The Blind Spots In the Nuclear Test Monitoring System

Lasrick writes The International Monitoring System managed by the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization relies on detecting one or more of four distinct signatures from a nuclear explosion. Seismic detectors continuously listen for the shock waves passing through the earth from underground nuclear tests. Hydro-acoustic monitors listen for sound waves in the oceans from underwater tests. Infrasound detectors scan for pressure waves in the atmosphere. The fourth kind of signal involves radioactive gases generated by a nuclear explosion and released into the atmosphere. Ulrich Kuhn and Michael Schoeppner describe the system in detail, and point out that there are blind spots, particularly in the area of noble gas detection: "Our research has found that the noble gas detection part of the International Monitoring System is unlikely to work as it should because of the limited distribution of noble gas stations, neglect of important meteorological patterns in some areas, and the radionuclide background from emissions from the commercial production of medical isotopes." Kuhn and Schoeppner go on to describe possible fixes, and call on the 183 states that have signed the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and the CTBTO to provide the resources to build extra monitoring stations where they are required and to curb activities that might limit the global capability to monitor possible nuclear tests.

Comments

happy to comply!

[swell]

My country will be happy to comply. We will spend whatever it takes to assure the world that we are not a nuclear threat. We know that when we do *not* have nuclear ambitions, we will benefit from the generosity of the nuclear powers and prosper in the years to come.

Ha, ha! Look around--the only countries who get any attention / financial support are those who are at the brink of being nuclear threats. We will threaten the shit out of you until you meet our demands!

Re:happy to comply!

[iggymanz]

Blind spots don't matter; new nuclear powers want their stutus, prestige, saber-rattling ability. They'll be sure to let everyone know.

Re:happy to comply!

[PPH]

My country

The Duchy of Grand Fenwick?

Neutrino detectors

[PPH]

An array of these should be able to detect a pulse of neutrinos produced by nuclear bombs.

Re:Neutrino detectors

[Anonymous Coward]

Evidently the behavior of nuclear weapons is fairly well quantified neutrino wise - you get 1.3e23 MeV neutrinos per kiloton yield spread over 4pi steradians of a sphere.

The sub-GeV neutrino-nucleon cross section is about 1e-44m^2. At the Super-K neutrino detector presents a detection volume that contains roughly 3e31 nucleons, which means we need about 3 neutrinos to pass through a square .55 micrometers on a side to hit the cross section it presents to get 3 counts at once and sound the alarm.

The result is, "damn that miserably small cross section" because the result is that a ~10kt Little Tinpot's First Nuke would only register to Super-K if it were within 100km or so. I haven't run numbers for Icecube but it's not promising because range scales as the square root of detector size since neutrino flux dilutes as the square of distance but target count is only proportional to volume.

The moon

[BradMajors]

Another blind spot is the dark side of the moon.

http://security.blogs.cnn.com/...

The US launched a satellite to check if the Russian were doing nuclear weapons testing on the dark side of the moon.

Re:The moon

[Rei]

I assume you mean "far side", not "dark side". The moon is tidally locked to the Earth, not the sun.

Legalize testing.

[Anonymous Coward]

If there is anything we've leatned from the War on Drugs, we've learned that bans don't work.

All they do is support a criminal underclass which serves no purpose.

Thus the solution is to repeal the ban and allow everyone to decide in a free market manner what nuclear testing they want.

It's like vaccines and traffic rules. Do you really want the government deciding for you? Or for your children? If you want to send your child to the middle of a busy highway to test your home made fusion bomb, should some bureaucract force you to inject your child with a poison that could cause retardation just because of some third world germs?

Blind spot?

[SlayerofGods]

So if the other 3 detectors can detect the explosions under ground, under the sea, and in the atmosphere. Where exactly does that leave for a covert test that this gas sampling might miss?
Oh I see he thinks we need a world wide network of monitors to confirm what the other 3 sensors pick up. Gee if only there was some way to stick those gas detectors on something mobile.....
WC-135 Constant Phoenix

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

It's really hard to make tactical nuclear weapons. If it were a tac-nuke test on the smaller side, it'd have the results observed if it were a success. If that were true, then they are decades above where we think they are. So we now assert it was a dud or a hoax, which are both more comforting. When North Korea makes an "average" size nuke, the US is finished. There is nothing the US has that could even theoretically stop a ballistic nuke from NK fired east, aimed at, say, somewhere in Africa, that is detonated as it passes over the USA. The EMP of a low-orbit detonation should just about knock out all non-hardened electronics, and most power generation/distribution. And if NK wants to be sure nobody will mess with it, announce it as a moon probe before launch. Sure, everyone will notice it's not reaching stable orbit, but it'll be close enough we'll assume it's a failure, at least until it's too late.

One nuke would just about end the entire USA without a single direct fatality. Aimed properly, if it fails, nobody would ever be able to prove what's on it. If they had two, rather than one over Kansas, they could blow up two at the same time over Nevada and Kentucky, guaranteeing a 100% coverage of the 48 states. Chicago's blast would be a little weaker, but LA, NYC, and DC would have stronger blasts. Either way, the loss of power for weeks across most of the US would lead to rioting and looting that would leave the US in much worse condition than if the rest of the world combined attempted a ground invasion.

Re:Blind spot?

[gl4ss]

with that kind of population why would anyone need to invade if it would be in worse condition than a war would bring just from rioting due to loss of electricity?

puh plze what would be the benefit anyhow? and would these two unknown effect nukes somehow stop the retaliation?

what's stopping russians from doing it then? ...seriously, much worse condition than combined ground attack from rest of the world? what the fuck man, what the fuck. americans are not that kind of gods and hundred million+ troops would CERTAINLY cause much more havoc.

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

with that kind of population why would anyone need to invade if it would be in worse condition than a war would bring just from rioting due to loss of electricity?

You are allowed to use proper punctuation and such to allow others to parse your sentences (or whatever you call them).

puh plze what would be the benefit anyhow?

So, nobody out there would like to see the US burn? Really? Because the news tells us the opposite every day.

and would these two unknown effect nukes somehow stop the retaliation?

So, with domestic conditions deteriorating and more military personnel out of the US than in, rather than stabilizing the country, you think the first priority would be to retaliate? I am glad you aren't in charge of anything larger than picking which shoe goes on which foot every morning.

what's stopping russians from doing it then?

They are our allies, and have been since the late '80s. Before that, both were so worried about nuclear war. North Korea has nothing to fear from that. We can't nuke them without nuking South Korea and China.

seriously, much worse condition than combined ground attack from rest of the world? what the fuck man, what the fuck. americans are not that kind of gods and hundred million+ troops would CERTAINLY cause much more havoc.

The US military budget is roughly equal to the rest of the world combined, along with the most heavily armed civilian populations (yes, I except the places where the guns are essentially government issued as no longer being civilian).

And you do know that there's more than one gun per adult in the USA. When every civilian is armed, the invading army is limited to armored vehicles, making the invading force tanks and not much else. Last I saw it compared this way, LAPD was in the top 10 militaries in the world. So how would you expect Australia to invade LA, when LAPD outguns them, and the gangs outgun LAPD, and about the only thing that would get the two working together would be an invasion? The US is impervious to a land war because there's no other military force on the continent, and China (or anyone else) can't extend it's sphere of influence outside the South China Sea.

Whichever cities are chosen as the landing points would be devastated, but the damage would be very localized, and the cities would be quickly rebuilt after. The results of a power outage that's projected to last months would cause a panic that would cause much more damage.

Re:Blind spot?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are vastly overstating the effects an EMP would have.

By about a million-fold. Do some research on the subject that isn't two-bit apocalypse fan-fiction.

Yes, power distribution and some communications would be offline. Some of it would need replacement, some not. Most electronics would not notice, aside from the lack of power. At worst, your vehicle might stop if it was running and you'd have to restart it.

Even the Tzar Bomba the Soviets let off had only MINOR effects.

Re:Blind spot?

[Rei]

Not to mention that North Korea isn't anywhere close to a missile that could be aimed on a trajectory that could reach to Africa.

EMP would be very expensive, let's not downplay that. But it's hardly the end of the world. For power companies, it'll be as if a major storm took out hardware across a rather large area. For businesses and the public, it'll mean having to replace random non-surge-protected electronic devices (we're not talking "close enough to erase hard drives" or anything, the power grid is vulnerable to these high altitude pulses because the wires act like giant antennae)

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

I did some research. Perhaps it's all uninformed '50s era fearmongering that's still around, but a low-orbit EMP would have the strength and angle to burn out power lines. The pulse would build up over-current that would cause massive failures of the lines themselves. Also, the pulse through IC would not only cause computers that are running to crash, but would leave scarring from the damage that would likely prevent them from ever running again. The more resistant transistors and tubes would not be as effected.

Long, roughly parallel conductors (like power lines) would be one of the things hardest hit, and this includes a number of antennae. Tight tolerance ICs would also receive damage.

Why don't you do some research before whining about other's opinions?

Even the Tzar Bomba the Soviets let off had only MINOR effects.

The size of the nuke is less important than the location. There has never been an orbital detonation. So you are saying that surface or sub-surface detonations have the same destructive power as orbital detonations? It's obvious that you are the one that needs to do more research.

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

And then when China nukes us back for nuking them? DPRK is un-nukable because we have an explicit ally (South Korea) and frenemy bordering it. Any retaliation by us would result in the destruction of Seoul. Is that what you want?

Re:Blind spot?

[cavreader]

If NK (or any one else for that matter) launched an nuclear EMP attack there would be retaliation and China be damned. Seoul can always be rebuilt if it is destroyed. Just look what happened when 3000 people were killed on 9/11 and you can pretty much imagine the US response to a nuclear EMP attack.

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

And when China nukes us back?

Re:Blind spot?

[cavreader]

They won't. Last time I checked China does't have a mutual defense treaty with NK. Plus NK is a pain in the ass for China. NK rhetoric and vitriolic threats have weakened China's security. Thanks to NK the US has beefed up it's anti-missile batteries along the US West Coast and helped increase the military preparedness in the South Pacific region. The deployment of more anti-missile batteries to protect against a NK missile attack can also be used to intercept missiles aimed towards the US west coast. Instead of downsizing the yearly US-SK naval exercises NK threats have resulted in expanding the size of the exercises. Without NK there would be no reason for the sizable US military presence in SK which also threatens China.

Re:Blind spot?

[AK Marc]

Nukes aren't precision enough for that. Anything that knocks out DPRK's ability to wipe out Seoul will damage Chine and South Korea. So if we are willing to destroy SK for take out NK, we should just invade now. Otherwise, it's stupid to wait. And nuking NK will damage China and South Korea.

Thanks to NK the US has beefed up it's anti-missile batteries along the US West Coast and helped increase the military preparedness in the South Pacific region. The deployment of more anti-missile batteries to protect against a NK missile attack can also be used to intercept missiles aimed towards the US west coast.

Aside from some theoretical Star Wars weapons that never left the drawing board, we have nothing that would stop an ICBM launched from NK. The worry is Scuds launched at Tokyo. Something we think is possible today, but not reliable with their current level of tech.

Re:Why sunglasses still matter...

[Rei]

No, this kind of blind spot.

Expect Russia to become even more paranoid and trigger happy than usual.

(This is, of course, what happens when you try to modernize every last system in your arsenal at once even when you're *not* under sanctions.. almost all of these programs can be expected to be behind schedule and underdeliver)

Re:Nuke test sensor glitch available for our frien

[seven of five]

Do geiger counters dream of radioactive sheep?