![]() ![]() The Tu-95 plane carrying the bomb was far away at the time of detonation. Screenshot from the filmĪlthough being detonated four kilometers above the ground, the seismic shock wave equivalent to an earthquake of over 5.0 on the Richter scale was measured around the world. ![]() A few seconds after the explosion, the diameter of the dust column was about 10 km. The town was 55 kilometers from ground zero. The flash dome itself reached 20 km, while the ring of absolute destruction had a radius of 35 kilometersĪfter 40 seconds, the dome of the fire reached 30 km and thereafter developed into a mushroom cloud which soared to a height of 60-65 kilometers with a diameter of 90 km. In the military town Severny, center for the nuclear weapons test around the Matochkin Strait, most buildings were destroyed. As seen in the film, the fireball flash lasted far longer than seen on any other nuclear weapon test videos. The bomb was detonated 4,000 meters above the ground. To slow the drift down after release, the bomb was deployed to a giant parachute, itself weighing nearly a ton. Measurement equipment was attached all over and a second plane flew beside, filming and monitoring radiation samples. The film shows how the modified Tu-95 bomber plane was coated with a special white reflective paint to protect it from the heat caused by thermal radiation from the explosion. Understanding the extreme radiation releases, the engineers, and among them Andrei Sakharov, decided to reduce the actual yield of 100 megatons to around half. Normal hydrogen bombs comprise two stages. Khrushchev wanted a 100 megaton weapon and to achieve such size, the engineers added a third stage on the thermonuclear warhead. It was Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev who in July 1961 ordered the development of the doomsday-size bomb at a time amid rising political tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States. With a yield of 50 megatons (50 million tons), equal to around 3,800 Hiroshima bombs, the weapon was set off over Novaya Zemlya on October 30, 1961. The bomb, officially named RDS-220 and later nick-named Tsar Bomba, was the largest nuclear weapon ever constructed. Videos from several directions and distances show the apocalypse looking detonation and following mushroom cloud. Then the release of the bomb attached to a parachute to slow the fall so the plane could get in safer distance from the blast. The Tu-95 aircraft take-off and flight across the Barents Sea to the detonation site near the Matochkin Strait at Novaya Zemlya. First the transportation of the giant bomb by rail to the Olenya airbase near Olenegorsk on the Kola Peninsula. The film, edited in classic Soviet-style propaganda, shows all preparation procedures. The documentary film was released and posted on August 20 on the YouTube channel of Rosatom State Atomic Energy Corporation in connection with the celebration of 75 years of nuclear industry. ![]()
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