The new Battlestar

[Storm Raven]

Caprica City was hit by a 50 megaton explosion.
I suppose a 50 megaton explosion is pretty big. But how big exactly?

If I remember my weapons terminology correctly, a megaton is the equivalent in explosive force to one million tons of TNT. Therefore, a fifty megaton explosion would be the equivalent in explosive force to fifty million tons of TNT.

In other words: a really big explosion.

 

[Garmorn]

I've seen the claim that 50 megatons would be something on the order of the destructive power of 2500 Hiroshima bombs.

Boom, Baby.

It is about 30 more powerfull then the current standard 1 megaton. One thing about large bombs is that after a certain size the loss effeciency quickly. Note most N-bombs while very destructive don't have a very large blast radius when compared to a city or a planet. I remember once reading that it would take four or five 1 megaton bombs (the current city buster size) to destory all of NYC. Now this does not count all of the secondary affects like fires, fall out and other secondary damage; while doing the same damage with one bomb you needed a 20 megaton weapon.

 

[buzzard]

It is about 30 more powerfull then the current standard 1 megaton. One thing about large bombs is that after a certain size the loss effeciency quickly. Note most N-bombs while very destructive don't have a very large blast radius when compared to a city or a planet. I remember once reading that it would take four or five 1 megaton bombs (the current city buster size) to destory all of NYC. Now this does not count all of the secondary affects like fires, fall out and other secondary damage; while doing the same damage with one bomb you needed a 20 megaton weapon.

The current 'standard' is not 1 megaton. It is more on the order of about 200-300 kilotons (the range really goes from 100-500 or so, but 200-300 covers the majority of the U.S. arsenal- foreign weapons use higher yields). Sub based missiles have tended to be more powerful since they are a touch less accurate (thus more like 300 kilotons). Land base would tend to be closer to the low end.

The Hiroshima bomb, Little Boy, was about 15 kT. The Nagisaki bomb, Fat Mat, was about 20 kT yield. Thus, yes 50 megatons would be 2500 times Nagisaki.

Keep in mind, though, that destructive power, while of course being related to yield, is not a linear correlation. You see the explosion from the nuke has to fill a volume (or at least the surface of a sphere), thus blast effects will go as the square root( or cube root- I'm only fairly knowlegable, not an expert) of the yield.

Thus, while your 50 mT bomb entails 2500 times the energy of Fat Man, it will only have a result about 50 times it in terms of the amount of land affected.

Current state of the art involves the use of MIRV (multiple independent re-entry vehicles) missiles which contain a number of smaller nukes (in the afforementioned yields) which when distributed properly will result in much more ground being covered by blast than a higher yield weapon of the same weight. I believe the highest yield nuke still in service is in the Russian inventory (they might have de-commissioned them), which is the SS-18, which pops off at 18 megatons (this is specifically designed to turn Cheyenne mountain into a crater). Then highest which has ever been detonated by mankind was a 50 megaton bomb set off the the USSR (in the 60s methinks).

buzzard

 

[Garmorn]

Thanks Blizzard, most of my data is more then a couple of decades old, 1 megatons were the standard at one point because of the inacuricies in the missles at that time.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

I see. Finis Caprica City.
I also saw that the Galactica withstood a small nuclear explosion against it's hull. A rather tough ship.
But I can't see any starship, without some form of shield (ala Star Trek) withstanding a hydrogen bomb of 50 megatons. Not unless it's made out of Krell Steel, as per the film Forbidden Planet. (Now, why didn't the Rebel Alliance use these kinds of things against the Imperial Fleet and Death Stars?)
That anti-missile flak of the Galactica makes sense. Destroy the missiles inbound. I know Real World ships have these systems.

Incidentally, that small nuke detonated against the Port Landing Bay.
I see that, in this new Battlestar Galactica, they have decided to abuse the Port Landing Bay again.
I cannot count how many times that poor Port Landing Bay has been blasted, suicided, burned, and otherwise mistreated. It's a staple of the old series, and apparently, of the new one!

We have actually tested a 50 megaton device?
If World War Three ever comes, I hope to be about a mile down, thank you.

 

[buzzard]

I see. Finis Caprica City.
I also saw that the Galactica withstood a small nuclear explosion against it's hull. A rather tough ship.
But I can't see any starship, without some form of shield (ala Star Trek) withstanding a hydrogen bomb of 50 megatons. Not unless it's made out of Krell Steel, as per the film Forbidden Planet. (Now, why didn't the Rebel Alliance use these kinds of things against the Imperial Fleet and Death Stars?)
That anti-missile flak of the Galactica makes sense. Destroy the missiles inbound. I know Real World ships have these systems.

I remeber seeing an article about the effects of a 10 MT bomb dropped on Manhattan. It would basically be leveled. Casualties would be in the millions. Thus your 50 MT would have done up Caprica city quite nicely I suspect.

As for a nuke on the hull, well as pointed out earlier, a nuke explosion would not be nearly has harsh in a vacuum. The energy would not have a convenient medium availble to heat up for blast and heat effects. Almost everything would be radiation effects (not just ionizing radiation, but a real wicked burst across the whole EM spectrum which would vaporize things nearby. Most of the energy would be radiated into space rather than doing damage to the target (not to say that there should be a shortage of damage to the target). Though just for the sake of argument we have to remember that the U.S. did a fair number of above ground nuke tests in the Pacific (way back when) which tested the effects on warships. Not all of them sank immediately. In fact I think the battleships faired kind of well. Anything not really armored got scoured off, but inside the armored spaces were relatively OK. A Battlestar could be assumed to be armored as well (or better) than a battelship. Mind you, the yields were not nearly up to 50 MT (though we did pop a 10 MT bomb off above ground once- that was Mike- they named all the blasts) but I don't know if they had ships under that one.

buzzard

 

[Endur]

I didn't have any issue with the BattleStar Galactica surviving a nuke. I'm a big fan of the old Star Trek Fleet Battles game. That game had nuclear mines, and even an unshielded ship would probably survive a nuclear mine (although it would be damaged heavily if it lacked shields in the Star Trek "shields are necessary" world).

 

[Scarbonac]

I see. Finis Caprica City.

Yep.

We have actually tested a 50 megaton device?
If World War Three ever comes, I hope to be about a mile down, thank you.

1) IIRC (as buzzard indicated), the Russians (Cold War flavor) did.

2) Not me, Baby; Ground Zero all the way; instant vaporization, preferably while asleep or "in the saddle", without realizing what's happening. No lingering slow death due to starvation, radiation or brain-eating punk mutant biker zombies in assless chaps for me, thank you.

 

[Altalazar]

And now the series has been picked up - it will be interesting to see where they go with it. I wonder if they'll eventually decide / figure out there really IS an Earth or if that will not be much of a focus at all.

 

[Qlippoth]

"You maniacs!"

And now the series has been picked up - it will be interesting to see where they go with it. I wonder if they'll eventually decide / figure out there really IS an Earth or if that will not be much of a focus at all.

Perhaps they'll find Earth, only to discover apes in power and a large statue half-buried in the sand...