Broken Arrow...

Wasn't this the one with the 'supposed' lost nuke? The intended flight path was out to sea to dispose the nuke, but they won't say what the actual path was. There was evidence of the nuke's bird cage left over in the wreckage.
 
That's right, it was indeed carrying a nuke. There was latent radioactivity at the crash site if I remember correctly as well. The nuke was likely not only dropped just off the coast, but detonated too (detonated, not fired, ie. one of the charges set off to destroy the weapon, but not result in chain reaction.) They never mentioned the radiation hazard to us.
 
More Broken Arrows in Canada

This is only one of 3 Nuclear weapons droped by the US Military on Canadian soil or very near Canadian Waters according to the documentary I saw. They also droped one somewhere in Quebec, and one off of the B.C. -Washington coast. The one off of B.C. was just recovered in the last few years.
 
Even if the nuke on board was jettisonned, sounds to me like this is a disaster waiting to happen, all that radioactive material just rotting away on the bottom of the ocean is an ecological time bomb ....
 
Radioactive elements are naturally present in the world's oceans. I doubt that a nuclear weapon with a few kg's of fissile material is an 'ecological time bomb'. Its' radiation is decreasing by the day.
 
canucklehead said:
Radioactive elements are naturally present in the world's oceans. I doubt that a nuclear weapon with a few kg's of fissile material is an 'ecological time bomb'. Its' radiation is decreasing by the day.
Click to expand...

Yes, but the halflife of Plutonium is 24,000 years, decreasing by the day eh? And in 24,000 years, it still is emitting a lot of radiation, being half the initial amount, then in another 24,000 years it's emitting half of the half... if you get what I'm saying, and STILL a deadly amount of radiation. Plutonium remains dangerous radioactively for over 250,000 years.
 
I understand the definition of half-life, all I'm saying is that this thing is not emitting radiation for miles in all directions. It's likely encased in lead (or whatever would normally shield an aircrew from weapon radiation) and they are designed to hold together in the event of a crash.

Granted, I'm not a nuclear physicist, but the fact that a lost nuke could be in the ocean off the coast of BC doesn't make me lose any sleep. Hey, it's been there for fifty some years, and hasn't killed anyone yet! :)
 
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