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Log–log plot comparing the yield (in kilotonnes) and mass (in kilograms) of various nuclear weapons developed by the United States.. The explosive yield of a nuclear weapon is the amount of energy released such as blast, thermal, and nuclear radiation, when that particular nuclear weapon is detonated, usually expressed as a TNT equivalent (the standardized equivalent mass of trinitrotoluene ...
A nuclear weapon [a] is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission or atomic bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb types release large quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter.
The July 19, 1957 test Plumbbob/John fired a small yield nuclear weapon on an AIR-2 Genie air-to-air rocket from a jet fighter. On August 1, 1958, Redstone rocket launched nuclear test Teak that detonated at an altitude of 77.8 km (48.3 mi). On August 12, 1958, Redstone #CC51 launched nuclear test Orange to a detonation altitude of 43 km (27 mi).
The M-388, a W54 nuclear warhead variant, weighed less than 60 pounds (27 kg). At the projectile's lowest yield setting of 10 tons, roughly equivalent to a single MOAB, its explosive force was only 1/144,000th (0.0007%) that of the Air Force's 1.44-megaton W49 warhead, a nuclear weapon commonly found on American ICBMs from the early 1960s.
Mao Zedong decided to begin a Chinese nuclear-weapons program during the First Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1954–1955. The People's Republic of China detonated its first thermonuclear bomb on 17 June 1967, 32 months after detonating its first fission weapon, with a yield of 3.31 Mt. It took place in the Lop Nor Test Site in northwest China. [33]
There were also plans to develop a 60-megaton weapon. As the National Security Archive explains, "One megaton would be 70 times the explosive yield of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima."
In January 2014, former Air Force Chief of Staff Norton A. Schwartz stated that the Mod 12 nuclear bomb upgrade would have enhanced accuracy and a lower yield with less fallout compared to previous versions of the weapon. Accuracy has not been a guarantee for air-dropped nuclear weapons, so consequently large warheads were needed to effectively ...
The W80 is a low to intermediate yield two-stage thermonuclear warhead deployed by the U.S. enduring stockpile with a variable yield ("dial-a-yield") of 5 or 150 kilotonnes of TNT (21 or 628 TJ). It was designed for deployment on cruise missiles and is the warhead used in all nuclear-armed ALCM and ACM missiles deployed by the US Air Force ...