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Nukemap

nukemap.org

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Re: Nukemap

#61

Post by ben_w »

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #37
ehsankia wrote: post #18

Common pet peeve with this site: Most people trying to share a scary screenshot will choose the largest one (Tsar Bomba 100t), of which 1 operation one was ever created, and that one has already been detonated. It's also not at all a practical bomb that would be used in practice.

On the other hand, the RS-28 is the Russian state of the art now, and is probably as deadly as the Tsar, but very practical. However, it is yet to see if it will work as advertised.

I’m not a weapons expert so I DuckDucked RS-28, and apparently it’s a missile not a warhead? Wikipedia says it can have a payload of:

> 10–15 MIRVs[3] Unspecified number of Avangard HGVs

I don’t know how to make use of this information.

Re: Nukemap

#62

Post by malandrew »

I would love if this was designed to take into account elevation data so you could figure out what areas would be shadowed by natural structures like hills.

For example, I'm in Seattle, but on the East side and I expect to be fully shielded from a surface detonation in downtown and to be mostly shielded from air detonation depending on the altitude.

Speaking of air detonations, what altitudes are most nuclear missiles designed to detonate at?

Re: Nukemap

#63

Post by belter »

AdamH12113 wrote: post #49
tablespoon wrote: post #3

I was looking at this the other day, and was wondering how nuclear weapons would actually be targeted against the US. Would they be aimed at city centers or nearby infrastructure? Would each city be targeted with one warhead, or blanketed with several over a large area? Because if there's a full-scale nuclear war, if the Russians only target the center of my city, I probably have a chance of surviving. However if the…

It probably depends on how the war escalated to a nuclear exchange and whether it's a first strike or a second strike. In a first strike, the goal would be to take out the enemy nuclear arsenal as quickly as possible ("counterforce") to prevent retaliation, so in that case we would hope that all or almost all of the warheads would be targeted at remote missile bases. But you need a large number of accurate missiles t…

You forgot about the Nuclear Submarines. They will ensure any first strike nation will not be be around after destroying their adversary.

Re: Nukemap

#64

Post by jupp0r »

minot wrote: post #46
wonderwonder wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each to their own but I have never understood this way of thinking. I have kids, I would want them to survive and to have a chance at life even if its not the shiny modern one. I would also want them to have kids and so on. Life would obviously be hard but it would still be life. Death comes soon enough for everyone anyway. Obviously the best outcome is no nukes at all.

I think the difference is I don’t have kids. I would like to think I want kids but there is no way I can afford having kids especially given I’m not sure if I can even afford to retire. I don’t understand the way of thinking of people millennials and later who aren’t at least millionaires who choose to (not counting accidental pregnancies) have children.

You could choose to live somewhere where you don't have to be a millionaire to have children. Lots of people move out of San Francisco around the time they are starting a family, for example.

Incidentally, these areas might also be less likely to be hit by nuclear bombs.

Re: Nukemap

#65

Post by _fs »

k__ wrote: post #32

I don't know how much of what I saw online was Ukraine propaganda. But the Russian military seems to be in bad shape. Almost nothing of the new stuff they paraded all these years is used in Ukraine. Some people argued that it's a smart ploy, others say they simply don't have the technology in amounts that are enough for a war. It makes me think, how many nukes does Russia actually have? How many are usable? How many…

ICBM's cannot be reliably intercepted. 95% of them will get through. Russia has > 300 ICBMS ready to go.

Re: Nukemap

#66

Post by motohagiography »

Is there a feature that counts the most popular targets people are testing against, not as though we were going to vote on them but say, Portland, as an example selected completely at random, e.g. which are the most popular places of interest for assessing the impact of a nuclear strike and how sure they can be of its effects?

Re: Nukemap

#67

Post by rootusrootus »

lsllc wrote: post #52

I assume we'd be looking at a Topol SS-25 missile type attack from Russia? For a city such as Boston, are we only looking at a single strike, or does the doctrine call for multiple warheads per city/metro area? For Boston at least you only have to be 7-8 miles from ground zero to avoid most of the damage and due to the prevailing winds, most of the fallout (from a ground strike) would be towards the north east (an ai…

> are we only looking at a single strike

I like the "only" part :). But in any case, the US and Russia both (by treaty) have about 1500 nuclear weapons ready to use. I'm guessing Boston would get more than one.

Re: Nukemap

#68

Post by BbzzbB »

mikewarot wrote: post #50

You don't know where the incoming ICBMs are targeted... Beau offers a much simpler way to think about this and plan ahead that could save your life https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox8ZDbCNTCE

I don't know who this guy is or what his channel is about but that seemed like a genuinely insightful video, thanks.

Re: Nukemap

#69

Post by OkayPhysicist »

javajosh wrote: post #17
excalibur wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guessing there would be several aimed at each city of any size, and the targeted locations would be spread out a bit to maximize impact. If you're conducting an all-out nuclear assault you're probably not pulling any punches.

I was going to say there aren't enough warheads to target every city because: >[The] United States and Russia have the vast majority of nuclear weaps, with 4,804 and 4,480 warheads stockpiled respectively. There are approximately 1,861 nukes spread over the rest of the world, between China, Israel, the U.K, Pakistan, and India. France has the largest number of nukes after the U.S. and Russia. [0] However, there are o…

I actually just recently read a report from the late 80s that discussed a couple of scenarios and likely distribution of nuclear targets in each one.

The best case scenario (in the context of a full scale nuclear war with Russia) was a couple hundred successfully detonated strikes. The eastern seaboard, and all the metropolitan areas on the west coast were smoking holes in the ground. Pretty much anywhere with a sufficiently large military base, or significant government presence was on the "likely destroyed" list. There were a lot of random inland areas, which I assumed were targeting silos.

Basically, even in the 400 bomb scenario, the Boise field office of the IRS becomes the nation's highest authority.

Re: Nukemap

#70

Post by wonderwonder »

minot wrote: post #46
wonderwonder wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each to their own but I have never understood this way of thinking. I have kids, I would want them to survive and to have a chance at life even if its not the shiny modern one. I would also want them to have kids and so on. Life would obviously be hard but it would still be life. Death comes soon enough for everyone anyway. Obviously the best outcome is no nukes at all.

I think the difference is I don’t have kids. I would like to think I want kids but there is no way I can afford having kids especially given I’m not sure if I can even afford to retire. I don’t understand the way of thinking of people millennials and later who aren’t at least millionaires who choose to (not counting accidental pregnancies) have children.

If I didn't have kids I think I would still want to live. In this scenario worst case I could voluntarily check out. You don't need to be rich to have kids friend. Don't get me wrong they are definitely a cost of living increase but all they really need is attention and to feel loved. Everything else takes care of itself. Of course they need food and shelter but housing is affordable away from major urban areas.

This is not to underplay the difficulty raising kids on a below average wage job.

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