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SciencePhysicsHow Do We Know the Nukes Still Work?
Scientists at U.S. National Laboratories are still testing nuclear weapons among the mountains, desert, and chaparral of the American West. High-tech machinery and warehouses stocked with supercomputer processors take data on warheads and explosions—yes, there are still explosions, which crack like rifle fire on schedule in the distance. But there are no nuclear explosions. Though … Continued
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Tech NewsThis 1960s Comic Strip Claimed Nuclear Explosions Were the Future of Road Construction
Nuclear weapons can wipe out an entire city in the blink of an eye, but what about all the good they can do? That was the pitch from this 1965 comic strip that extolled the virtues of nuclear bombs to build everything from highways to a “second Panama canal.” Americans of the 1950s and ‘60s … Continued
By Matt Novak -
Tech NewsNewsF-16 Fighter Jet Crashes Into California Warehouse, Worker Captures Aftermath on Video
On Thursday, an F-16 fighter jet crashed into a warehouse near the March Air Reserve Base in southern California. The pilot ejected and survived, but roughly a dozen people inside the warehouse were sent to the hospital for minor injuries related to the crash. The aftermath was all captured on video. The fighter jet, part … Continued
By Matt Novak -
Tech NewsBest of the WeekThanos, CBD, and Disembodied Pig Brains: Best Gizmodo Stories of the Week
An awful lot happened this week—some of it good, much of it bad, and a bit of it just plain weird. In the good news category, the Hubble Space Telescope turned 29, New York City passed a world-first law requiring owners of large buildings to reduce their climate impact, scientists used a modified 747 to … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsMeet the Nuclear Weapons Nerds
John Coster-Mullen was driving his truck to a warehouse in Oshkosh, Wisconsin when he told me that he owns uranium. He’d been talking on the phone for about hour, and I hadn’t been able to ask a single question about the project that has consumed a quarter century of his life—the reverse-engineering of America’s first … Continued
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Tech NewsThis Is the Most Cinematic Nuclear Bomb Footage I’ve Ever Seen
Over the past two years, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has been digitizing old, never-before-seen films of nuclear tests and uploading them to YouTube. The LLNL just uploaded a new batch of films last week, and I couldn’t help but notice that one in particular is incredibly cinematic. This particular test was part of … Continued
By Matt Novak -
Tech NewsNewsSatellite Analysis Shows North Korea’s 2017 Nuclear Test Literally Moved a Mountain
By combining satellite radar with seismic data, an international team of researchers has re-assessed the effects of North Korea’s most recent nuclear test at Mount Mantap, offering disturbing new estimates for the strength of the device used and its influence on the mountain itself. In 2003, the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea became the … Continued
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Tech News
Blow Up Your House With the Prettiest Nuclear Bomb Simulator
What would happen if a nuclear weapon fell in your backyard? You and everything around you would be destroyed, of course. But how many casualties would there be in the surrounding area? And what would it look like if it was a North Korean nuke versus a Russian nuke? There’s a new interactive map that … Continued
By Matt Novak -
io9The 9 Most Nightmarish Movies About Nuclear Attacks
Film, especially science fiction, has always loved to explore the future we are most afraid of. That’s why nukes have been lighting up the screen for decades, with recent events have made the theme more timely and scarier than ever. Here are the nine most nightmare-inducing movies about nuclear attacks. Note: Dr. Strangelove, Miracle Mile, … Continued
By Cheryl Eddy -
EartherClimate Change
‘Limited’ Nuclear Strikes Could Still Wreak Climate Havoc
With the Cold War a fading memory, some nuclear powers have adopted strategies allowing for limited nuclear strikes. But a disturbing new study shows that even small batches of nukes can have disastrous environmental consequences on a global scale. In the 1980s, experts warned of a nuclear winter—a severe and protracted global cooling event triggered … Continued
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Tech NewsSploidSo How Close Do You Live to a Nuclear Bomb?
Hooray. If you live south of the Equator or in any of the countries that light up green in the map above, you’re good. Keep on living there because you don’t squat next to any nuclear weapons. But if you’re in the countries painted red—like the United States, Germany, Russia, China, India, etc.—you might live … Continued
By Casey Chan -
Tech NewsSploidCould We Survive a Nuclear Winter?
Here’s the short answer: we probably could not survive a nuclear winter. But the long answer, well, it depends on which countries are going to war, how many nukes are being dropped, and where those bombs are being detonated. Life Noggins explains that in a simulation with 100 nuclear bombs being dropped between Pakistan and … Continued
By Casey Chan -
Tech NewsSploidThe True Scale of Nuclear Bombs Is Totally Frightening
Nuclear weapons are already scary enough, but when you dig deeper and find out how powerful the weapons truly are, they get even more terrifying. The weapons we’ve built after the first atomic bombs are so strong that you can basically use Hiroshima as a unit of measurement. The largest nuclear explosion in human history, … Continued
By Casey Chan -
Tech NewsSploidAll the Largest Nuclear Explosions in History
Nuclear bombs are the deadliest weapons we’ve ever created because of the destruction they’ve caused to human life and the damage they leave with radiation and the sheer magnitude of their explosions. The arms race led to more and more testing of bigger and bigger bombs. Here are the largest nuclear explosions in history. SPLOID … Continued
By Casey Chan -
Tech NewsPrivacy and Security
North Korea Says It Has a Hydrogen Bomb, Experts Call BS
East Asia’s secluded dictatorship says it’s got the technology to make monstrously destructive hydrogen bombs. Fat chance, say some defense experts. Leader Kim Jong Un apparently told North Korean state media on Thursday that the nation has turned into “a powerful nuclear weapons state ready to detonate [a] self-reliant A-bomb and H-bomb to reliably defend … Continued
By Bryan Lufkin -
Tech NewsSploidStunning map visualization shows every nuclear detonation since 1945
The nuclear bomb, that devastatingly powerful world killer of a weapon, has been around for 70 years. The first nuclear bomb—Trinity—was detonated in a test in New Mexico in 1945, a month later the US Army dropped nukes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the world was never the same. Here’s an interesting visualization that shows … Continued
By Casey Chan -
Tech NewsSploid10 of the craziest nuclear bomb explosions in movie history
There have been over 2,000 nuclear explosions in real life but if we believe the movies, it seems like every other action movie drops one in for added color. And I totally get it. I hope to never see a nuclear bomb go off in person but I wouldn’t mind seeing more explosive mushroom cloud … Continued
By Casey Chan -
io9
How To Fight Fire With Nuclear Bombs
In the 1960s and 1970s, the United States attempted to improve the image of nuclear bombs by using them for public works. This went about as poorly as you’d suspect. It was called Operation Plowshare. Nuclear bombs were tested to see if they could excavate large caverns inside mountains, produce steam power, or clear rough … Continued
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Tech News
You Can Buy This Window From the Manhattan Project for a Small Fortune
Bonhams auction house is gearing up for a big “History of Science” sale on October 22. Among the many intriguing lots is a slab of unique glass used during one of the darkest scientific pursuits we’ve ever embarked upon: The Manhattan Project. But don’t worry. It’s not radioactive. In fact, the Manhattan Project viewing window … Continued
