweeps up
and conducts the energy straight into you house
just like a lightning strike but instead of a huge flash/bang
random devices will just go pop and cease to work.
at the same time some unprotected transformers will fail
and the parts or all of the grid will fail in turn.

I doubt mr kim's people actually have the know how to pull this off
against the US or Europe.
but you can be certain russia, china, and a few others could
whether they ever will is the $6,000,000 question

However the real fear is the sun
coronal mass ejections and high end X class flares can, have and WILL
do the exact same damage in a similar way
this is well known to science and the governments of the world
really need to take this seriously
forget politics look up the carrington event if that happen'ed today
large parts of the world would be in serious trouble.

for those that haven't read it look up the book
One Second After by William Forstchen its based on actual research
and will scare the hell out of you.

The ships steel hulls/above deck cabins act as a faraday cage, protecting the electronics within from Electromagnetic waves. Cameras & other equipment in the past also had metal housings. A modern metal car with metal encased ECM might not be affected by an EMP but a plastic or fiberglass car may be affected by an EMP.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: grey580

One of my favorite history moments is the time five men stood at ground zero of an airburst.

Never heard of this. The most coherent thing I can say after that is, "Wut ! ? " Thanks for that, as I have never heard of anything like that. Well, people remaining closer than they probably should back when there was new research occurring in the field, but not this. Wow.

I'd say modern electronics and computers are way more fragile now, especially those gaming PC's with those perspex windows. The whole idea of a PC case was to shield the electronics from RF interference. One PC I had would keep crashing just before my smartphone received notification there was heavy rainstorm nearby.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: grey580

One of my favorite history moments is the time five men stood at ground zero of an airburst.

Haha I watched that on YouTube it's absolutely crazy