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In 1963, it was reported that Starfish Prime had created a belt of MeV electrons. [17] In 1968, it was reported that some Starfish electrons had remained in the atmosphere for 5 years. [18] A year later, the US and USSR signed the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which banned all above-ground nuclear testing. France and China continued above ...
The Starfish Prime radiation belt had, by far, the greatest intensity and duration of any of the artificial radiation belts. [1] The Starfish Prime radiation belt damaged the United Kingdom Satellite Ariel 1 and the United States satellites, Traac, Transit 4B, Injun I and Telstar I. It also damaged the Soviet satellite Cosmos V. All of these ...
It is generally understood that the inner and outer Van Allen belts result from different processes. The inner belt is mainly composed of energetic protons produced from the decay of so-called neutrons, which are themselves the result of cosmic ray collisions in the upper atmosphere. The outer Van Allen belt consists mainly of electrons.
These belts were also noticed independently by Van Allen after whom they are named. The American exploded a nuclear bomb, Starfish Prime, at 400 km above Johnston Island in 1962 and this disrupted the inner radiation belts for years. [4] It was thought for a while that the belts were man-made, creations of either country's secret weapons.
The Starfish Prime radiation belt persisted at high altitude for many months and damaged the United States satellites Traac, Transit 4B, Injun I and Telstar I, as well as the United Kingdom satellite Ariel. It also damaged the Soviet satellite Cosmos V. All of these satellites failed completely within several months of the Starfish detonation. [8]
It created a very brief fireball visible over a wide area, plus bright artificial auroras visible in Hawaii for several minutes. "Starfish Prime" also produced an electromagnetic pulse that disrupted some electric power and communication systems in Hawaii. It pumped enough radiation into the Van Allen belts to destroy or damage seven satellites ...
The day before Telstar 1 launched, a U.S. high-altitude nuclear bomb (called Starfish Prime) had energized the Earth's Van Allen Belt where Telstar 1 went into orbit. This vast increase in a radiation belt, combined with subsequent high-altitude blasts, including a Soviet test in October, overwhelmed Telstar's fragile transistors.
In July 1962, the US carried out the Starfish Prime test, exploding a 1.44 Mt (6.0 PJ) bomb 400 kilometres (250 mi; 1,300,000 ft) above the mid-Pacific Ocean.This demonstrated that the effects of a high-altitude nuclear explosion were much larger than had been previously calculated.