Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosion (1966) [video]

Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by ranger207 on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @12:16AM (#28613055)

The American peaceful nuclear explosion program was called Project Plowshare[0] and seems to have been mostly tests, with practical applications to come later. In contrast, the Soviet Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy[1] claims almost a hundred non-testing uses. Most likely both programs were ultimately for weapons development, but it's interesting that the Soviets did manage to actually use some explosions for real non-weapon uses, while the American program never went that far.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Plowshare [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Explosions_for_the_Nat...

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by masklinn on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @10:00AM (#28616393)

> Most likely both programs were ultimately for weapons development

Seems unlikely, the weapons used were pretty well understood. There was a real hype about the idea of non-military use of nukes as explosives back then, as it offered explosive energy in scales simply unfeasible with conventional explosives.

For reference, Minor Scale (the largest non-nuclear explosion in history, as far as I know) was 4kT, the average NEftNE explosion was 12.5, and they went as high as 140. Plowshare ranged from 0.3 to 104, but most tests were in the range of Minor Scale.

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by Lammy on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @02:03AM (#28613498)

Check out https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28205620

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by throw63738 on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @05:38AM (#28614540)

There was real hype about terraforming and redirecting rivers from North to South.

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by adwww on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @06:47AM (#28614904)

nothing could possibly have gone wrong there...

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by joconde on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @10:33AM (#28616729)

How do we avoid fallout in that case?

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by xeromal on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @11:40AM (#28617627)

A lot of fallout comes from detonating over the ground so that the force smacks into earth and spins up a ton of debris which is breathed in and causes all those nasty diseases. How long a place is irradiated is pretty much tied to how long those particulates float around causing mayhem. After that, sweeping up all the debris and containing it is a solid way of preparing the area for humans again.

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by hutzlibu on Thursday September 23, 2021 @02:17AM (#28625699)

"After that, sweeping up all the debris and containing it is a solid way of preparing the area for humans again."

Sounds like lots of effort. And would still leave me wondering at every rock I encounter, of whether I should avoid this one, because it was overlooked.

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Re:Soviets put out a burning gas well with a nuclear explosi... by tantalor on Wednesday September 22, 2021 @11:18AM (#28617332)

Underground detonation.

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