US's most powerful nuclear bomb being dismantled

[onehandle]

Source: AP

AMARILLO, Texas (AP) — The last of the nation's most powerful nuclear bombs — a weapon hundreds of times stronger than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima — is being disassembled nearly half a century after it was put into service at the height of the Cold War.

The final components of the B53 bomb will be broken down Tuesday at the Pantex Plant near Amarillo, the nation's only nuclear weapons assembly and disassembly facility. The completion of the dismantling program is a year ahead of schedule, according to the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration, and aligns with President Barack Obama's goal of reducing the number of nuclear weapons.

Thomas D'Agostino, the nuclear administration's chief, called the bomb's elimination a "significant milestone."

First put into service in 1962, when Cold War tensions peaked during the Cuban Missile Crisis, the B53 weighed 10,000 pounds and was the size of a minivan. According to the American Federation of Scientists, it was 600 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, at the end of World War II.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/uss-most-powerful-nuclear-bomb-being-dismantled-071325260.html

[liberal N proud]

1. What if we need it?

:sarcasm:

[HysteryDiagnosis]

3. We do need it to remind us of how effing stupid we can be. n/t

[hack89]

19. Don't worry - they were replaced by something better. nt

[exboyfil]

2. That looks like the bomb Slim Pickens

rode to glory in Dr. Strangelove.

[Tesha]

5. It's the real thing in about the same megatonage range as the movie bombs.

Before MIRVs, we use to build 'em really big!

Tesha

[OKIsItJustMe]

9. I don’t believe Major Kong could have straddled the B53

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_-sFohRgxOBI/SyTPKMvZnLI/AAAAAAAAJAw/HrXYaBiQh2g/s320/slim.pickens+%26+bomb.jpg

[SkyDaddy7]

4. Thank-you President Obama!! nt.

[BumRushDaShow]

7. +infinity

not what the detractors will want to see.

[SkyDaddy7]

23. Exactly! To them this does not count for SHIT!

I wonder what they really want...A Republican victory in 2012 is all I can think of.

[madokie]

6. Thats great news to me anyway

being war tested I fully understand the reason we don't need such behemoths.

ETA: I love my President.

[4_TN_TITANS]

8. "600 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima"

Holy shit! I didn't know that we had such a behemoth sitting around. That thing could level entire countries. :scared:

[AtheistCrusader]

21. Nah, just most of a city.

It's only 9 megatons. Would take out most of the greater Seattle area, if airburst at the proper altitude. Less at ground level.

[Botany]

10. Obama hasn't done anything and I am mad.

" ..... and aligns with President Barack Obama's goal of reducing the number of nuclear weapons."

Half of the world's plutonium will shortly be gone because President Obama talked w/ other nations
and they along w/ the President decided that it was expensive and dangerous to keep the stuff.

[NewJeffCT]

11. Have Republicans started whining about this yet?

just curious

[Botany]

13. they will be very shortly

n/t

[hack89]

20. They were retired from the active stockpile 14 years ago

no one is whining.

[octothorpe]

25. Heh... Read the yahoo comments at the link.

Of course it is teh internets, but you know at least some of them are real people expressing their idiotic opinions.

[hack89]

26. Because we know just how rare idiocy is on the internets!

:)

[tclambert]

12. Wikipedia says it was a 9 megaton weapon designed for destroying Soviet leadership bunkers.

Even then, it was expected to take multiple B53 explosions at the surface to collapse the deep bunkers. The current strategy calls for newer ground penetrating bunker busters requiring a smaller yield.

Mythbusters used 850 pounds of a weaker explosive than TNT to blow up a cement truck. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m48j9INPICo&feature=related So, that's less than one twenty millionth of a B53 explosion.

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. Only 9 megatons? I thought it was supposed to be BIG.

Don't I remember reading about the Soviets having some 20 megaton bombs?

[Archae]

15. The Russians did explode a 53 megaton air-dropped bomb.

Footage was in the documentary "Beyond Trinity."

[The Green Manalishi]

16. The ones the Soviets uses were bigger because their accuracy

was much less. At least that is my understanding.

[RaleighNCDUer]

17. Yeah. I laughed about it then, too.

Ours were accurate to w/i 10 yards. Theirs were only accurate to within 150 yards. As if 150 yards off when the blast radius is 1.5 miles is really a problem.

[Bosonic]

18. Tsar Bomba was 57 Megatons

(dialled down from 100MT)

[Historic NY]

22. Well it was bigger than a bread box....we have new & improved models...

http://www.nukestrat.com/us/afn/B53decision.htm

[lovuian]

24. Nuclear Bombs are passe' You bomb the world ...You kill

yourself and the world