A Look Back At Bombing the Van Allen Belts 237
An anonymous reader points out a recent story at NPR describing one of the greatest lightshows in history — a US hydrogen bomb test 250 miles above the Pacific Ocean in 1962. The mission came about after James Van Allen confirmed the existence of radiation belts around the earth that now bear his name. As it turns out, the same day Van Allen announced his findings at a press conference, he "agreed with the military to get involved with a project to set off atomic bombs in the magnetosphere to see if they could disrupt it." According to NPR, "The plan was to send rockets hundreds of miles up, higher than the Earth's atmosphere, and then detonate nuclear weapons to see: a) If a bomb's radiation would make it harder to see what was up there (like incoming Russian missiles!); b) If an explosion would do any damage to objects nearby; c) If the Van Allen belts would move a blast down the bands to an earthly target (Moscow! for example); and — most peculiar — d) if a man-made explosion might 'alter' the natural shape of the belts." The article is accompanied by a podcast and a video with recently declassified views of the test. They also explain how the different colors of light in the sky were produced.
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:3, Informative)
I believe there's an international treaty where you cannot nuclear attack a nation having an nuclear arsenaln, even if it's just "one nuke".
This fact allows the US to nuke, say Irak, until they have developed their own nuclear weapons. That's why these nations are developing their own weapons, not to "nuke the Western world" but to get themselves safe.
It began earlier (Score:5, Informative)
By the way, despite what TFA says, there are two electron radiation belts, not just two of them at all; there's also a proton one. Wikipedia considers it to be a part of the inner radiation belt, but the accepted terminology says otherwise to the best of my knowledge.
I wonder... (Score:4, Informative)
... if this plan involved any of the same people who wanted to set off a nuclear bomb on the moon. [guardian.co.uk]
EMP (Score:5, Informative)
This test series (specifically, Starfish Prime [wikipedia.org]) uncovered the electromagnetic pulse (EMP [globalsecurity.org]) effect, an unexpected side effect of nuclear explosions at altitude. The gamma rays from a high altitude burst hit atoms and thus eject electrons high in the atmosphere over a wide area, more or less simultaneously, and the current from the ejected electrons can cause a very wide-spread electromagnetic pulse, which can knock out power lines and electronics at great distances (> 1000 km).
So, I guess we can call Allen the father of the EMP, although I am not sure he would have wanted the honor.
Re:One disappointing part about the article... (Score:5, Informative)
I will give this a shot. I assume you mean these.
a) If a bomb's radiation would make it harder to see what was up there (like incoming Russian missiles!); b) If an explosion would do any damage to objects nearby; c) If the Van Allen belts would move a blast down the bands to an earthly target (Moscow! for example); and — most peculiar — d) if a man-made explosion might "alter" the natural shape of the belts.
a. Yes, especially in the radio.
b. Yes, in a fairly predictable fashion (from heat, gamma rays).
c. No
d. Yes, for a short while, sort of like a solar flare. That can actually cause a "geomagnetically induced current," which could be a problem for long electrical transmission lines.
However, the real find from the test was the prompt EMP, which was not anticipated. (See my post further down on that one.)
Re:Azimov story... (Score:2, Informative)
Isaac Azimov wrote a short sci-fi story about an explorer, who had just come back from visiting the newly contacted planet "Earth", adding humans to the "Register Of Intelligent Life". Some minutes later, after the explorer explained how humans tested atomic bombs "on their own planet" the registrar erased the entry as being unqualified for inclusion under "Intelligent".
He didn't cross of humans as "being unqualified for inclusion under intelligent." He crossed off humans under the assumption we would cause ourselves to go extinct, as many other species who had qualified as intelligent, had. Also, the explorer hadn't contacted Earth, he had observed/explored it. Humans had no knowledge of the Explorer or the Register.
Re:Mommy, I want a H-Bomb! (Score:3, Informative)
Well, it's not like there's law against it.
We finally have a Supreme Court that takes the Second Amendment seriously, and there is nothing there in the Constitution that would allow the Government to limit your capacity to defend yourself and your family against your neighbors and tyrants.
In fact, the Second Amendment's intent can only be fulfilled if every family owned a nuclear weapon. Only then will the Government think twice before using the eminent domain and tax-and-spend laws to confiscate your Private Property.
Re:Voyage to the Bottom of The Sea?!? (Score:3, Informative)
Before the television show there was the movie, and that premise was most of the entire plot.
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.iranfocus.com/en/?option=com_content&task=view&id=4164 [iranfocus.com]
Transcript of speech by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at "World Without Zionism" conference in Tehran
"Such people are using words like "it's not possible". They say how could we have a world without America and Zionism? But you know well that this slogan and goal can be achieved and can definitely be realised"
Re:I can't see the tags... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:One disappointing part about the article... (Score:1, Informative)
Those questions were the questions in the 60's... it wasn't an "ask slashdot" article.
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:1, Informative)
Give it up. You aren't going to build any sympathy for Iran.
Until Iran starts talking even remotely like they want to play on the world theatre without threatening acts of war they won't get any legitimate support.
They repeatedly threaten to commit acts of war doing things such as running the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip, etc. etc.
They actually do commit acts of war (attacking British Patrol boats)
They kidnap and torture people making an innocent mistake of navigation while hiking. (Stupid, yes, but not worthy of life in jail.)
Their theofacist government has a guy that participated in an act of war against the US by capturing embassy employees and military personnel as a "puppet president".
Somehow, a pot-smoking dweeb like yourself never seems to trot out the facts either.
So, shove it. Better yet, go over there and help them develop a few weapons. They'll kill you just for being white, after you fulfill your propaganda purposes that is.
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:5, Informative)
I think, perhaps, the terrorists didn't forsee the real end-result of that terror.
On the contrary, they foresaw it only too well, and the USA's reaction meant that they had succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Having the population of the USA live in a state of fear would be an important goal for them (after all, is this not the very definition of the word "terrorism"?), and in this the subsequent actions of the USA government, and their stoking of the perceived terrorist threat, helped Al Qaeda succeed in this.
If you recall, in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, there was worldwide sympathy for the USA, and not just from its usual allies. How quickly, and how damagingly (to the USA itself) this goodwill was squandered by what happened in Iraq (and the decision to start a war there in the first place) and the more-extreme excesses of the "war on terror". Portraying the conflict as some sort of religious crusade also played into their hands.
The Bush administration was played like a fiddle by Al Qaeda.
Re:I can't see the tags... (Score:5, Informative)
Richard Rhodes' _Making of the Atomic Bomb_ mentions that it was Fermi who offered tongue-in-cheek to take wagers from other scientists on whether the bomb would ignite the atmosphere and if this would destroy just New Mexico or the whole world, annoying Groves in the process. Oppenheimer asked Teller to look into this along with other similar far-fetched possibilities.
No one went to the press. No one was kicked off the project over this. That's the truth, though it makes a much less sensational headline.
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:1, Informative)
Right and if you think that's not the same thing, then I have a lovely bridge to sell you.
How are they planning on changing the "current form of the Israeli government"? By using the trade and diplomacy to bring about peaceful effective change? Or maybe, attempting to wipe them out once they have the military advantage.
It is true that there is a large Jewish population in Iran. The reason they are still there is because they cannot leave. No more than one member of a family can leave the country at a time and when individuals leave the country they are put under surveillance and if it is suspected they have made contact with anyone deemed to be "Zionists", they are sentenced to death.
I'm going to assume your comment is ignorant rather than bigoted so if you wish to be better informed please check out the following links:
http://www.adl.org/main_International_Affairs/ahmadinejad_words.htm
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/iranjews.html
Re:Hypocrasy (Score:3, Informative)
There has never been an invasion of a nuclear state.
Yom Kippur War [wikipedia.org]