If a nuke were dropped on London (God Forbid) what would be the devastation thirty miles out from ground zero?

Question

I'm no terrorist, i live about thirty miles outside and want to know if my house would be blown to bits.

Answer 1

you are posing a threat. aree you a  terrorist? please dont nuke london.

Answer 2

Don't worry. A nuclear blast won't kill you. The radiation fallout probably will. ;-)

It entirely depends on who pops a nuke. If the Al Quackies would do it, it is likely a small very dirty bomb. Meaning relatively little blast damage, and a heck of a lot of fallout.

If Putin gets angy, London gets vaporized. Less fallout, and lots of blast damage. That would be a big thermo nuclear weapon.

Can't think of anybody else who'd be interested in vaporizing London.  

Answer 3

If there was ever a threat of that happening I would advise you to go straight to the centre of London.  Chances are London wouldnt be the only place and I certainly wouldnt want to live in the aftermath.

What a lovely thought!!  Its this c**p weather, its making everyone depressed!!

Answer 4

depends on the size of the explosive

Answer 5

Depends on the strength of the bomb and whether it was ground burst or air burst.

At 30 miles from ground zero with most modern nukes, you would be incinerated by a wall of fire about 60 meters high.  

Answer 6

It depends on the warhead yield, really.  Trident, a typical ICBM, generally has several warheads, each of which can have a yield of 100kT or 475kT.  The bigger warhead causes extensive damage out to about 6km or so depending on weather conditions.  If you were thirty miles away from ground zero you wouldn't notice any effect from such an explosion, except maybe fallout after a few hours.  

It would take at least a 100MT bomb to have any immediate effects at 30 miles.  The biggest one ever built was the Russian 'Tsar Bomba', which had a yield of about 57MT...

This link has a blast effect calculator - you simply pick the warhead yield you want to calculate effects for.

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Scie...  

Answer 7

It would be just as bad as where it hit!

Nukes wont be dropped on London for fear of retalliation from NATO

Answer 8

Who cares ?

May I suggest nuking Motherwell, Aberdeen and Dundee first ?

Answer 9

From a 1 megaton bomb, 30 miles out the damage would be : serious structural damage, rooves removed, all windows smashed, serious fire damage and massive radiation contamination. That's before the fallout starts, falling.

Answer 10

Depends on the size and yield but at 30 miles you would get plenty of radiation, enough to kill you

Answer 11

There are many sizes of nuclear weapons, so your question is hard to answer.

In the case of Hiroshima, almost everything within a 3 mile radius was heavily damaged.  The nukes used by nations today are far larger, and can do more damage.

Answer 12

The short answer is:  no, your house would not be destroyed by the blast, but the wind may drive nuclear fallout (radio-active dust and dirt) towards your house.

In the bad old days, the US and the USSR (and the UK) vied to see who could build the largest bomb, and then build a delivery system for it.  The USSR had 50-megaton monsters atop huge liquid fueled  rockets.  If one of those hit London (and open records show that there were 5 aimed at London) then your house would be gone.  Everything within 200 miles would be gone.