Tsar Bomba
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The Tsar Bomba () ( code name: ''Ivan'' or ''Vanya''), also known by the alphanumerical designation "AN602", was a
thermonuclear Thermonuclear fusion is the process of atomic nuclei combining or “fusing” using high temperatures to drive them close enough together for this to become possible. There are two forms of thermonuclear fusion: ''uncontrolled'', in which the re ...
aerial bomb, and the most powerful
nuclear weapon A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...
ever created and tested. Overall, the Soviet physicist
Andrei Sakharov Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov ( rus, Андрей Дмитриевич Сахаров, p=ɐnˈdrʲej ˈdmʲitrʲɪjevʲɪtɕ ˈsaxərəf; 21 May 192114 December 1989) was a Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident, nobel laureate and activist for n ...
oversaw the project at
Arzamas-16 Sarov (russian: Саро́в) is a closed town in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It was known as Gorkiy-130 (Горький-130) and Arzamas-16 (), after a (somewhat) nearby town of Arzamas,SarovLabsCreation of Nuclear Center Arzamas-16/ref ...
, while the main work of design was by Sakharov, Viktor Adamsky,
Yuri Babayev Yuri Nikolayevich Babayev (russian: Юрий Николаевич Бабаев; 21 May 1928 – 6 October 1986), , was a Soviet physicist who spent a long career in the former Soviet program of nuclear weapons, and known as one of the princi ...
, Yuri Smirnov, and
Yuri Trutnev Yury Petrovich Trutnev (russian: Ю́рий Петро́вич Тру́тнев; born 1 March 1956) is a Russian politician who serves as a Deputy Prime Minister of Russia and Presidential Envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District since 2013. F ...
. The project was ordered by
Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
in July 1961 as part of the Soviet resumption of nuclear testing after the Test Ban Moratorium, with the detonation timed to coincide with the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Tested on 30 October 1961, the test verified new design principles for high-yield thermonuclear charges, allowing, as its final report put it, the design of a nuclear device "of practically unlimited power". The bomb was dropped by parachute from a Tu-95V aircraft, and detonated autonomously above the cape
Sukhoy Nos Sukhoy Nos (russian: Сухой Нос, literally 'Dry Cape'; there is another Sukhoy Nos on Vaygach island south of Novaya Zemlya) is a cape on Severny Island, the northern island of the archipelago Novaya Zemlya, projecting westward into the ...
of
Severny Island Severny Island (russian: Се́верный о́стров, Severnyy ostrov, Northern Island) is a Russian Arctic island. It is the northern island of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago. It was historically called Lütke Land after Friedrich Benjamin ...
, Novaya Zemlya, from
Mityushikha Bay Mityushikha Bay (russian: Губа Митюшиха) is a bay on Severny Island in Novaya Zemlya, Russia. Nuclear tests were conducted in 1961 in the area of the bay. Geography It is a long fjord open to the west near the SW end of the island, ...
, north of the
Matochkin Strait Matochkin Strait or Matochkin Shar (russian: Ма́точкин Шар) is a strait, structurally a fjord, between the Severny and Yuzhny Islands of Novaya Zemlya. It connects the Barents Sea and the Kara Sea. Geography The Matochkin Strait is ...
. The detonation was monitored by
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intelligence agencies, via a
KC-135A The Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker is an American military aerial refueling aircraft that was developed from the Boeing 367-80 prototype, alongside the Boeing 707 airliner. It is the predominant variant of the C-135 Stratolifter family of transpo ...
aircraft (Operation ''SpeedLight'') in the area at the time. A secret U.S. reconnaissance aircraft named "Speed Light Alpha" monitored the blast, coming close enough to have its antiradiation paint scorched. The
bhangmeter A bhangmeter is a non-imaging radiometer installed on reconnaissance and navigation satellites to detect atmospheric nuclear detonations and determine the yield of the nuclear weapon. They are also installed on some armored fighting vehicles, in ...
results and other data suggested the bomb yielded around , which was the accepted yield in technical literature until 1991, when Soviet scientists revealed that their instruments indicated a yield of . As they had the instrumental data and access to the test site, their yield figure has been accepted as more accurate. In theory, the bomb would have had a yield in excess of if it had included the
uranium-238 Uranium-238 (238U or U-238) is the most common isotope of uranium found in nature, with a relative abundance of 99%. Unlike uranium-235, it is non-fissile, which means it cannot sustain a chain reaction in a thermal-neutron reactor. However, it ...
fusion tamper which figured in the design but which was omitted in the test to reduce radioactive fallout. As only one bomb was built to completion, that capability has never been demonstrated. The remaining bomb casings are located at the Russian Atomic Weapon Museum in
Sarov Sarov (russian: Саро́в) is a closed town in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia. It was known as Gorkiy-130 (Горький-130) and Arzamas-16 (), after a (somewhat) nearby town of Arzamas,SarovLabsCreation of Nuclear Center Arzamas-16/ref ...
and the Museum of Nuclear Weapons,
All-Russian Scientific Research Institute Of Technical Physics All-Russian Scientific Research Institute Of Technical Physics (VNIITF) (russian: Всероссийский научно-исследовательский институт технической физики) is a research institute based in Sn ...
, in
Snezhinsk Snezhinsk ( rus, Сне́жинск, p=ˈsnʲeʐɨnsk) is a closed town in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia. Population: History The settlement began in 1955 as Residential settlement number 2, a name which it had until 1957 when it received town ...
. Tsar Bomba was a modification of an earlier project, RN202, which used a ballistic case of the same size but a very different internal mechanism. A number of published books, even some authored by those involved in product development 602, contain inaccuracies that are replicated elsewhere, including wrongly identifying Tsar Bomba as RDS-202 or RN202.


Project goals

In the mid-1950s, the United States had an unconditional superiority over the USSR in nuclear weapons, although thermonuclear charges had already been created in the USSR at this time. Also, there were no effective means of delivering nuclear warheads to the US, both in the 1950s and in 1961. The USSR was not therefore able to muster a possible realistic retaliatory nuclear strike against the US. Given the Soviet Union's actual strategic disadvantage in relation to America's nuclear weapons possessions, foreign policy and
propaganda Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
considerations during the leaderships of
Georgy Malenkov Georgy Maximilianovich Malenkov ( – 14 January 1988) was a Soviet politician who briefly succeeded Joseph Stalin as the leader of the Soviet Union. However, at the insistence of the rest of the Presidium, he relinquished control over the p ...
and
Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
made a response to the perceived US nuclear blackmail imperative. The creation of the Tsar Bomba represented a necessitated bluff in order to maintain the concept of nuclear deterrence. Also on June 23, 1960, the Resolution of the
Council of Ministers of the USSR The Council of Ministers of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( rus, Совет министров СССР, r=Sovet Ministrov SSSR, p=sɐˈvʲet mʲɪˈnʲistrəf ɛsɛsɛˈsɛr; sometimes abbreviated to ''Sovmin'' or referred to as the '' ...
was issued on the creation of a super-heavy ballistic missile
N-1 N1, N.I, N-1, or N01 may refer to: Information technology * Nokia N1, an Android tablet * Nexus One, an Android phone made by HTC * Nylas N1, a desktop email client * Oppo N1, an Android phone * N1, a Sun Microsystems software brand now mostly ...
(GRAU index – 11A52) with a
warhead A warhead is the forward section of a device that contains the explosive agent or toxic (biological, chemical, or nuclear) material that is delivered by a missile, rocket, torpedo, or bomb. Classification Types of warheads include: * Expl ...
weighing . For a comparative assessment, the weight of the warhead tested in 1964 by the
UR-500 Proton (Russian: Протон) (formal designation: UR-500) is an expendable launch system used for both commercial and Russian government space launches. The first Proton rocket was launched in 1965. Modern versions of the launch system are sti ...
ICBM was . The development of new designs of nuclear and thermonuclear ammunition requires testing. The operability of the device, its safety in emergency situations, and the calculated energy release during an explosion must be confirmed.


Name

The bomb was officially known as "product 602" () or "AN602", and codenamed "Ivan". The usage of different names can be a source of confusion. The Tsar Bomba, being a modification of the RN202, is sometimes mistakenly labelled as RDS-37, RDS-202 or PH202 (product 202). Unofficially, the bomb would later become known as "Tsar Bomba" and " Kuzka's mother" (, ). The name Tsar Bomba (loosely translated as ''Emperor of Bombs'') comes from an allusion to two other Russian historical artifacts, the
Tsar Cannon The Tsar Cannon (russian: Царь-пушка, ''Tsar'-pushka'') is a large early modern period artillery piece (known as a ''bombarda'' in Russian) on display on the grounds of the Moscow Kremlin. It is a monument of Russian artillery casting ar ...
and the
Tsar Bell The Tsar Bell (russian: Царь–колокол; ), also known as the Tsarsky Kolokol, Tsar Kolokol III, or Royal Bell, is a , bell on display on the grounds of the Moscow Kremlin. The bell was commissioned by Empress Anna Ivanovna, niece o ...
, both of which were created as showpieces but whose large size made them impractical for actual use. The name "Tsar Bomba" does not seem to have been used for the weapon prior to the 1990s. The name "Kuzka's Mother" was inspired by the statement of Khrushchev to then US Vice President
Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...
: "We have funds at our disposal that will have dire consequences for you. We will show you Kuzka's mother!" The
Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
(CIA) designated the test as "JOE 111", using their "JOE" counting scheme begun with
RDS-1 The RDS-1 (russian: РДС-1), also known as Izdeliye 501 (device 501) and First Lightning (), was the nuclear bomb used in the Soviet Union's first nuclear weapon test. The United States assigned it the code-name Joe-1, in reference to Joseph ...
in 1949.


Development

The development of a super-powerful bomb began in 1956 and was carried out in two stages. At the first stage, from 1956 to 1958, it was "product 202", which was developed in the recently-created NII-1011. The modern name of NII-1011 is the "Russian Federal Nuclear Center or the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Technical Physics" (RFNC-VNIITF). According to the official history of the institute, the order on the creation of a research institute in the system of the
Ministry of Medium Machine Building The Ministry of Medium Machine-Building Industry of the USSR (russian: Министерство среднего машиностроения СССР - Минсредмаш СССР, МСМ СССР) was the government ministry of the Soviet Unio ...
was signed on April 5, 1955; work at the NII-1011 began a little later. At the second stage of development, from 1960 to a successful test in 1961, the bomb was called "item 602" and was developed at
KB-11 The All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Experimental Physics (VNIIEF) (russian: Всероссийский научно-исследовательский институт экспериментальной физики) is a research inst ...
(VNIIEF), V. B. Adamsky was developing, and besides him, the physical scheme was developed by
Andrei Sakharov Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov ( rus, Андрей Дмитриевич Сахаров, p=ɐnˈdrʲej ˈdmʲitrʲɪjevʲɪtɕ ˈsaxərəf; 21 May 192114 December 1989) was a Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident, nobel laureate and activist for n ...
, Yu. N. Babaev, Yu. N. Smirnov, Yu. A. Trutnev.


Product 202

After the successful test of the
RDS-37 RDS-37 was the Soviet Union's first two-stage hydrogen bomb, first tested on 22 November 1955. The weapon had a nominal yield of approximately 3 megatons. It was scaled down to 1.6 megatons for the live test. Leading to the RDS-37 The RDS-3 ...
, KB-11 employees (Sakharov, Zeldovich, and Dovidenko) performed a preliminary calculation and, on February 2, 1956, they handed over to N. I. Pavlov, a note with the parameters for charges of and the possibility of increasing the power to . After the creation in 1955 of the second nuclear center – NII-1011, in 1956, by a resolution of the Council of Ministers, the center was assigned the task of developing an ultra-high-power charge, which was called "Project 202". On March 12, 1956, a draft Joint Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU Central Committee) and the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union on the preparation and testing of the 202 product was adopted. The project planned to develop a version of the RDS-37 with a capacity of . RDS-202 was designed with a maximum calculated power release of , with a diameter of , a length of , weighing with a parachute system and structurally coordinated with the
Tu-95 The Tupolev Tu-95 (russian: Туполев Ту-95; NATO reporting name: "Bear") is a large, four-engine turboprop-powered strategic bomber and missile platform. First flown in 1952, the Tu-95 entered service with the Long-Range Aviation of t ...
-202 carrier aircraft specially converted for its use. On June 6, 1956, the NII-1011 report described the RDS-202 thermonuclear device with a design power of up to with the required task of . In reality, this device was developed with an estimated power of , after testing the products "40GN", "245" and "205" its tests were deemed inappropriate and canceled. The Tsar Bomba differs from its parent design – the RN202 – in several places. The Tsar Bomba was a three-stage bomb with a Trutnev-Babaev second- and third-stage design, with a yield of 50 Mt.The yield of the test has been estimated at by different sources over time. Today all Russian sources use 50 Mt as the official figure. See the section "Was it 50 Megatons or 57?" at This is equivalent to about 1,570 times the combined energy of the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 10 times the combined energy of all the conventional explosives used in
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, one quarter of the estimated yield of the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, and 10% of the combined yield of all other nuclear tests to date. A three-stage hydrogen bomb uses a
fission bomb A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb ...
primary to compress a thermonuclear secondary, as in most hydrogen bombs, and then uses energy from the resulting explosion to compress a much larger additional thermonuclear stage. There is evidence that the Tsar Bomba had several third stages rather than a single very large one. RDS-202 was assembled on the principle of radiation implosion, which was previously tested during the creation of RDS-37. Since it used a much-heavier secondary module than in the RDS-37, not one, but two primary modules (charges), located on two opposite sides of the secondary module, were used to compress it. This physical charging scheme was later used in the design of the AN-602, but the AN-602 thermonuclear charge itself (secondary module) was new. The RDS-202 thermonuclear charge was manufactured in 1956, and was planned for testing in 1957, but was not tested and put into storage. Two years after the manufacture of the RDS-202, in July 1958, it was decided to remove it from storage, dismantle and use automation units and charge parts for experimental work (Order No. 277 of the Ministry of Medium Machine Building dated May 23, 1957). The CPSU Central Committee and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a draft Joint Resolution on 12 March, 1956, on the preparation and testing of ''izdeliye 202'', which read:


Product 602

In 1960, KB-11 began developing a thermonuclear device with a design capacity of . In February 1961, the leaders of KB-11 sent a letter to the Central Committee of the CPSU with the subject line "Some questions of the development of nuclear weapons and methods of their use", which, among other things, raised the question of the expediency of developing such a 100 Mt device. On July 10, 1961, a discussion took place in the Central Committee of the CPSU, at which First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev supported the development and testing of this super-powerful bomb. To speed up the work on Tsar Bomba, it was based on the 202 Project, but was a new project, developed by a different group. In particular, in KB-11, six casings for the Project 202 bomb already manufactured at NII-1011 and a set of equipment developed for the 202 Project testing were used. Tsar Bomba had a "three-stage" design: the first stage is the necessary fission trigger. The second stage was two relatively small thermonuclear charges with a calculated contribution to the explosion of , which were used for radiation implosion of the third stage, the main thermonuclear module located between them, and starting a thermonuclear reaction in it, contributing 50 Mt of explosion energy. As a result of the thermonuclear reaction, huge numbers of high-energy fast neutrons were formed in the main thermonuclear module, which, in turn, initiated the fast fission nuclear reaction in the nuclei of the surrounding
uranium-238 Uranium-238 (238U or U-238) is the most common isotope of uranium found in nature, with a relative abundance of 99%. Unlike uranium-235, it is non-fissile, which means it cannot sustain a chain reaction in a thermal-neutron reactor. However, it ...
, which would have added another 50 Mt of energy to the explosion, so that the estimated energy release of Tsar Bomba was around 100 Mt. The test of such a complete three-stage 100 Mt bomb was rejected due to the extremely high level of radioactive contamination that would be caused by the fission reaction of large quantities of uranium-238 fission. During the test, the bomb was used in a two-stage version. A. D. Sakharov suggested using nuclear passive material instead of the uranium-238 in the secondary bomb module, which reduced the bomb's energy to 50 Mt, and, in addition to reducing the amount of radioactive fission products, avoided the fireball's contact with the Earth's surface, thus eliminating radioactive contamination of the soil and the distribution of large amounts of fallout into the atmosphere. Many technical innovations were applied in the design of Tsar Bomba. The thermonuclear charge was made according to the "bifilar" scheme – the radiation implosion of the main thermonuclear stage was carried out from two opposite sides. These secondary charges produced X-ray compression of the main thermonuclear charge. For this, the second stage was separated into two fusion charges which were placed in the front and rear parts of the bomb, for which a synchronous detonation was required with a difference in initiation of no more than 100 nanoseconds. To ensure synchronous detonation of charges with the required accuracy, the sequencing unit of the detonation electronics was modified at KB-25 (now "Federal State Unitary Enterprise "NL Dukhov All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Automation")(VNIIA).


Development of the carrier aircraft

The initial three-stage design of Tsar Bomba was capable of yielding approximately 100 Mt through fast fission (3,000 times the power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs); however, it was thought that this would have resulted in too much
nuclear fallout Nuclear fallout is the residual radioactive material propelled into the upper atmosphere following a nuclear blast, so called because it "falls out" of the sky after the explosion and the shock wave has passed. It commonly refers to the radioac ...
, and the aircraft delivering the bomb would not have had enough time to escape the explosion. To limit the amount of fallout, the third stage and possibly the second stage had a
lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...
tamper instead of a uranium-238 fusion tamper (which greatly amplifies the fusion reaction by fissioning uranium atoms with fast neutrons from the fusion reaction). This eliminated
fast fission Fast fission is fission that occurs when a heavy atom absorbs a high-energy neutron, called a fast neutron, and splits. Most fissionable materials need thermal neutrons, which move more slowly. Fast reactors vs. thermal reactors Fast neutron re ...
by the fusion-stage neutrons so that approximately 97% of the total yield resulted from
thermonuclear fusion Thermonuclear fusion is the process of atomic nuclei combining or “fusing” using high temperatures to drive them close enough together for this to become possible. There are two forms of thermonuclear fusion: ''uncontrolled'', in which the re ...
alone (as such, it was one of the "cleanest" nuclear bombs ever created, generating a very low amount of fallout relative to its yield). There was a strong incentive for this modification, since most of the fallout from a test of the bomb would probably have descended on populated Soviet territory. The first studies on "Topic 242" began immediately after
Igor Kurchatov Igor Vasil'evich Kurchatov (russian: Игорь Васильевич Курчатов; 12 January 1903 – 7 February 1960), was a Soviet physicist who played a central role in organizing and directing the former Soviet program of nuclear weapo ...
talked with
Andrei Tupolev Andrei Nikolayevich Tupolev (russian: Андрей Николаевич Туполев; – 23 December 1972) was a Russian and later Soviet aeronautical engineer known for his pioneering aircraft designs as Director of the Tupolev Design ...
(then held in late 1954). Tupolev appointed his deputy for weapon systems, Aleksandr Nadashkevich, as the head of the Topic. Subsequent analysis indicated that to carry such a heavy, concentrated load, the Tu-95 bomber carrying the Tsar Bomba needed to have its engines, bomb bay, suspension and release mechanisms extensively redesigned. The Tsar Bomba's dimensional and weight drawings were passed in the first half of 1955, together with its placement layout drawing. The Tsar Bomba's weight accounted for 15% of the weight of its Tu-95 carrier as expected. The carrier, aside from having its fuel tanks and bomb bay doors removed, had its BD-206 bomb-holder replaced by a new, heavier beam-type BD7-95-242 (or BD-242) holder attached directly to the longitudinal weight-bearing beams. The problem of how to release the bomb was also solved; the bomb-holder would release all three of its locks in a synchronous fashion via electro-automatic mechanisms as required by safety protocols. A Joint Resolution of the CPSU Central Committee and the Council of Ministers (Nr. 357-28ss) was issued on 17 March, 1956, which mandated that OKB-156 begin conversion of a Tu-95 bomber into a high-yield nuclear bomb carrier. These works were carried out in the
Gromov Flight Research Institute The Gromov Flight Research Institute or GFRI for short (russian: link=no, Лётно-исследовательский институт имени М. М. Громова, russian: link=no, ЛИИ) is an important Russian State Researc ...
from May to September 1956. The converted bomber, designated the Tu-95V, was accepted for duty and was handed over for flight tests which, including a release of a mock-up "superbomb", were conducted under the command of Colonel S. M. Kulikov until 1959, and passed without major issues. Despite the creation of the Tu-95V bomb-carrier aircraft, the test of the Tsar Bomba was postponed for political reasons: namely, Khrushchev's visit to the United States and a pause in the Cold War. The Tu-95V during this period was flown to
Uzyn Uzyn () is a city in Bila Tserkva Raion of Kyiv Oblast (province) of northern Ukraine. It hosts the administration of Uzyn urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. The city and covers an area of . Population: . The largest industrial or ...
, in today's Ukraine, and was used as a training aircraft; therefore, it was no longer listed as a combat aircraft. With the beginning of a new round of the Cold War in 1961, the test was resumed. The Tu-95V had all connectors in its automatic release mechanism replaced, the bomb bay doors removed and the aircraft itself covered with a special, reflective white paint. In late 1961, the aircraft was modified for testing Tsar Bomba at the Kuibyshev aircraft plant.


Test

Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
, the first secretary of the Communist Party, announced the upcoming tests of a 50-Mt bomb in his opening report at the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on October 17, 1961. Before the official announcement, in a casual conversation, he told an American politician about the bomb, and this information was published on September 8, 1961, in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''. The Tsar Bomba was tested on October 30, 1961. The Tupolev Tu-95V aircraft, No. 5800302, with the bomb took off from the Olenya airfield, and was flown to State Test Site No. 6 of the USSR Ministry of Defense located on Novaya ZemlyaБоголепов и Гостев, 08:57 with a crew of nine: * Test pilot – Major Andrei Yegorovich Durnovtsev * Lead navigator of tests – Major Ivan Nikiforovich Kleshch * Second pilot – Captain Mikhail Konstantinovich Kondratenko * Navigator-operator of the radar – Lieutenant Anatoly Sergeevich Bobikov * Radar operator – Captain Alexander Filippovich Prokopenko * Flight engineer – Captain Grigory Mikhailovich Yevtushenko * Radio operator – Lieutenant Mikhail Petrovich Mashkin * Gunner-radio operator – Captain Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Snetkov * Gunner-radio operator – Corporal Vasily Yakovlevich Bolotov The test was also attended by the
Tupolev Tu-16 The Tupolev Tu-16 ( NATO reporting name: Badger) is a twin-engined jet strategic heavy bomber used by the Soviet Union. It has been flown for almost 70 years, and the Chinese license-built Xian H-6 remains in service with the People's Liberatio ...
laboratory aircraft, no. 3709, equipped for monitoring the tests, and its crew: * Leading test pilot – Lieutenant Colonel Vladimir Fyodorovich Martynenko * Second pilot – Senior Lieutenant Vladimir Ivanovich Mukhanov * Leading navigator – Major Semyon Artemievich Grigoryuk * Navigator-operator of the radar – Major Vasily Timofeevich Muzlanov * Gunner-radio operator – Senior Sergeant Mikhail Emelyanovich Shumilov Both aircraft were painted with special reflective paint to minimize heat damage. Despite this effort, Durnovtsev, and his crew, were given only a 50% chance of surviving the test. The bomb, weighing , was so large ( long by in diameter) that the Tu-95V had to have its
bomb bay The bomb bay or weapons bay on some military aircraft is a compartment to carry bombs, usually in the aircraft's fuselage, with "bomb bay doors" which open at the bottom. The bomb bay doors are opened and the bombs are dropped when over t ...
doors and fuselage
fuel tank A fuel tank (also called a petrol tank or gas tank) is a safe container for flammable fluids. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propelle ...
s removed. The bomb was attached to an ,
parachute A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, who ...
, which gave the release and observer planes time to fly about away from
ground zero In relation to nuclear explosions and other large bombs, ground zero (also called surface zero) is the point on the Earth's surface closest to a detonation. In the case of an explosion above the ground, ''ground zero'' is the point on the groun ...
, giving them a 50 percent chance of survival. The bomb was released two hours after takeoff from a height of on a test target within
Sukhoy Nos Sukhoy Nos (russian: Сухой Нос, literally 'Dry Cape'; there is another Sukhoy Nos on Vaygach island south of Novaya Zemlya) is a cape on Severny Island, the northern island of the archipelago Novaya Zemlya, projecting westward into the ...
. The Tsar Bomba detonated at 11:32 (or 11:33)
Moscow Time Moscow Time (MSK, russian: моско́вское вре́мя) is the time zone for the city of Moscow, Russia, and most of western Russia, including Saint Petersburg. It is the second-westernmost of the eleven time zones of Russia. It has b ...
on October 30, 1961, over the
Mityushikha Bay Mityushikha Bay (russian: Губа Митюшиха) is a bay on Severny Island in Novaya Zemlya, Russia. Nuclear tests were conducted in 1961 in the area of the bay. Geography It is a long fjord open to the west near the SW end of the island, ...
nuclear testing range (Sukhoy Nos Zone C), at a height of
ASL American Sign Language (ASL) is a natural language that serves as the predominant sign language of Deaf communities in the United States of America and most of Anglophone Canada. ASL is a complete and organized visual language that is express ...
( above the target) (some sources suggest ASL and above target, or ). By this time the Tu-95V had already escaped to away, and the Tu-16 away. When detonation occurred, the
shock wave In physics, a shock wave (also spelled shockwave), or shock, is a type of propagating disturbance that moves faster than the local speed of sound in the medium. Like an ordinary wave, a shock wave carries energy and can propagate through a me ...
caught up with the Tu-95V at a distance of and the Tu-16 at . The Tu-95V dropped in the air because of the shock wave but was able to recover and land safely. According to initial data, the Tsar Bomba had a nuclear yield of (significantly exceeding what the design itself would suggest) and was overestimated at values all the way up to . Although simplistic fireball calculations predicted it would be large enough to hit the ground, the bomb's own shock wave bounced back and prevented this. The fireball reached nearly as high as the altitude of the release plane and was visible at almost away. The
mushroom cloud A mushroom cloud is a distinctive mushroom-shaped flammagenitus cloud of debris, smoke and usually condensed water vapor resulting from a large explosion. The effect is most commonly associated with a nuclear explosion, but any sufficiently ener ...
was about high (nearly eight times the height of
Mount Everest Mount Everest (; Tibetan: ''Chomolungma'' ; ) is Earth's highest mountain above sea level, located in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas. The China–Nepal border runs across its summit point. Its elevation (snow heig ...
), which meant that the cloud was above the stratosphere and well inside the mesosphere when it peaked. The cap of the mushroom cloud had a peak width of and its base was wide. A Soviet cameraman said:
The clouds beneath the aircraft and in the distance were lit up by the powerful flash. The sea of light spread under the hatch and even clouds began to glow and became transparent. At that moment, our aircraft emerged from between two cloud layers and down below in the gap a huge bright orange ball was emerging. The ball was powerful and arrogant like Jupiter. Slowly and silently it crept upwards ... Having broken through the thick layer of clouds it kept growing. It seemed to suck the whole Earth into it. The spectacle was fantastic, unreal, supernatural."


Test results

The explosion of Tsar Bomba, according to the classification of
nuclear explosion A nuclear explosion is an explosion that occurs as a result of the rapid release of energy from a high-speed nuclear reaction. The driving reaction may be nuclear fission or nuclear fusion or a multi-stage cascading combination of the two, tho ...
s, was an ultra-high-power low-air nuclear explosion. * The flare was visible at a distance of more than . It was observed in Norway, Greenland and Alaska. * The explosion's nuclear mushroom rose to a height of . The shape of the "hat" was two-tiered; the diameter of the upper tier was estimated at , the lower tier at . The cloud was observed from the explosion site. * The blast wave circled the globe three times, with the first one taking 36 hours and 27 minutes. * A seismic wave in the earth's crust, generated by the shock wave of the explosion, circled the globe three times. * The atmospheric pressure wave resulting from the explosion was recorded three times in
New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
: the station in
Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
recorded an increase in pressure at 21:57, on October 30, coming from the north-west, at 07:17 on October 31, from the southeast, and at 09:16, on November 1, from the northwest (all GMT time), with amplitudes of , , and . Respectively, the average wave speed is estimated at , or 9.9 degrees of the
great circle In mathematics, a great circle or orthodrome is the circular intersection of a sphere and a plane passing through the sphere's center point. Any arc of a great circle is a geodesic of the sphere, so that great circles in spherical geomet ...
per hour. * Glass shattered in windows from the explosion in a village on
Dikson Island Dikson Island (russian: Ди́ксон), initially Dickson, is the name of an island in Taymyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District (russian: Таймы́рский Долга́но-Не́нецкий райо́н), Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, situated in ...
. * The sound wave generated by the explosion reached Dikson Island, but there are no reports of destruction or damage to structures even in the
urban-type settlement Urban-type settlementrussian: посёлок городско́го ти́па, translit=posyolok gorodskogo tipa, abbreviated: russian: п.г.т., translit=p.g.t.; ua, селище міського типу, translit=selyshche mis'koho typu, ab ...
of
Amderma Amderma (russian: Амдерма, lit. ''a walrus rookery'' in Nenets) is a rural locality (a settlement) in Zapolyarny District of Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Russia, located on the coast of Kara Sea, near the Vaygach Island, from Naryan-Mar, t ...
, which is much closer () to the landfall. * Ionization of the atmosphere caused interference to radio communications even hundreds of kilometers from the test site for about 40 minutes. * Radioactive contamination of the experimental field with a radius of in the epicenter area was no more than 1
milliroentgen The roentgen or röntgen (; symbol R) is a legacy unit of measurement for the radiation exposure, exposure of X-rays and gamma rays, and is defined as the electric charge freed by such radiation in a specified volume of air divided by the mass of ...
/ hour. The testers appeared at the explosion site 2 hours later; radioactive contamination posed practically no danger to the test participants. All buildings in the village of Severny, both wooden and brick, located from ground zero within the Sukhoy Nos test range, were destroyed. In districts hundreds of kilometres from ground zero, wooden houses were destroyed; stone ones lost their roofs, windows, and doors; and radio communications were interrupted for almost one hour. One participant in the test saw a bright flash through dark goggles and felt the effects of a thermal pulse even at a distance of . The heat from the explosion could have caused
third-degree burns A burn is an injury to skin, or other tissues, caused by heat, cold, electricity, chemicals, friction, or ultraviolet radiation (like sunburn). Most burns are due to heat from hot liquids (called scalding), solids, or fire. Burns occur mainl ...
away from ground zero. A shock wave was observed in the air at Dikson settlement away; windowpanes were partially broken for distances up to .
Atmospheric focusing Atmospheric focusing is a type of wave interaction causing shock waves to affect areas at a greater distance than otherwise expected. Variations in the atmosphere create distortions in the wavefront by refracting a segment, allowing it to converge ...
caused blast damage at even greater distances, breaking windows in Norway and Finland. Despite being detonated above ground, its seismic body wave magnitude was estimated at 5.0–5.25.


Reactions

Immediately after the test, several US Senators condemned the Soviet Union.
Prime Minister of Sweden The prime minister ( sv, statsminister ; literally translating to "Minister of State") is the head of government of Sweden. The prime minister and their cabinet (the government) exercise executive authority in the Kingdom of Sweden and are su ...
Tage Erlander Tage Fritjof Erlander (; 13 June 1901 – 21 June 1985) was a Swedish politician who served as Prime Minister of Sweden from 1946 to 1969. He was the leader of the Swedish Social Democratic Party and led the government for an uninterrupted tenu ...
saw the blast as the Soviets' answer to a personal appeal to halt nuclear testing that he had sent the Soviet leader in the week prior to the blast. The
British Foreign Office The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) is a department of the Government of the United Kingdom. Equivalent to other countries' ministries of foreign affairs, it was created on 2 September 2020 through the merger of the Foreign ...
,
Prime Minister of Norway The prime minister of Norway ( no, statsminister, which directly translates to "minister of state") is the head of government and chief executive of Norway. The prime minister and Cabinet (consisting of all the most senior government department ...
Einar Gerhardsen Einar Henry Gerhardsen (; 10 May 1897 – 19 September 1987) was a Norwegian politician from the Labour Party of Norway. He was the 22nd prime minister of Norway for three periods, 1945–1951, 1955–1963 and 1963–1965. With totally 17 years in ...
,
Prime Minister of Denmark The prime minister of Denmark ( da, Danmarks statsminister, fo, Forsætisráðharri, kl, Ministeriuneq) is the head of government in the Kingdom of Denmark comprising the three constituent countries: Denmark, Greenland and the Faroe Island ...
Viggo Kampmann Olfert Viggo Fischer Kampmann (; 21 July 1910 – 3 June 1976) was a Danish politician who served as the leader of the Danish Social Democrats and Prime Minister of Denmark from 1960 to 1962. He formed his first cabinet just prior to the 1960 el ...
and others also released statements condemning the blast. Soviet and Chinese radio stations mentioned the US
underground nuclear test Underground nuclear testing is the Nuclear weapons testing, test detonation of nuclear weapons that is performed underground. When the device being tested is buried at sufficient depth, the nuclear explosion may be contained, with no release of ...
of a much smaller bomb (possibly the ''Mink'' test) carried out the day prior, without mentioning the Tsar Bomba test.


Consequences of the test

The creation and testing of a superbomb were of great political importance; the Soviet Union demonstrated its potential in creating a nuclear arsenal of great power (at that time, the most powerful thermonuclear charge tested by the United States was 15 Mt (
Castle Bravo Castle Bravo was the first in a series of high-yield thermonuclear weapon design tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands, as part of '' Operation Castle''. Detonated on March 1, 1954, the device was the most powerful ...
)). After the Tsar Bomba test, the United States did not increase the power of its own thermonuclear tests and, in 1963 in Moscow, the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, Outer Space and Under Water was signed. The scientific result of the test was the experimental verification of the principles of calculation and design of multistage thermonuclear charges. It was experimentally proven that there is no fundamental limitation on increasing the power of a thermonuclear charge. However, as early as October 30, 1949, three years before the
Ivy Mike Ivy Mike was the codename given to the first full-scale test of a thermonuclear device, in which part of the explosive yield comes from nuclear fusion. Ivy Mike was detonated on November 1, 1952, by the United States on the island of Elugelab ...
test which utilized the
Teller-Ulam A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a low ...
design, in the Supplement to the official report of the General Advisory Committee of the
US Atomic Energy Commission The United States Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) was an agency of the United States government established after World War II by U.S. Congress to foster and control the peacetime development of atomic science and technology. President H ...
, nuclear physicists
Enrico Fermi Enrico Fermi (; 29 September 1901 – 28 November 1954) was an Italian (later naturalized American) physicist and the creator of the world's first nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1. He has been called the "architect of the nuclear age" and ...
and
Isidor Isaac Rabi Isidor Isaac Rabi (; born Israel Isaac Rabi, July 29, 1898 – January 11, 1988) was an American physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944 for his discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance, which is used in magnetic resonance ima ...
observed that thermonuclear weapons have "unlimited destructive power". In the tested specimen of the bomb, to raise the explosion power by another 50 Mt, it was enough to replace the lead sheath with uranium-238, as was normally expected. The replacement of the cladding material and the decrease in the explosion power were motivated by the desire to reduce the amount of radioactive fallout to an acceptable level, and not by the desire to reduce the weight of the bomb, as is sometimes believed. The weight of Tsar Bomba did decrease from this, but insignificantly. The uranium cladding was supposed to weigh about , the lead sheath of the same volume – based on the lower density of lead – is about . The resulting relief of just over one ton is weakly noticeable with a total mass of Tsar Bomba of at least 24 tons and did not affect the state of affairs with its transportation. The explosion is one of the cleanest in the history of atmospheric nuclear tests per unit of power. The first stage of the bomb was a uranium charge with a capacity of 1.5 Mt, which in itself provided a large amount of radioactive fallout; nevertheless, it can be assumed that Tsar Bomba was really relatively clean – more than 97% of the explosion power was provided by a thermonuclear fusion reaction, which practically does not create radioactive contamination. A distant consequence was the increased radioactivity accumulated in the glaciers of Novaya Zemlya. According to the 2015 expedition, due to nuclear tests, the glaciers of Novaya Zemlya are 65–130 times more radioactive than the background in neighboring areas, including contamination from the tests of the Kuzka's Mother.
Sakharov Sakharov (feminine: Sakharova) (russian: Сахаров, Сахарова) is a Russian surname, derived from the word ''"сахар"'' (sugar). Other spellings of the surname are Saharov / Saharova, Sakharoff , Saharoff. The surname may refer to: ...
was against nuclear proliferation, and played a key role in signing the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty. Sakharov became an advocate of civil liberties and reforms in the Soviet Union. These efforts earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975.


Analysis

The Tsar Bomba is the single most physically powerful device ever deployed on Earth, the most powerful nuclear bomb tested and the largest man-made explosion in history. For comparison, the largest weapon ever produced by the US, the now-decommissioned B41, had a predicted maximum yield of . The largest nuclear device ever tested by the US (
Castle Bravo Castle Bravo was the first in a series of high-yield thermonuclear weapon design tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands, as part of '' Operation Castle''. Detonated on March 1, 1954, the device was the most powerful ...
) yielded because of an unexpectedly-high involvement of
lithium-7 Naturally occurring lithium (3Li) is composed of two stable isotopes, lithium-6 and lithium-7, with the latter being far more abundant on Earth. Both of the natural isotopes have an unexpectedly low nuclear binding energy per nucleon ( for lit ...
in the fusion reaction; the preliminary prediction for the yield was from . The largest weapons deployed by the Soviet Union were also around (e.g., the SS-18 Mod. 3
warhead A warhead is the forward section of a device that contains the explosive agent or toxic (biological, chemical, or nuclear) material that is delivered by a missile, rocket, torpedo, or bomb. Classification Types of warheads include: * Expl ...
). The weight and size of the Tsar Bomba limited the range and speed of the specially-modified bomber carrying it. Delivery by an
intercontinental ballistic missile An intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) is a ballistic missile with a range greater than , primarily designed for nuclear weapons delivery (delivering one or more thermonuclear warheads). Conventional, chemical, and biological weapons c ...
would have required a much stronger missile (the
Proton A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol , H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 ''e'' elementary charge. Its mass is slightly less than that of a neutron and 1,836 times the mass of an electron (the proton–electron mass ...
started its development as that delivery system). It has been estimated that detonating the original 100 Mt design would have released fallout amounting to about 26% of all fallout emitted since the invention of nuclear weapons. It was decided that a full 100 Mt detonation would create a nuclear fallout that was unacceptable in terms of pollution from a single test, as well as a near-certainty that the release plane and crew would be destroyed before it could escape the blast radius. The Tsar Bomba was the culmination of a series of high-yield
thermonuclear weapon A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a low ...
s designed by the Soviet Union and the United States during the 1950s (e.g., the Mark 17 and B41 nuclear bombs).


Practical applications

Tsar Bomba was never a practical weapon; it was a single product, the design of which allowed reaching a power of 100 Mt TE. The test of a 50-Mt bomb was, among other things, a test of the performance of the product design for 100 Mt. The bomb was intended exclusively to exert psychological pressure on the United States. Experts began to develop military
missiles In military terminology, a missile is a guided airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight usually by a jet engine or rocket motor. Missiles are thus also called guided missiles or guided rockets (when a previously unguided rocket i ...
for warheads (150 Mt and more) that have been redirected for space use: * UR-500 – (warhead mass – 40 tons, virtually implemented as a carrier rocket – "
Proton A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol , H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 ''e'' elementary charge. Its mass is slightly less than that of a neutron and 1,836 times the mass of an electron (the proton–electron mass ...
" – GRAU index – 8K82) *
N-1 N1, N.I, N-1, or N01 may refer to: Information technology * Nokia N1, an Android tablet * Nexus One, an Android phone made by HTC * Nylas N1, a desktop email client * Oppo N1, an Android phone * N1, a Sun Microsystems software brand now mostly ...
– (warhead mass – , the development was reoriented into a carrier for the lunar program, the project was brought to the stage of flight design tests and closed in 1976, GRAU index – 11A52) * R-56 – (GRAU index – 8K67)


Films

*Footage from a Soviet documentary about the bomb is featured in ''
Trinity and Beyond ''Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie'' is a 1995 American documentary film directed by Peter Kuran and narrated by William Shatner. Using restored archive footage, the film traces the development of nuclear weapons and their testing, from ...
: The Atomic Bomb Movie'' (Visual Concept Entertainment, 1995), where it is referred to as the ''Russian monster bomb''. The video states that the ''Tsar Bomba'' project broke the voluntary moratorium on nuclear tests. In fact, the Soviets restarted their tests and broke the unilateral voluntary moratorium 30 days before ''Tsar Bomba'', testing 45 times in that month. Since the moratorium was unilateral there was no multilateral legal obstacle. The US had declared their own one-year unilateral moratorium on nuclear tests and, as that year had expired, the US had already announced that it considered itself free to resume testing without further notice. Later, it was stated that the US had not resumed testing at the time of the ''Tsar Bomba'' test. That announcement was in error, as the US had in fact tested five times under
Operation Nougat Operation Nougat was a series of 44 nuclear tests conducted (with one exception) at the Nevada Test Site in 1961 and 1962, immediately after the Soviet Union abrogated a testing moratorium, with the US' ''Mink'' test shot taking place the day ...
between the USSR's ending of the moratorium on 1 October and the Tsar Bomba test on 30 October. *"World's Biggest Bomb", a 2011 episode of the
PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...
documentary series ''
Secrets of the Dead ''Secrets of the Dead'', produced by WNET 13 New York, is an ongoing PBS television series which began in 2000. The show generally follows an investigator or team of investigators exploring what modern science can tell us about some of the great ...
'' produced by Blink Films &
WNET WNET (channel 13), branded on-air as "Thirteen" (stylized as "THIRTEEN"), is a primary PBS member television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York City area. Owned by The WNET Group (formerly known as the ...
, chronicles the events leading to the detonations of
Castle Bravo Castle Bravo was the first in a series of high-yield thermonuclear weapon design tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands, as part of '' Operation Castle''. Detonated on March 1, 1954, the device was the most powerful ...
and the Tsar Bomba. *In connection with the celebration of 75 years of nuclear industry,
Rosatom Rosatom, ( rus, Росатом, p=rɐsˈatəm}) also known as Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation, the State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom or Rosatom State Corporation, is a Russian state corporation headquartered in Moscow that speciali ...
released a declassified documentary video of the Tsar Bomba test on
YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
in August 2020.


See also

*
Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
*
Castle Bravo Castle Bravo was the first in a series of high-yield thermonuclear weapon design tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands, as part of '' Operation Castle''. Detonated on March 1, 1954, the device was the most powerful ...
– largest US Test, and second largest detonation by MT *
Father of All Bombs Aviation Thermobaric Bomb of Increased Power (ATBIP; russian: Авиационная вакуумная бомба повышенной мощности, АВБПМ), nicknamed "Father of All Bombs" (FOAB; russian: "Папа всех бомб", ...
– largest Russian conventional bomb *
Soviet atomic bomb project The Soviet atomic bomb project was the classified research and development program that was authorized by Joseph Stalin in the Soviet Union to develop nuclear weapons during and after World War II. Although the Soviet scientific community disc ...
*
Doomsday device A doomsday device is a hypothetical construction — usually a weapon or weapons system — which could destroy all life on a planet, particularly Earth, or destroy the planet itself, bringing " doomsday", a term used for the end of planet Earth ...


References


External links

* * * {{Portal bar, Nuclear technology, Soviet Union 1961 in military history 1961 in science 1961 in the Soviet Union Explosions in 1961 Cold War weapons of the Soviet Union Novaya Zemlya Nuclear bombs of the Soviet Union Russian inventions Soviet inventions Soviet nuclear weapons testing October 1961 events