View Single Post
  #28  
Old January 7th 17, 07:24 AM posted to sci.space.history
Fred J. McCall[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 10,018
Default The Space Race was about Power Projection - Miles O'Brien

"Scott M. Kozel" wrote:

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 10:10:35 PM UTC-5, Fred J. McCall wrote:
"Scott M. Kozel" wrote:

Likewise nobody has ever tested a cobalt bomb. A cobalt bomb
would blow up one third of the world, so there is no place to
safely test one.


Don't be silly. The cobalt adds nothing to the explosion.


The way it was explained was that a large hydrogen bomb is encased
in a cobalt casing, and when it detonates a fission-fusion-fission
reaction takes place, and the explosion is so large that it would
blow up one third of the world.


Utter nonsense. Most modern bombs are fission-fusion-fission and use
HEU for the 'jacket'. Older designs used less fissionable NU or DU,
which made the bombs physically larger and heavier than modern
designs. Cobalt isn't normally fissionable so it adds nothing to the
force of an explosion if it is used for a 'jacket'. See how close
cobalt is to iron in the periodic table? No energy of fission
available there.


In the past war planners worked scenarios such as "which city will
we blow up", or "whose country will we blow up". With a cobalt bomb
the question would be "whose one third of the world will we blow up".


Utter nonsense.


Since there is no place to test a cobalt bomb safely, it is unproven
as to the outcome of detonating a cobalt bomb. But nobody would want
to try it.


A 'cobalt' bomb is a large RADIOLOGICAL bomb. What the cobalt does is
produce ****loads of really nasty and long lived fallout isotopes
(Co60). This then spread around huge chunks of countryside, making it
uninhabitable for very long times, since its half-life is measured in
years. It adds NOTHING to the force of the explosion.

Let me say it again, since you didn't get it the first time I said it.
A COBALT JACKET ADDS ***NOTHING*** TO THE EXPLOSIVE FORCE OF A
THERMONUCLEAR WEAPONS.


--
"Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the
truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong."
-- Thomas Jefferson