Posted on 03/28/2014 12:43:42 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Even a relatively small regional nuclear war could trigger global cooling, damage the ozone layer and cause droughts for more than a decade, researchers say.
These findings should further spur the elimination of the more than 17,000 nuclear weapons that exist today, scientists added.
During the Cold War, a nuclear exchange between superpowers was feared for years. One potential consequence of such a global nuclear war was "nuclear winter," wherein nuclear explosions sparked huge fires whose smoke, dust and ash blotted out the sun, resulting in a "twilight at noon" for weeks. Much of humanity might eventually die from the resulting crop failures and starvation.
Today, with the United States the only standing superpower, nuclear winter might seem a distant threat. Still, nuclear war remains a very real threat; for instance, between developing-world nuclear powers such as India and Pakistan.
To see what effects such a regional nuclear conflict might have on climate, scientists modeled a war between India and Pakistan involving 100 Hiroshima-level bombs, each packing the equivalent of 15,000 tons of TNT just a small fraction of the world's current nuclear arsenal. They simulated interactions within and between the atmosphere, ocean, land and sea ice components of the Earth's climate system.
Scientists found the effects of such a war could be catastrophic.
"Most people would be surprised to know that even a very small regional nuclear war on the other side of the planet could disrupt global climate for at least a decade and wipe out the ozone layer for a decade," study lead author Michael Mills, an atmospheric scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, told Live Science...
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
small. 100 nukes. don’t sound small.
Agenda journalism based on mights and coulds
They’d love for us to unilaterally disarm, trusting that the other nuclear powers would follow suit.
Which is amazingly stupid
I think that if there ever was a nuclear war, global cooling would be about the least of our worries.
Those who beat their swords into plowshares will plow for those who do not.
Frankly, if you went out and asked a thousand folks to rank their worries in life...nuke weapons, climate change, and nuclear reactor safety rank around number 532. Journalists always fail to take into account the reality of life.
Why this? Why now???
0bamao will save us all from the Gorebull Warming but having a nuclear war with Pooty Poot.
0bamao will save us all from the Gorebull Warming by having a nuclear war with Pooty Poot.
Like that “offhand remark” by Mr. Obama being more worried about a smuggled nuke in NYC than the Russians in Crimea? They’re up to something, I would guess. Remember, all parts of the octopus coordinate with one another.
The US and Soviets did a lot of nuke testing in the past. Really BIG nukes too. So, where was the global cooling then?
*cool*
An entire planet based on, "these findings"
I'VE found something ...
In the beginning was the Word ...
The nook war advocates in here never cease to amaze me. Yeah, lets hope there is one just to see what happens. Right?
Good news, the fix for global warming has been discovered, and we can get rid of Pakistan...
Even if they are right (even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then) so what. Nuclear winter isn't going to deter an unstable regime any more than a "gun free zone" sign deters a mass murderer. Liberals...unrealistically expecting bad people to act rationally over and over and over again. Sheesh. We'll be keeping our nuclear deterrent. I'd rather be alive and cold rather than hot (briefly) and dead.
The US and Soviet Union didn’t conduct testing of all sorts of nuclear devices for nothing. Don’t you remember?
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