What Can the Hawaii Nuclear Missile False Alarm Teach Us About Preparedness?
First, I want to go on the record to say unequivocally, I am not upset by the fact that there was false alarm in Hawaii. False alarms happen because there are systems in place to warn. In Hawaii, the system is semi-independent, but closely associated with the primary warning system that would be used throughout the United States in the event of a nuclear war (accidental or otherwise). What I am angry about is that the same government who maintains these warning systems does absolutely nothing to teach the general public what to do in the event a warning comes through, and (with the ironic exception of Hawaii), is largely doing nothing in terms of making workable plans to protect citizens in the event of a nuclear war.
It is impossible, to discuss nuclear war preparedness in more than a cursory fashion in a short blog post, but today I wanted to address a few high points that people should keep in mind, and to illustrate why I think nuclear war preparedness remains a relevant concern in the post-Cold War era. An intentional nuclear war is a fairly unlikely scenario in the current political environment (propaganda regarding the DPRK notwithstanding). What is far more likely to happen is accidental nuclear war, resulting from lax controls under Cold War Era policies of Mutually Assured Destruction and Launch On Warning, still in place to maintain the Deterrent Effect of Nuclear Weapons.
Who are the likely players?
When it comes to accidental nuclear war, the most likely players are the United States and Russia. Both of these countries maintain large forces of Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), and Submarine Launched Ballistic Missiles and (SLBMs). While both countries maintain other types of nuclear weapons (such as nuclear bombs carried by conventional bombers) the ICBM and SLBM forces are of most concern for an accidental nuclear war. These weapon systems are key, because once triggered, they cannot be destroyed or recalled, and there is no real effective defense against them.
Several other countries maintain ICBM or SLBM weapons in their inventory (most notably Great Britain, France, China, India and Pakistan), but do not always keep the weapons in a state of immediate launch readiness. Both Countries, as a matter of documented public policy maintain a launch on warning posture, and both still publicly follow the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction. In short, both countries publicly state that upon warning of a nuclear weapons launch (detection of inbound nuclear missiles), they will launch a responsive attack. While the President of each country ostensibly has a number of options with regard to the scope of the response, there are likely systems in place (fail-safes in ironic military parlance) that would launch massive counter attacks using the ICBM and SLBM force. In fact, for many years it has been believed, with significant compelling evidence that Russia maintains the former Soviet Era Dead Hand system that would launch a full force level counterstrike automatically upon detection of a nuclear detonation in a Russian city. Although there is no evidence for such a system in the public domain in the United States, one can surmise that an equivalent system likely exists, if for no other reason than the timing concerns to be discussed below.
What would happen in an accidental nuclear war?
Assuming a worst-case scenario either the United States or Russia has a system failure that indicates an incoming threat (this has happened dozens of times since the 1950s). The threat detection systems of each country have deteriorated dramatically since the mid-1990s, but the Cold War era policy of Launch on Warning must be maintained in order to maintain the deterrence strategy. This is because one of the prime targets of nuclear missiles, are the other side’s nuclear missile silos. The United State’s ICBM force relies solely on a silo based system. The locations of nuclear missile silos are not secret, and anyone with a modest amount of internet searching can find their locations on Google Earth in only a few minutes. Each silo is specially hardened to withstand a nearby detonation, but it is not possible to build a silo that won’t be irreparably damaged by a direct hit from a nuclear weapon (in essence a direct hit means that the silo has to be within the nuclear fireball…that area of matter that is largely converted to plasma in the moments after an explosion, a typical 800kt warhead will heat a sphere a mile in diameter to over 16,000 degrees Fahrenheit in on second).
A typical ICBM takes around 30 minutes to fly from its launch site to its target, assuming a Great Circle Path is utilized. This would most often be the case, however, the newest Russian ICBM the Topal M, may have the capability to follow a semi-orbital flight path around the South Pole to take advantage of the extremely limited warning systems the United States has to verify missile flights along that trajectory (the flight time would be significantly longer, but the the ability to verify launch warnings or targets is essentially non-existent on those paths).
The warhead will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere traveling at more than 20,000 mph, many times faster than a bullet leaves the barrel of a gun. Warheads targeted a nuclear weapons silos or hardened command and control bunkers typically detonate at or near the ground to maximize the probability of breaching defenses. Warheads targeted at industrial, commercial, civilian, or non-hardened targets will typically be detonated at an optimized height above ground to maximize the thermal and blast effects. Blasts at or near the ground generate much more radioactive fallout than airburst weapons. SLBMs are generally launched much closer to the target country, and have flight times in the order of 15 minutes or less.
The short length of time between launch and detonation leads to the biggest problem with ICBM and SLBMs, very limited decision making windows to respond. Launches are typically detectable once the missile is above the cloud deck. Satellites can pick up the large heat flare of the launch motor once it is above the clouds… generally this happens a minute or less after launch. Radar confirmation would come next, and would take around 9-12 minutes depending on the flight path. At some point in time the President of the respective country would be alerted. Under the U.S. plan the nuclear weapons liaison (the guy who carries the nuclear football for the President), would brief the President on retaliation options and set up the system to give command orders. In theory, U.S. Nuclear weapons are under civilian control, via the elected sitting President…but one need only follow the time to see why this is probably not really the case. Under an ICBM attack on a conventional path, it would take about a minute for the President to mechanically give the launch order, and about 2-3 minutes for the ICBM and SLBM forces to respond. Pragmatically it might take much longer for the SLBM force to respond, upwards of 20 minutes…but SLBMs launched from submarines are much harder for an enemy to target than an ICBM. This leaves the President less than 10 minutes to initiate a retaliatory strike, and to activate the National Emergency Warning that will begin a transmit sequence to every cell phone in the U.S. If the incoming missile is an SLBM launched at Washington from the North Atlantic…. There probably would not be time for the President to issue the order… he may find out about the attack only moments before the White House would be destroyed by the warhead.
In any event, under most likely scenarios, detonation of hostile missiles would occur at most 15 minutes after a warning. The average American in an impacted area would find out about an impending nuclear attack in one of 4 ways. 1) If the President has time, and is able to activate the National Warning System, you would receive a text alert on your cell phone, at most 15 minutes before the first warhead’s detonate, but more likely 2-8 minutes before hand… IF you have you phone with you, and IF you happen to look at it. 2) While the Emergency Broadcast System is no longer maintained, National Weather Radio and associated commercial broadcast stations would likely initiate a warning at about the same time a text message was sent out. This message would probably take about 30 seconds longer to digest than the cell phone text. Again, you would have to be near enough to a properly equipped NWR radio or other TV or radio to get this warning. 3) You will witness, with your own eyes, the unmistakable sight of a reentering warhead and subsequent detonation, or 4) electronic devices around will cease working immediately, without explanation, as the EMP from a specially targeted warhead detonates in the upper atmosphere. This may, or may not, be coupled with visual evidence of an explosion, depending on where you are physically.
Where are the likely targets?
Any nuclear weapons site, military site, airport large with a regularly scheduled passenger service (ie large enough to service military bombers in an emergency), oil refineries, power plants, military installations, or centers of global commerce and trade are likely targets.
Literally any time, night or day. There is literally no way to predict when an accidental nuclear war might begin.
There are two immediate threats from nuclear weapons. Immediate blast effects, and residual radiation. The immediate blast effects consist of three components 1) thermal energy in the form of radiated light. The energy of a nuclear detonation is difficult to comprehend, if you are close enough, it can set your clothing on fire just from the fireball. Even many miles away, the brightness of the detonation can cause permanent and irreparable blindness that can significantly decrease your likelihood of survival. 2) Prompt Radiation effects, in the form of neutrons and gamma rays. This is radiation from the nuclear reaction at the core of the weapon itself. If you are close enough to be impacted by this, and you are not in a shelter, you will die. However, you have to be fairly close, and would likely die of the blast effects anyway. 3) Blast effects, basically a blast wave that travels at approximately the speed of sound, and does most of the physical damage. If you are caught in the open, the old duck and cover drills from the 1950s and 60s will afford you better protection than most people realize. In simple terms, get on the ground well away from buildings and large structures (ideally in a ditch or behind a low wall), head towards the likely point of detonation (head pointed toward the flash), with your hands covering the back of your neck. You may feel intense heat from the thermal effects almost immediately. The blast wave will be coming, but may take more than a minute to arrive. The longer the distance between the flash and the blast (just like lightning), the longer you have to take subsequent precautions.
The residual radiation effects, or fallout, happen as the result of physical pieces of the bomb (generally from a small mote of dust to a pebble sized component) and debris, made radioactive by the nuclear physics effects of the bomb. Remember that all post-nuclear radiation hazard comes from fallout, that is physical dust particles. The dust can be so small that it is only detectable with special tools like a Geiger counter, but nonetheless it is very dangerous. The radiation hazard comes from particles and rays emitted by the radioactive atoms in the dust. There are two ways to protect yourself form this hazard. Get the dust off of you (and keep it out of your shelter), and put as much mass between yourself and the dust as possible.
Protection from fallout is all about mass. The most massive something is, the more protection it affords. The bomb debris are most radioactive immediately following detonation, and will be radioactive at levels that make even short exposures hazardous for about 14 days following the detonation. However, radiation levels that are a short distance away from the immediate detonation area (more than about 7 miles away for a 800KT range weapon), will not be high enough to be immediately fatal until fallout has had an opportunity to actually fall out of the atmosphere. However, in the first hour after a detonation fallout is INTENSELY radioactive, and extremely dangerous, so you need to find adequate protection as quickly as possible.
In the event you get a warning, you should go immediately to the nearest location you can safely get too in less than 10 minutes, be constantly vigilant for a potential explosion. If you notice anything like a bright flash of light, close your eyes immediately (it takes less than a second to be blinded permanently), and dive to the ground face down, head toward (as best you can tell) the source of the light. Start counting slowly, about every 5 seconds that elapse between the flash and the blast front is about a mile of distance. If the blast is less than 30 seconds away, you may be injured, burned, and there may be fires and massive destruction all around you. Every 5 seconds after that dramatically increases your chance of survival. If you reach 120 without the blast wave passing (it will be unmistakable), you can begin carefully moving to look for shelter. Go quickly to the largest building you can find. The longer you are in the open the more likely you are to be contaminated by fallout. Once you arrive, remove your outter layer of clothing. Find a place where you can clean the dust from your skin. This needs to happen as quickly as possible. Gently wipe exposed skin with a moist cloth. If possible take a shower. Do not use conditioner or other moisturizing produce which can keep dust close to your skin. You need to have a rudimentary understanding of Protection Factor, and need to learn how to assess your shelter to use it to the maximum benefit. Even compromise shelters can afford you significant protection, especially if you are fortunate enough to be outside of the fallout plume. Ideally you want to be in a purpose build fallout shelter, but these are very rare in the United States at this time. Generally speaking, You want as close to the middle of the building (in all three dimensions) as possible, well away from windows, adjacent roofs etc. Remember, radiation will be coming from any place where dust can accumulate from outside, you want as much heavy stuff between you and the dust as possible.
Once you are in a sheltered place, you will likely have to stay there for at least 14 days before you can move about safely. Remember that radiation dosing is cumulative, so the more you expose yourself, the more likely you are to get sick.
Why is preparation important?
In the event of a real nuclear emergency, you will have almost no time to make lifesaving decisions. The first priority is to survive the initial blast. Learn to recognize the warning signs (sun like brightness in the sky comes from one of two things, nuclear detonations or bollides (big nasty meteors that can blow up in the sky and cause injury), each poses similar blast danger, and should be treated with caution and respect). Everyone should read Nuclear War Survival Skills by Cresson Kearney. The amount of useful information in this book is tremendous. It is not the brightest book to read, but you will learn what to expect, and how to protect your family. Keep in mind that the techniques in the book were developed by real nuclear scientists, and were tested using average everyday volunteer families. Make no mistake, if accidental nuclear war happens, millions of people will die. However, it is a situation where having knowledge and being prepared can dramatically increase your odds of survival.
