Wrongo!
That deep sea glow comes from a bioluminescent shark!
| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Tech |
| Lost nuclear bomb possibly found [1958 Broken Arrow] |
| 2004-09-14 |
| Device dropped in ocean off Georgia during Cold War Monday, September 13, 2004 Posted: 10:38 PM EDT (0238 GMT) WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Government experts are investigating a claim that an unarmed nuclear bomb, lost off the Georgia coast at the height of the Cold War, might have been found, an Air Force spokesman said Monday. The hydrogen bomb was lost in the Atlantic Ocean in 1958 following a collision of a B-47 bomber and an F-86 fighter. A group led by retired Air Force Lt. Col. Derek Duke of Statesboro, Georgia, said in July that it had found a large object underwater near Savannah that was emitting high levels of radioactivity, according to an Associated Press report. The group said it used radiation and metal detection equipment to search an area in Wassaw Sound off Tybee Island where the bomb reportedly was dropped, the AP reported. Air Force spokesman Lt. Col. Frank Smolinsky said Monday that it's "only prudent to completely evaluate the evidence" from the group's search. Smolinsky said experts from the Air Force, the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy were examining the information and may decide soon to conduct their own tests with more sophisticated equipment on the scene. Smolinsky said if the bomb were found, a decision would have to be made about whether to try to recover it or leave it where it is. An Air Force investigation concluded in 2001 that the bomb is probably harmless if left where it is. It also said a recovery operation could set off the conventional explosives in the bomb that would put the recovery crew at risk and do serious environmental damage. The 7,600-pound, 12-foot-long thermonuclear bomb contained 400 pounds of high explosives as well as uranium. The Air Force insists the bomb was being used for practice and did not contain the plutonium trigger needed for a nuclear explosion. The accident took place the morning of February 5, 1958, over the coast of Georgia. According to the 2001 Air Force investigation, a B-47 carrying a Mark 15, Mod 0, nuclear bomb on a simulated combat mission from Homestead Air Force Base in Florida collided with an F-86. The pilot of the F-86 bailed out safely and his plane crashed. The B-47 was damaged but flyable. The B-47 crew tried landing three times at Hunter Air Force Base in Georgia with the nuclear weapon onboard. But because of the damage and the risk that the conventional explosives could be detonated, the crew was granted permission to jettison the nuclear bomb into the Atlantic Ocean off Savannah. The bomb was dropped from an altitude of about 7,200 feet at an air speed of about 200 knots. The B-47 crew did not see an explosion when the bomb hit the ocean. The plane later landed safely at Hunter. |
| Posted by:Zenster |
| #9 Zenster - Sir, my bad entirely. Let me explain. Without the plutonium core - IIRC called the 'pit', the weapon cannot go nuclear in any way. WHat you have - at worst - is a 'dirty bomb', but underwater and under the ocean floor, even if the conventional explosives went it's a whole lot better than having it happen up top. Aussie Mike is also right - my mistake was in that I was working from memory and when you get to the advnaced age of 44, it gets ugly. My sincerest apologies to everybody on this one for the technical errors, but my basic point does still stand: without the pit, no nuclear yield, just a conventional explosion that scatters whatever radioactive material might be inside the casing. Best regards, Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-09-14 10:57:00 PM |
| #8 The hydrogen bomb Yeah, I'm not going to Savvanah anytime soon. |
| Posted by: Charles 2004-09-14 8:12:29 PM |
| #7 Mike Kozlowski, you mentioned how: Obviously, you can't get a nuclear yield, because there's nothing nuclear about this thing. Yet the article states: The 7,600-pound, 12-foot-long thermonuclear bomb contained 400 pounds of high explosives as well as uranium. The Air Force insists the bomb was being used for practice and did not contain the plutonium trigger needed for a nuclear explosion. EMPHASIS ADDED Even if it's just a U-238 jacket, isn't this a significant chunk of radioactive material? The article and your post don't seem to match up. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-09-14 6:52:12 PM |
| #6 Deuterium isn't radioactive. You are thinking about Tritium which is used as a booster inside plutonium cores.(Implosion causes some fusion which gives off neutrons which causes more fission in the plutonium) Even without the plutonium trigger though, the Nuke might contain uranium 238 as a jacket as in three stage weapons (plutonium trigger, fusion package, surrounded by U238 jacket which releases more energy from fissions from high neutron flux) Dirty as all getout. Anyone know what type of fusion weapon a Mk15 is? |
| Posted by: Aussie Mike 2004-09-14 6:35:36 PM |
| #5 Mike, the AF is getting ready to remove an F-15 which crashed in the muck off St. George Island FL a year or so ago, it's been under 24/7 guard ever since. I was hoping for souvenirs but wasn't allowed to get close enough for a peek. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-09-14 1:46:08 PM |
| #4 Big Ed- No, those are the secret NAVY experiments...let's keep our consipracy theories straight here, shall we?*S* Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-09-14 1:05:17 PM |
| #3
|
| Posted by: BigEd 2004-09-14 12:42:51 PM |
| #2 *Wheels out chalkboard and podium* Let's look at a couple details that the article most convienently doesn't bring up. The reason the crew never saw an explosion is that the chute deployed on the bomb when it was jettisoned. (Chute-deployed bombs - and until the 70s, most were - deploy as soon as they leave the plane, whether they're dropped or jettisoned.) The bomb had a reasonably soft landing, but through sheer weight alone (the Mk15 weighed nearly four tons)would have sunk into the muck down there off Tybee - I've been within sight of where it went in several times, it's pretty much marsh/bog/God only knows all the way around. This sucker is not only easily fifty feet or so under the mud, it's going to stay there for a while. Secondly, the biggest hazard is an uncommanded detonation of the conventional explosives inside the bomb. Obviously, you can't get a nuclear yield, because there's nothing nuclear about this thing. But why in God's name anyone wants to make a Titanic - level recovery operation just to pull up what is for all practical purposes a fairly small conventional weapon (there's roughly the saem amount of explosives in it as in a standard Mk82 500-lb weapon) is beyond me. The problem here is that after almost fifty years underwater, the explosives have probably deteriorated to the point where they couldn't go off if they had to, though in all honesty that possibility cannot be ruled out. Another question that needs to be answered is one that Ship inadvertantly brought up. This thing is roughly the size of a Volkswagen, and it is some distance (perhaps as much as 50 feet) under the mud. Compare it to CSS Hunley, the Confederate sub raised off Charleston in 2000. Hunley is about the same weight, but almost forty feet long, about three feet across, and was only a foot or so beneath the mud of Charleston Harbor. Yet she evaded detection for more than one hundred and thirty years, including some very high tech searches. And we are to believe that LTC Duke found a 'radioactive object' (with no radioactive material in it) with what he had on his dive boat? The only 'radioactive' material aboard the weapon would POSSIBLY be deuterium (heavy water), and I guarantee he didn't pick that up. My conclusion: LTC Duke is looking for a financial killing and a book contract by using existing documentation to claim there's a nuclear weapon where everybody already knows there's one. The USAF is in a no-win situation: if they find it, they get bitched at for leaving it there, if they don't; they're covering it up. Believe me, if anybody here has a vacation scheduled for Tybee Island, take it. It'll still be there. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-09-14 10:32:00 AM |
| #1 I believe it is the legendary lost bomb of the Confederacy. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-09-14 9:43:18 AM |