Russia Tests World's Largest Non-Nuclear Bomb

mahesh_gharat writes "Russia has tested the "Father of all bombs," a conventional air-delivered explosive that experts say can only be compared with a nuclear weapon in terms of its destructive power.The device is a fuel-air explosive, commonly known as a vacuum bomb, that spreads a high incendiary vapour cloud over a wide area and then ignites it, creating an ultra-sonic shock wave and searing fireball that destroys everything in its wake."

Comments

Just in time too

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Now that Putin's dissolved that pesky and meddlesome parliament, his plans for the Russian conquest can proceed apace.

First up: Ukraine! Ukraine is weak.

Re:Enough with the hyperbole

[chebucto]

If the Father of all Bombs is only 44t, it's dwarfed by the Halifax Explosion. Admittadly, the Halifax Explosion was an explosion of a munitions ship, not a single bomb, but it's far closer to a nuclear explosion than that firecracker the Russkies set off. If you trust Wikipedia, the explosion set off 2.9kt of explosives, and consisted of:

• 223,188 kilograms benzol
• 56,301 kilograms of nitrocellulose (guncotton)
• 1,602,519 kilograms of wet picric acid
• 544,311 kilograms of dry picric acid (highly explosive, and extremely sensitive to shock, heat and friction), and
• 226,797 kilograms of TNT

The Explosion leveled Halifax, and caused over 10,000 casualties.

Re:Who's your daddy?

[Harmonious Botch]

Yes, environmentally friendly in this case means no readiation. So they can come in and rebuild as soon as it cools. With a Russian economy that is growing at 7-8% per year, they are capable of big rebuilding projects, so this is a rather useful weapon.

Re:INVADE!

[religious freak]

Russia refers to their inanimate objects as masculine, the US feminine, and Germany as "it". It has always been such, for whatever reason.

quite possibly the cruelest weapon made

[SuperBanana]

preads a high incendiary vapour cloud over a wide area and then ignites it, creating an ultra-sonic shock wave and searing fireball that destroys everything in its wake.

Here's a slightly more accurate description of what it does....to people.

• People unlucky enough to be within the actual fuel-air mixture area are set on fire, both internally (lungs- they breathe in the fuel/air mixture) and externally (the infrared radiation immediately ignites their clothing, hair, and skin) while suffocating. That's pretty much the most painful way to die, hands down, that I can think of.
• Anyone within the shockwave and following vacuum is liable to either be thrown against other objects or be crushed by them, or structures that collapse. This is the greatest hope you have, as it is the quickest potential way to die.
• Anyone unfortunate enough to not be burned alive or crushed, will suffer from the pain of blown eardrums and collapsed or burst lungs, while simultaneously suffocating because all the air around them is devoid of oxygen; the fire consumed it. Oh, and everything around you that is flammable is burning whatever oxygen might be left.

They're indiscriminate and quite possibly the cruelest way of killing people save WW1-era chemical attacks.

The fact that the US and Russia are the only countries to use and develop them should speak volumes.

Re:Who's your daddy?

[WindBourne]

Actually, the russian came out and said that they did in fact have our plans. They were stolen in 75, and according to Russia, did play a part in building their shuttle. But as I pointed out, they made a number of intelligent choices, in particular the changes of the engine placement. I only wish that they had not killed off the energia.

A "vacuum bomb"?

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

The device is a fuel-air explosive, commonly known as a vacuum bomb...

Nah...that type of thing is more widely known as a fuel-air explosive. Even my old flight sims from the late 1980s called them that. (Even back then the common target was Iran...)

Re:Who's your daddy?

[The Bungi]

tu-160 was a bigger version of the B1-A

The Blackjack might look like the Lancer but it really is a completely different aircraft. Not only is it bigger, it's also heavier, faster and carries a lot more ordnance.

The Soviet Union designed the TU-160 as a counter weight to the US carrier groups. If WWIII had actually started, those birds were the only thing in their inventory that could effectively counter a Navy task force. In fact their entire strategy for a land war in Europe depended on them interdicting shipping from the US across the GIUK line. The bombers would attack the escort ships with massive conventional cruise missile swarms, or single nuclear ones.

Bears, Bisons, Backfires and Blackjacks. That's why the Aegis cruisers were designed, and that's why the F-14 Tomcat and the AIM-54 Phoenix were rushed into service.

Re:What a LOAD of shit.

[bentcd]

Strategic bombers did attack ships. The problem was they can't hit them! As far as I understand, this was an important part of the motivation behind the development of the Norden bomb sight at the time.