Have you ever sat down and wondered, “What if mankind decided to launch all nuclear bombs on Earth at once?”
To begin with, it is logical to assume that detonating the world’s nuclear weapons would be a very bad idea. It would be utterly absurd for the world to do so. However, with Vladimir Putin launching a war on Ukraine, many people are concerned that a nuclear World War may erupt, destroying countries and civilization.
In response to the possibility of other foreign countries becoming involved, Putin warned world leaders that doing so would have far-reaching implications, stating, “if you do, you will face consequences larger than any of you have experienced in history.”
If you needed more proof that destroying all of the world’s nuclear warheads was a bad idea, watch this video from Kurzgesagt. This spellbinding eight-minute film has already received over 5 million views on YouTube.
There are 15,000 nuclear weapons on the earth as of 2019. It would take only three nuclear warheads to destroy one of the Earth’s 4,500 cities, implying 13,500 bombs, with 1,500 remaining. 15,000 warheads are comparable to 3 billion tons of TNT and 15 times the energy of Krakatoa, the most explosive volcanic explosion in history.
When exploded, it would generate a blast wave that would wipe out everything within a 3,000-kilometer radius. The explosion would be heard worldwide, and the pressure wave would circulate for several weeks. Finally, the cloud would reach the Earth’s atmosphere’s outskirts and be close to space.
If detonated in South America’s Amazon Rainforest, it would start a fire that would consume practically the whole continent. In addition, radiation would destroy anything inside the blast radius, rendering the surrounding area uninhabitable for hundreds of kilometres.
Unfortunately, it isn’t even the worst-case scenario shown in the video. It would be disastrous if humanity mined all uranium globally and made as many bombs as possible.
There are estimated to be 35 million tons of uranium on Earth, enough to make 10 billion Hiroshima bombs.
If it were detonated in the Amazon Rainforest, half of South America would be able to observe the explosion. It would produce a 100km-wide crater, with debris blasted so far that part of it would end up in space. Most large animals would be killed, and firestorms and earthquakes worse than anything ever recorded would demolish towns.
The plume it would produce would encircle the earth, preventing sunlight from reaching the surface and causing a worldwide winter with temperatures dropping below freezing for decades. Every kind of life on Earth would become extinct. The debris would even demolish the International Space Station. You could live underground or underwater for as long as your supplies last.
Over millions of years, any life would have to reappear on the planet. Isn’t it a tad extreme? Let’s hope Trump and Putin don’t get the wrong ideas from this video.
