Posted on 11/21/2004 9:19:23 PM PST by Mount Athos
Imagine a relatively small nuclear bomb of 10 kilotons exploding in San Francisco's Union Square. "Everything to the Museum of Modern Art would vaporize," writes Harvard security analyst Graham Allison in his chilling new book, "Nuclear Terrorism." "Everything from the Transamerica building to Nob Hill would be sites of massive destruction; everything within the perimeter of Coit Tower and the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge would go up in flames." No survivors would be found amid nearly 100 square blocks, and buildings in about 400 square blocks would be totally destroyed or left looking like the Oklahoma City federal building after it was crushed by a truck bomb. To alert Americans to the intimate extent of the peril, Allison's book is linked to an Internet "Blast Map" showing the radius of destruction for such a nuclear device anywhere in the United States. It can be viewed by ZIP code at www.nuclearterror.org. Allison and other experts agree that the most likely form of nuclear terrorism is a "dirty bomb," where radioactive material is scattered by a conventional explosive or perhaps an attack on a nuclear reactor. But some analysts are worried more by the less likely but far more catastrophic detonation of a terrorist nuclear bomb. "The gravest danger, however, and the one requiring the most urgent attention, is the possibility that terrorists could obtain highly enriched uranium or plutonium for use in an improvised nuclear device," according to Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, and former Sen. Sam Nunn, now head of the nonprofit Nuclear Threat Initiative.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
/sarcasm
The dirty bomb scenario is more plausible. It is also possible that a crude little boy could be assembled given relatively few resources. While the yield from such a "crude" device would be inefficient, it would produce a disproportionately dirty fallout.
San Francisco bashing is so 90's.
Let me guess, you also want an earthquake to sink the whole state into the ocean and all of America's problems will be solved?
"I have always been under the impression that so many things must be "just right" for there to be a blast."
Unfortunately, this is not the case.
An implosion type plutonium bomb is very difficult to properly trigger, but this is not the case with an enriched uranium bomb.
It really only takes two subcritical masses of enriched uranium placed at opposite ends of a "gun barrel" type bomb
fired at each other with high explosives.
The timing devices to ensure proper timing of the detonation of the HE are critical, but not nearly so critical as plutonium bombs.
A crude device of this type could produce a nuclear detonation.
You know that was tongue-in-cheek right??
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