Broken Arrow...

canucklehead said:
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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Let me rephrase my concerns, one whatever "container" the thing is in ends up being broken/rotten away, the Plutonium would then be exposed to sea water, and would begin to dissolve and be scattered by it. Plutonium is one of the most poisonous substances known to man, it doesn't take much to kill everything around. This has the potential of killing every living thing within a significant area around the device, and thanks to Plutonium's long half-life has the potential to keep the contaminated area inhospitable to life for thousands of years ...:eek:
 
Some Rangers I know who were up there inspecting it said they highly doubt there was any use of explosives to blow anything in place. There was ammo and other explosive stores left there (at the time) plus much of the debris field left as is. Normally the procedure for a highly classified aircraft like a nuke dropper would be to destroy or recover any classified equipment.

edit: after finally seeing the pics it does look to me that dmls were used for the destruction of the engines etc. My guess is snow was too deep even during the 97 visit to find everything. The recent visitor saw more ammo etc than is in the pics.

Long story short they did not believe there was much recovery or destruction done by the Americans in the 50's and it had sat relatively untouched since the crash.

I would love to visit it.
 
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RobSmith said:
Let me rephrase my concerns, one whatever "container" the thing is in ends up being broken/rotten away, the Plutonium would then be exposed to sea water, and would begin to dissolve and be scattered by it. Plutonium is one of the most poisonous substances known to man, it doesn't take much to kill everything around. This has the potential of killing every living thing within a significant area around the device, and thanks to Plutonium's long half-life has the potential to keep the contaminated area inhospitable to life for thousands of years ...:eek:
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I would say that's an extreme scenario. Granted, I haven't researched the issue in depth, but if the potential reality is THAT extreme, I'm sure some along the way has studied the issue in greater detail and determined it's a very unlikely situation.

Maybe we'll both never know for sure. :eek:
 
canucklehead said:
Maybe we'll both never know for sure. :eek:
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That's one thing I'd rather not know about .... I'm going off theorizing from a recent documentary I saw about a sunk WW2 German sub that was carrying canisters of mercury ... the canisters eventually leaked and now the amount of mercury on the seabed is well over the lethal dose around the sub's wreck ...
 
Gibbs505 said:
"Near" is a relative term up here!!:D :D
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Near = Someone who knows the area, and someone who is within 3-4 hours driving distance. :p

I just might go visit that crash site just for fun, always wanted to see the Rocky Mountains anyways. :dancingbanana:

Dimitri
 
Dimitri said:
Near = Someone who knows the area, and someone who is within 3-4 hours driving distance. :p

I just might go visit that crash site just for fun, always wanted to see the Rocky Mountains anyways. :dancingbanana:

Dimitri
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well, first of all, if you want to see the Rocky Mountains, take a good look driving through Jasper because they're nowhere near the crash site. :D The crash is in the northern Kispiox range which is on the eastern edge of the coast range. Its kind of hard to keep track of mountain ranges up here, they kind of run together. You would have to charter a helicopter and fly out of Smithers or Terrace or line up a guide and hike in. I don't know where you would start to hike in. North of Hazelton somewhere. The crash site is the definition of the word "isolated". The crash site is now a National Heritage Site so its hard to say what the rules are to visit there.
 
bdft said:
well, first of all, if you want to see the Rocky Mountains, take a good look driving through Jasper because they're nowhere near the crash site. :D The crash is in the northern Kispiox range which is on the eastern edge of the coast range. Its kind of hard to keep track of mountain ranges up here, they kind of run together. You would have to charter a helicopter and fly out of Smithers or Terrace or line up a guide and hike in. I don't know where you would start to hike in. North of Hazelton somewhere. The crash site is the definition of the word "isolated". The crash site is now a National Heritage Site so its hard to say what the rules are to visit there.
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Sorry I come from Ontario we only got hills so all of the mountains on the West Coast of Canada are the "Rocky Mountains" :)

I doubt anyone would care if I hiked in and took some pictures, Heritage Site or not its as you said isolated so I dont think they got someone there with a little booth to tell you what the rules are. :p

I think I need to get a better map of the area before deciding to hike though, water would be a problem and depending on the animals in that area a small game license might be good to carry more water and less food. :dancingbanana:

Dimitri
 
I read this story in 'Air Classics' magazine back in the 1990's I think it was anyways. From what they said, I seem to recall it was a MKV atomic bomb, basically one of the first standardized plutonium bombs. They dropped and fired the bomb without the initiator/core, which was supposedly stored in a safe near the flight deck. I think the wreck sat there for 3-4 years before it was finally located. This might be tinfoil hat time, but there was a hint that there were human remains buried at the site(???) which does not make sense, but that was the gist of the article.

From Wikipedia:

"A B-36 was also involved in two "Broken Arrow" incidents. On February 13, 1950, a B-36, serial number 44-92075, crashed in an unpopulated region of British Columbia, resulting in the first loss of an American nuclear weapon. On May 22, 1957, a B-36 accidentally dropped a Mark-17 hydrogen bomb on a deserted area while landing at Kirtland AFB in Albuquerque NM. Only the conventional trigger detonated, the bomb being unarmed. These incidents were classified for decades. See list of military nuclear accidents.[10][11]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-36B_44-92075
 
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RobSmith said:
Let me rephrase my concerns, one whatever "container" the thing is in ends up being broken/rotten away, the Plutonium would then be exposed to sea water, and would begin to dissolve and be scattered by it. Plutonium is one of the most poisonous substances known to man, it doesn't take much to kill everything around. This has the potential of killing every living thing within a significant area around the device, and thanks to Plutonium's long half-life has the potential to keep the contaminated area inhospitable to life for thousands of years ...:eek:
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That would make it easy to find then. :runaway:
 
RobSmith said:
Let me rephrase my concerns, one whatever "container" the thing is in ends up being broken/rotten away, the Plutonium would then be exposed to sea water, and would begin to dissolve and be scattered by it. Plutonium is one of the most poisonous substances known to man, it doesn't take much to kill everything around. This has the potential of killing every living thing within a significant area around the device, and thanks to Plutonium's long half-life has the potential to keep the contaminated area inhospitable to life for thousands of years ...:eek:
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so as long as I keep it dry in the basement its ok then :D


I've been to Smithers a few times and worked in the area back in the mid 90's

I saw the documentry a while back and suspect that whatever sensitive materials the US could no recover was destroyed in situ
 
woodchopper said:
I saw the documentry a while back and suspect that whatever sensitive materials the US could no recover was destroyed in situ
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The keyword is "that they could recover". The documentary speculates that the bomb would have been dropped in the Pacific ocean before the plane crashed. They even speculated that it may have been detonated but I don't believe that part, as every seismograph in the area would have recorded the event. So.... It's safe to assume that there may be a live nuke on the bottom of the ocean off the coast of BC. :runaway:
 
didnt you guys read the story? It says they watched the bomb hit the ground and blow up. It bomb had no atomic detonator in it when they let it go. it says there were several airmen that witnessed it go off! perhaps there are 2 different accounts for what happpened. Either way, pretty cool story.
 
Neat stuff.

Out here in the Cowichan Valley a WW2 plane went down back in the 40's, no nukes of course, but the crew didn't survive. :(
 
The bomb was detonated over the Pacific, and did NOT have its plutonium core installed. Standard practice was to use a dummy lead core. Despite what the conspiracy theorists like to say, the crew was pretty clear on what they did with the bomb, and that it was inert. As I recall, there was still some U238 in the bomb, and that would have been dispersed by the explosion. Still, not much different to DU ordnance going *bang*.
 
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