Nukes and Weather

[shemp]

I was sitting around the barn with some of the locals, and we were wondering, what would happen if you dropped a nuclear bomb into a hurricane or a tornado? Besides being a possible plot for a really bad SciFi Network movie, would there be any positive effects? Or would you just have an even bigger mess on your hands?

My guess would be that if you dropped one into a tornado, you'd probably blast the **** out of it and destroy it, but the side effects would be much worse than the cure. On the other hand, if you dropped a small one into a hurricane that was far away from land, could you head off the storm, or would you turn it into a nuclear-fallout-filled Category 10 once-in-an-eon storm?

 

[Jimbo07]

I was sitting around the barn with some of the locals, and we were wondering, what would happen if you dropped a nuclear bomb into a hurricane or a tornado? Besides being a possible plot for a really bad SciFi Network movie, would there be any positive effects? Or would you just have an even bigger mess on your hands?

My guess would be that if you dropped one into a tornado, you'd probably blast the **** out of it and destroy it, but the side effects would be much worse than the cure. On the other hand, if you dropped a small one into a hurricane that was far away from land, could you head off the storm, or would you turn it into a nuclear-fallout-filled Category 10 once-in-an-eon storm?

A single hurricane has much more energy than nuclear weapons. I suspect the effect of one weapon would be miniscule...

 

[Arkan_Wolfshade]

A single hurricane has much more energy than nuclear weapons. I suspect the effect of one weapon would be miniscule...

Total energy, sure, but what would the effects of a nuke (or more likely a MOAB) be on the actual system that was the storm. Would it distrupt it? Add to its energy? etc

 

[Jimbo07]

Total energy, sure, but what would the effects of a nuke (or more likely a MOAB) be on the actual system that was the storm. Would it distrupt it? Add to its energy? etc

umm... I meant... MUCH more energy... let me see if I can find some actual numbers.

Here are a few possibilities though:
i) Nothing or very little effect (most likely)
ii) Enough pressure is created in the eye to disrupt it (hurricane's energy is still there, eye quickly reforms)
iii) Radioactive hurricane

Understand that I am combining applied knowledge from two or three areas (ex. Meteorology from navigation, physics education), but am otherwise inexpert...

 

[Macoy]

umm... I meant... MUCH more energy... let me see if I can find some actual numbers.

Here are a few possibilities though:
i) Nothing or very little effect (most likely)
ii) Enough pressure is created in the eye to disrupt it (hurricane's energy is still there, eye quickly reforms)
iii) Radioactive hurricane

Understand that I am combining applied knowledge from two or three areas (ex. Meteorology from navigation, physics education), but am otherwise inexpert...

I choose 'iii)'.

 

[Arkan_Wolfshade]

I choose 'iii)'.

psst, that's why I thought a MOAB would be a better choice.

 

[Gaspode]

What about the tornado? It's a much smaller system than the hurricane. Would there be anything left of it after the nuke went off?

 

[Macoy]

psst, that's why I thought a MOAB would be a better choice.

Then perhaps we should fire magazines of MOABs against the spin of the eye wall, and thus demand its submission!

On, on, to the asteroids!

 

[CapelDodger]

Understand that I am combining applied knowledge from two or three areas (ex. Meteorology from navigation, physics education), but am otherwise inexpert...

I think we're all inexpert until we try it. Whch should not be before we sort out maximum surveillance, of course (satellites, surface and sub-surface sensors in a dense grid), and some property-speculation in Central America and around the Gulf. If we short enough of it we could finance the whole project.

 

[UnrepentantSinner]

I was sitting around the barn with some of the locals, and we were wondering, what would happen if you dropped a nuclear bomb into a hurricane or a tornado? Besides being a possible plot for a really bad SciFi Network movie, would there be any positive effects? Or would you just have an even bigger mess on your hands?

I heard a meteorologist discuss the hurricane option once and he said it would do nothing but make a radioactive hurricane so, yes, we would have an even bigger mess on our hands.

 

[Cuddles]

A typical hurricane is around 300 miles wide. A typical nuclear weapon will cause a significant pressure wave up to 10-30 miles radius. Even ignoring the energy difference, nuclear blasts just wouldn't affect enough of the hurricane to really disrupt it.

 

[Crossbow]

If a nuclear bomb were dropped into a tornado, then I expect that the tornado would be destroyed and not be able to reform within a few miles of the hypocenter.

However, the weather that produces the tornado (fast moving cold front into a very large mass of unstable air) would not be terribly disrupted, therefore the fallout and other products would still be very much in effect.

If a nuclear bomb were dropped into a hurricane (which is hundreds, even thousands of times more powerful than the largest atomic weapon), then I expect that the hurricane system would be largely unaffected, but as with the other case, the fallout and other products of a nuclear explosion would still be very much in effect.