Deadliest Weapon Ever Fired: Tsar Nuclear Bomb, 1,500 Times Powerful Than Hiroshima

Whenever we think of massive destruction made by humanity, the very first thing that comes to our mind is the damage caused in Hiroshima and Nagasaki because of nuclear bombs. That gave the world its first horrifying glimpse into the devastating power of nuclear bombs.

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However, what if I told you that there was a bomb that was developed in 1961 that was nearly 1,500 times more powerful than the one¡¯s at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the bomb was made by Russia (then USSR) and it was called Tsar Bomba.

King of Nuclear Bombs

Tsar Bomba, as the name suggests, was called the ¡®King of Bombs (in Russian), although it had a code name of RDS-220 and was also referred to as Big Ivan. The bomb was a hydrogen nuclear bomb that came into the limelight right after its test detonation that occurred over Novra Zemlya island in the Arctic Ocean on October 30, 1961. The explosion was termed as the most powerful human-made explosion ever recorded.

Tsar Bomba was developed under the guidance of Andrey Sakharov and a team of Soviet physicists under him, during the Cold War period between the U.S.S.R and the United States of America that was showing no signs of taming down. The bomb was supposed to be a statement, a power-demonstration to showcase what the Soviet Union was capable of.

The Tsar Bomba was a three-staged bomb with a 100 megaton capacity. However, since the devastation caused by the bomb would have resulted in being too dangerous, for the test, they reduced the capacity to 50 megaton which was roughly 1500 times (3,000 times if it would have been at its full capacity) more powerful than the bombs that the US dropped in Japan nearly a decade earlier.

The researchers also worked on a novel fusion process that drastically reduced the fallout. The end result was a bomb that weighed roughly 27 tons and was roughly 8 metres in length, with a diameter of two metres.

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The Tsar nuclear bomb test

To test the devastation of this monstrosity, scientists modified a Tu-95V bomber to carry the weapon. It was equipped with a parachute to allow the bomb to drop slowly, giving the aircraft pilots enough time to fly off to a safe distance. The aircraft was piloted by one Andrey Durnovtsev and the aircraft was accompanied by an observer plane that captured the bomb being dropped and the eventual detonation.

The bomb was dropped at 11:32 AM Moscow time over the Mityushikha Bay test site over the deserted island of Novaya Zemlya. The bomb exploded while it was in the air (without making contact with the ground) -- roughly 60 kilometres high, however, this didn¡¯t limit the devastation that it was designed to cause.

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The unprecedented destruction

Even though the bomb was detonated mid-air, the devastation it caused was catastrophic, to say the least. the 57-megaton bomb formed mushroom clouds that went as high as 64 kilometres, with the dome stretching nearly 100 kilometres.

The flash of its explosion was seen over a thousand kilometres away from the detonation site. A village called Severny, roughly 55 kilometres from the epicentre of the detonation was completely destroyed.

Moreover, buildings over 160 kilometres away were damaged beyond repair. The scientists also estimated that even though there were no human casualties in this test, the blast would have been capable of causing third-degree burns up to a hundred kilometres away from the epicentre.

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Surprisingly, since the fireball never made contact with the Earth, the amount of radiation was surprisingly low. Radio comms were disrupted and non-functional for over an hour.

One of the cameramen who captured the devastation from the top revealed what it felt like, ¡°The clouds beneath the aircraft and in the distance were lit up by the powerful flash. The sea of light spread under the hatch and even clouds began to glow and became transparent. At that moment, our aircraft emerged from between two cloud layers and down below in the gap a huge bright orange ball was emerging. The ball was powerful and arrogant like Jupiter. Slowly and silently it crept upwards... Having broken through the thick layer of clouds it kept growing. It seemed to suck the whole Earth into it. The spectacle was fantastic, unreal, supernatural.¡±

The bomb was never put into use

Soon after the test, the whole world got to know about the bomb of devastation straight from hell. Soon, nations started condemning USSR¡¯s feat, including the US, UK and even Sweden, among a few other Scandinavian countries neighbouring USSR.

However, the bomb was never greenlit for operational use as due to its massive size, the only way it could have been carried would have been through a heavy bomber aircraft and at that pace, it would have easily been taken down by enemy aircraft.

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Sakharov turned against his own creation

Moreover, further development for the bomb was impacted by the fact that the very creator of this bomb, Sakharov, realising the magnitude of the Tsar Bomba, went against testing and development of nuclear weapons.

He became a supporter of the 1963 Partial Test Ban (which was soon signed by the USSR, The US and the UK) while also being vocal about nuclear proliferation. Surprisingly, his efforts would soon award him with a Nobel Peace Prize in 1975.