US's Most Powerful Nuclear Bomb Being Dismantled

SpuriousLogic sends this excerpt from an AP report: "The last of the nation's most powerful nuclear bombs — a weapon hundreds of times stronger than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima — is being disassembled nearly half a century after it was put into service at the height of the Cold War. The final components of the B53 bomb will be broken down Tuesday at the Pantex Plant near Amarillo, the nation's only nuclear weapons assembly and disassembly facility. ... The weapon is considered dismantled when the roughly 300 pounds of high explosives inside are separated from the special nuclear material, known as the pit. The uranium pits from bombs dismantled at Pantex will be stored on an interim basis at the plant, Cunningham said. The material and components are then processed, which includes sanitizing, recycling and disposal, the National Nuclear Security Administration said last fall when it announced the Texas plant's role in the B53 dismantling."

Comments

Oops

[Tenek]

The final components will be accidentally dropped Tuesday at the Amarillo Crater...

Re:Oops

[Luckyo]

It's pretty unlikely to trigger a nuclear explosion considering the requirements to reach criticality in a bomb. In most cases, you'll have explosives go off by accident on such a bomb, they don't do enough compression to cause criticality and end up being essentially a dirty bomb scattering highly enriched uranium or plutonium around.

Which is what bunker is designed to protect against.

9 Megatons

[csshelton]

Since it wasn't included in the synopsis...

Rather unfair

[Lucas123]

They should have at least tried to sell it on eBay first to recoup some of those tax dolars -- pick up only, of course.

Re:Good

[Qzukk]

B61 Mod 11

Doesn't that make it the B6?