Michael Light (1) (1963–)

I love nuclear weapons. I'm fascinated by them. They can wipe out everything and leave a lingering poison that cleans up the rest. Except for the cockroaches, maybe. The capability to actually pull off apocalypto is what makes nuclear weapons so cool, better than any fictional apocalypse could possibly be. And its totally real. The instantaneous capability makes it much scarier than biological or nerve gas weapons. These latter are more likely to take more time and leave too many survivors, animal and human, and all the stuff intact. Nuclear weapons wipe the slate clean.

My favorite "devices" are actually THERMOnuclear weapons, especially the really big ones. They don't make most of these big ones anymore, instead favoring smaller nuclear devices delivered as MIRV warheads (Multiple Independent Reentry Vehicles). These elegant devices pushed into space by a single ballistic missile spray their smaller warheads in different directions so they are harder to target and knock out. They can also do more damage than one targeted device, even a big one. Besides the big hydrogen weapons require huge missiles to get them skyward, they were more meant for the bomber age.

It's possible to make a much bigger fusion device than a fission nuclear weapon. But the fusion reaction of slamming two tritium atoms and creating helium while destroying a little mass in the process (its the c in E=mc2 that makes the mass so negligible and the bang so big, c, the speed of light, is a big number and you get to square it!) together requires so much temperature and pressure that a fission device is required to pull it off; no cold fusion here. So you're left with all the fun of fission weapons as well: plenty of fallout and radiation sickness and fires (assuming you are one of the unlucky ones that survives instantaneous vaporization or the massive shock wave that is going to pulp your insides in its wake).

Whether you love it or hate it this is a beautiful art book about nature. Beautifully produced. Fusion of hydrogen is what powers the sun and most stars (some fuse helium late in their lives), so H-bombs are one big starlight experiment; actually a not so big experiment in the universal scheme of things. So I claim this is ultimately a book about art and nature and the experiments that teach us more about both. They also happen to make REALLY good weapons too.

There are footnotes to each "test" and dates. The really big ones, the multi-megaton ones, are ultimately so beautiful and terrible you'll feel guilty oohing and aahing over them. Some of them annihilate entire islands!

The biggest fusion nuclear weapon ever detonated was the Tsar Bomb built by the Soviet Union in their quest to make everything bigger and better. It was a 50 megaton behemoth dropped by a modified bomber that had to be stripped of everything else to carry the massive bomb. The bomb was dropped with a parachute so it would take longer to fall otherwise the bomber itself would not have been able to get far enough away fast enough. The bomb was actually scaled down from an unbelievable 100 megaton device because even with the parachute the plane would not have been able to get far enough away. Great stuff. It's incredible what people will try!

This kind of artwork is actually pretty much over due to the lingering deadly effects of above ground testing, so this is an archive of art from a bygone era. I'm sure cgi can produce a pretty convincing nuclear explosion nowadays, just like it can a fake Picasso, but these are the real thing by the original artists. Enjoy!… (plus d'informations)