For every person, regardless of his age, place of location and nationality, the term "nuclear winter" is something extremely frightening and terrible. Gloomy images, dilapidated cities, the absence of sunlight and the complete absence of civilization in our usual form immediately appear in my head. What could be causing this? Is our future a nuclear winter? Can this really happen or is this picture just a figment of the imagination of authors and directors? Let's begin to understand this issue in order.
Introduction
First of all, we note that a large, one might even say, the vast majority of the population of our planet is convinced that the photos of the nuclear winter, which are provided in books, magazines, on the Web, and other sources describing this phenomenon, are a true forecast of the future. The people believe that this could happen to the world due to nuclear bombing. There are a number of official interpretations of how nature, climate and other components of the biosphere will behave if the Third World War occurs. We will definitely consider this theory of nuclear winter, all its components and draw a logical conclusion.
However, it is worth paying attention to the obvious. No matter how scary we are, there are certain formulas and calculations that allow mathematically calculating all the consequences of atomic bombing. Having done this, one can see that the myth of a nuclear winter is nothing but a “greatly exaggerated truth,” or, more simply, a horror story. Of course, it would be foolish to deny the fact that such weapons cannot harm humanity. The damage will be palpable, but not the same as it is described in most books and films.
The official interpretation of the term
In a broad sense, nuclear winter is a hypothesis according to which the Earth’s climate will radically change as a result of atomic bombing on a very large scale. In short, it is assumed that as a result of widespread nuclear explosions and the uplift of a huge amount of smoke and soot into the atmosphere, sunlight will begin to reflect off the Earth's surface with greater intensity. It turns out that the consequence of a nuclear winter is a decrease in the temperature regime above the surface of the planet. The climate will become approximately the same as in the subarctic zone, a thick snow layer will cover the Earth, a new ice age will come.
For the first time that it was a nuclear winter, why everything should be just like that and what other consequences this phenomenon might have, it was established in the second half of the 20th century. Scientists of the USSR and the USA worked on theory. Read more about this below.
The origin of the version
For the first time, the problems of a nuclear winter and all the consequences arising from it were described by the Soviet scientist Georgy Golitsyn and the American researcher Karl Sagan. Subsequently, the model they developed was confirmed by the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In the laboratory, a biosphere model called “Gaia” was constructed. Based on the experiments that were carried out on it, it turned out that if the total power of atomic explosions is equal to 10,000 megatons, then the solar flux will decrease by 400 times at the surface of the Earth. In this situation, the period of self-purification of the atmosphere will last several months. All this, in turn, will cause a cardinal change in the Earth's climate. Nuclear winter will consist in the fact that the atmosphere will cool significantly over the continents, the air temperature over the surfaces known to us will fall first by 15 degrees, and then by 25-30.
More about the weather
The researchers noted the key problem of the nuclear winter that smog that would stand in the air after numerous explosions of warheads and fires resulting from the bombing would literally obscure our planet from sunlight. Thus, ultraviolet light will not be able to reach the Earth in the amount in which it is now. First of all, this will cause not only a nuclear winter, it will be the beginning of a nuclear night, which will last several months. Secondly, an insufficient amount of ultraviolet radiation will negatively affect photosynthesis in plants, therefore, the usual oxygen composition will be disrupted. This will lead to epidemics and the extinction of hundreds of species of plants and animals, as well as the death of people.
What will happen after
The most important consequence of a nuclear winter is a violation of the entire biosphere. Climate change will drastically “clean” the ranks of flora and fauna, destroy many human lives. In a word, the fittest will survive. It is believed that cattle breeding and agriculture will be possible only at the equator, since all other lands will be under a huge layer of snow and ice. Even after the smog has scattered over the planet and the Sun can begin to warm its surface, it will take a huge amount of time to correct what happened. The effect of a nuclear winter will last for more than one generation, moreover, even after normalizing the situation, the climate will not become the same, but will have new properties.
Several scenarios
Well, now we propose to imagine that nuclear winter has come. What can be expected from such a man-made natural phenomenon? How deplorable will the climate be? Will the nuclear winter end quickly or will it last several hundred years? Options will be presented in increasing order, from the most “positive” outcome to the most sad:
- A widespread drop in temperature by 1-2 degrees, which will last for one year. Great impact on the population of species and people will not.
- The onset of nuclear fall. The temperature will drop by 3-4 degrees, it will last several years. The forecast is characterized by bad weather, hurricanes, lack of a good harvest.
- The onset of a ten-year nuclear winter. This, as described in the film "The Day After Tomorrow," but the cause is not a natural disaster, but an atomic explosion. Almost all of the land, with the exception of the equator, is covered with snow. People will continue to fight for warmer territories. There will also be attempts to "warm" the planet with additional nuclear explosions, which will entail the onset of a nuclear summer. However, humanity has enough food supplies to survive this period.
- The onset of a new ice age. It will last several hundred years, and during this period humanity will completely change, and subsequently the earth map.
- Irreversible cooling. This is the worst case scenario. It involves the establishment of the Antarctic climate throughout the Earth, the freezing of the oceans and continents. Only civilization that can settle under ice near geothermal springs can survive.
Why do you think so?
The term nuclear winter has a huge plume. It begins around 1816, when Western Europe and North America survived the so-called year without summer. This event got its name due to record low temperatures, even during the hot season. In the United States, 1816 was nicknamed "eighteen hundred to die frozen," and from the beginning of the written history of mankind to the present moment, this time has indeed been the coldest.
At that time, people did not know the reasons for such severe weather, but in 1920 climatologist William Humphreys put forward his first hypothesis. He believed that the cause of cold weather was the eruption of the Tambora volcano in the previous, 1815, which is located on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa in the southern hemisphere. The smoke and smog that formed during this lithospheric process, flowed by wind flows to the region of the Northern Hemisphere, forming there a short-term cyclone called volcanic winter.
The further life of the theory
The eruption of Tambora volcano was a landmark event. Humanity has not seen such natural phenomena before this for many centuries, and so far no such cataclysms have been encountered. However, such a massive eruption of a huge volcano caused only an abnormal cooling, and not even all over the world. Atypical summer weather lasted only one year, after which the situation completely stabilized.
The aforementioned scientists Golitsyn and Sagan “got hooked” on this phenomenon and extracted from it only extremely negative aspects, missing the fact that the cooling was short-term and did not cause much damage to the world. Nevertheless, their theory received a very wide resonance in a number of leading countries and became a kind of dogma, the only true forecast for the near future of mankind. Despite the fact that their theory was repeatedly criticized and destructured, they could not officially refute it.
Modern official version
Based on the works of Sagan and Golitsyn, modern American scientists have made the so-called updated calculations. They once again confirmed the concept of atomic winter as a result of widespread explosions of nuclear warheads, and these are the numbers that were released in the course of a new experiment. If war breaks out between India and Pakistan, the strategic nuclear reserves of these powers will be enough to release 6.6 million tons of soot into the atmosphere. According to researchers, this amount of soot will be enough to keep the temperature above the planet's surface below the record level of 1816.
If superpowers — Russia and the United States — enter the fray, more than 150 megatons of soot will be emitted into the atmosphere. This will cause the beginning of a new ice age, comparable in its weather conditions to the Pleistocene era. The details of such a phenomenon are described in detail above.
Critical point of view of this forecast
No one questions the fact that nuclear weapons are the most destructive and terrible thing that exists on the planet. However, many people, including very experienced and educated scientists, for some reason deny the gloomy forecast that was created in the middle of the last century. The most ardent opponent of the theory of atomic winter is Fred Singer, who not only publishes his works, but also enters into scientific discussions with Sagan. It is worth emphasizing that it does not just “soften” the forecast, but gives the opposite results of the outcome of such a war. He believes that after numerous nuclear explosions there will come not a cooling, but a greenhouse effect. Its impact on the biosphere will not be so deplorable, the climate will return to normal after a short period of time.
Singer emphasizes that the essence of the nuclear winter was concluded by researchers in disruption of the biosphere, which would entail a radical change in climate, and in nuclear contamination of the air. But all this is a fairy tale made up of ignorance of the structural features of nuclear weapons. He presented myths regarding this topic individually and each refuted. Let's study them.
Myth 1 - nuclear weapons can break through the mantle
This kind of weapon is often attributed to such supernatural properties. Allegedly, even in rocky areas, the most powerful warheads can completely disrupt the tectonic structure of the planet and bring the mantle to the surface of the Earth. Well, in fact, the explosion of one of the most powerful bombs, whose potential is equal to 58 Mt, forms a funnel with a diameter of about 1.5 km, and at the same time its depth will be 200 meters. Therefore, there is nothing to talk about breaking through the crust - this is just a far-fetched forecast.
Myth 2 - all life on Earth will perish
And it will die precisely because of the explosion itself, which supposedly will be so vast that in a second it will destroy both living creatures and buildings. The well-known atomic bombing of the islands of Hiroshima and Nagasaki will help us refute this version. During this military operation, only these settlements were completely destroyed, and all the lands and waters surrounding them remained practically unharmed.
Now let's give specific numbers. 100% of the population will die within 4 km of the explosion. Another 80% will suffer at a distance of 7.5 km from the strong destruction of buildings, in other words, under the rubble. But within a radius of already 10 km of the dead there will be no more than 5%, but at the same time half of the population may receive injuries of varying severity. It turns out that, by fighting, the powers will be able to destroy each other, but not the whole world.
Myth 3 - The New Ice Age
Or nuclear winter itself - call it what you want. This is exactly how Sagan portrays the consequences of a nuclear attack - with a widespread change of climate during the "obscuration" of sunlight and excess soot in the atmosphere. The researcher claims that the explosions of atomic bombs will cause forest and city fires. The smog that rises from them will reach the stratosphere and create the effect of the night for several months. This will be enough to reduce the temperature of the planet by several tens of degrees.
Refuting this sad version, Singer stated the following. Firstly, no one will “burn” the forests, since a forest fire, even on the territory of the enemy, is harmful to the entire planet. Secondly, fires in modern cities, which are built of metal, and not of wood, are a myth. The twin towers blown up in 2001 served as proof of this. They did not burn, but smoked for long hours. Well, and most importantly - the Earth simply can not ignite like a match everywhere. In some regions, fire will stop the fog, in others - rain, and in others - snow cover. Smog from fire will not even reach the stratosphere, as it will be crushed by clouds and fall to the ground in the form of black rain.
Myth 4 - radiation contamination
It is difficult to imagine a nuclear winter without the acclaimed "Caution! Radiation!" and without people who sadly roam the desert land with ruined buildings in gas masks. This concept has been fed to us for decades, but, as it turned out, it is radically different from reality, and there is even an obvious example. These are the above-mentioned islands of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, which suffered from very powerful and destructive nuclear warheads. At that time, people who were at the epicenter of the explosion died directly from the blow or did not survive under the rubble. Those who survived did not mutate and were not infected by radiation - they continued to live and endured healthy offspring. Now these Japanese cities live and prosper, and nothing in them hints at the post-apocalyptic conditions that were observed there in 45.
In practice, let’s say that modern warheads contain predominantly short-lived isotopes. 7 hours after the explosion, the degree of radiation decreases 10 times, after 50 hours - 100 times, and after 350 hours - 1000 times.
Also note a curious fact. Many people live in such radioactive corners of the world that the background there far exceeds the permissible limits and is much higher than 350 hours after the bombing. So it will be possible to populate the affected area after a few months.
Why are we so scared by atomic warfare?
Of course, in the history of mankind there have been countless wars that not only destroyed states and claimed the lives of people, but also pretty much spoiled the biosphere. But are nuclear missiles capable of wiping all living things off the face of the planet? If this were true, then even the warring countries would know that by destroying the enemy in this way, they would not be able to populate its territory.
Talk about total nuclear disarmament began around the time the atomic winter concept arrived. All this propaganda was introduced in order to set humanity on a pacifist way, to disarm the main powers that have similar potential, and to exclude the chances of the occurrence of regular skirmishes between peoples.
There is also a less "humane" version. She tells us that the United States launched the nuclear disarmament program with the goal of neutralizing the main enemy — the USSR. As a result, as we know, Gorbachev signed the ill-fated act, during which the Union fell apart and became not so scary in the eyes of America.
Conclusion
Having studied the official theory, learned about its truths and falsehoods, having looked at the photos of the nuclear winter, we understand that there are many more mysteries in this matter. Answers to them are kept only in narrow government circles, but they will never go down to the masses. We can only hope not that there will never be a nuclear bombing, in principle, but as a result, there will be no atomic winter with its “ice age”. Even if the official theory is a myth, and the consequences will not be as widespread as it seems, nobody wants to survive another “Hiroshima”.
So, to some extent, the nuclear disarmament program is great, because pacifism is a form of humanism. Humanity is now very educated and comprehensively developed, so it will be extremely stupid and unreasonable to fight and destroy each other.