Air Force Finds No Trace of Lost Nuke

[southernleftylady]

SAVANNAH, Ga. - The first government search in decades for a nuclear bomb lost off the Georgia coast in 1958 failed to uncover any trace of the sunken weapon, the Air Force said in a report Friday.
The report released nine months after scientists tested radiation levels in waters off Tybee Island concluded the 7,600-pound bomb cannot explode and should be left at sea.

"The best course of action in this matter is to not continue to search for it and to leave the property in place," said the report by the Air Force Nuclear Weapons and Counterproliferation Agency.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050617/ap_on_re_us/offshore_nuke;_ylt=AsdCLCjG_NS_S_yVguDiSBOs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA2M2YzbmJmBHNlYwN1cw--

[Lerkfish]

1. "plausible deniability" anyone?

how convenient if this is used against us, by us, because they reported it lost.

:scared:

question: do we honestly think if such a thing truly was there, they'd announce it in the news in the first place?

[MindPilot]

2. I really doubt that a bomb that's almost as old as me is much of a threat

it's probably deep beneath the ocean floor and has been for decades. They go hunting for that thing every few years, and the result is generally the same, still not there.

[RaleighNCDUer]

3. The bomb itself, no.

Its plutonium core, however, should be a matter of extreme interest. Unless it is lost in a trench too deep for recovery, why would we want to leave it there to be picked up by whoever?

The difficulty in building nukes isn't in the bomb itself, it is in acquiring a sufficient amount of fissible material. And we have decided to leave x amount of plutonium just lying around.

Of course, who knows. Maybe it was salvaged 4 decades ago by a Soviet sub.

[Alpharetta]

10. It would be cheaper to bribe a few Pakistani or ex-USSR guards

and get one of those fully operational nukes.

[Zynx]

11. Also safer - you really want to handle that sort of uncased plutonium?

That's insta-cancer type stuff.

[brooklynite]

7. C'mon; nobody would blow up a "Red" state...

[trogdor]

4. I think I know who's got it.

[Beetwasher]

5. In Other News, "Dr. No" Has Started Deep Sea Diving Expedition in the Area

n/t

[oneighty]

6. The bomb was jettisoned

in very shallow water. Likely it is buried deep in the mud. My outfit EOD Unit Two Charleston S.C. spent many diving hours searching for it. It is not a hazard as far as going 'boom' is concerned.

No submarine could have picked it up.

180

[Roy]

8. I think you misunderstood.....

The nuke is not lost.....

They can't find the receipt!

[reprobate]

9. There's also one lost off the coast of England you never heard about.

In the early '60s I was stationed at the USAF base in england responssible for handling all the air-ground communications for military aircraft transiting the atlantic (RAF Croughton).

While doing maintanence on their equipment one night some excitement went up from the air-ground operators. I plugged into one of the monitor jacks to listen. It was a B-47 declaring a Mayday. He had lost two engines and power to another and was losing altitude. Eventually contact was lost and it was assumed he was down in the atlantic. SAC then called a Broken Arrow alert (atomic weapon lost).

The search went on thru the next day with no reports of finding anything. Which is reasonable, since the atlantic can be a real bitch in the winter. It was then called off.

So if little ole me knows of this one, it's reasonable to assume that there are more nukes out there under no one's control. But after 4 decades under the atlantic, it's likely no danger to anyone. unless someone has the ability to recover the fissile materials on board.

[katty]

12. lost nuke in the WH-check Oval Office first

[stickdog]

13. Whoops! Oh, well, no use crying over spilled plutonium! (nt)