What would happen if you detonated a nuclear bomb in a volcano?

Question

Would it make any difference (in effect, on the earth somehow) if you were able to submerge a nuclear bomb in a volcano and detonate it? Could a bomb even survive being submerged in magma? Could you create seismic activity? What if you dropped one in a fault line? Has anyone ever studied this or tried it?

Answer 1

Not that much compared to the volcano itself. There would of course be radioactive fallout to worry about (which would not normally be present in a volcanic eruption) but the damage would not be on the "Hollywood Thriller" scale. But if the volcano is already active enough to have magma where you could reach it and do something to it with a nuclear bomb, that volcano is probably already letting out a lot more energy than the bomb.

Mount Saint Helens was estimated to have released the equivalent of a 350 Megaton nuclear bomb -- since the very largest city-killer bombs ever put into production were about 20 megatons (most are a megaton or less in yield), they are basically pop-guns compared to a volcano.

Now, if you could find a volcano like MSH which was already under great pressure, and use the nuke from the outside of the volcano to crack the lava dome to trigger an explosive eruption when you wanted it, that might be pretty impressive. But again -- consider how much power was built up in MSH before it cracked its own lava dome, compared to how much force the nuke could generate to "help along" this process. I think the volcano would have to be right on the verge of blowing in the first place for such a plan to have any hope of success, and there just aren't many such opportunities in any one lifespan.

Submerging the bomb into the magma basically won't work. Magma is typically about 2400 degrees F or hotter, which is above the melting point of almost all metals and certainly above the point at which they lose all structural strength. In addition, nuclear weapons are triggered by the detonation of small amounts of conventional explosives timed to go off in very precisely-controlled patterns, and the heat of the magma would doubtless either set some of these off prematurely or cause them to not detonate properly. Nuclear weapons are designed to NOT go "boom" if anything at all goes wrong in the detonation sequence (this is done as a safety feature, so that for example a warhead won't undergo a nuclear explosion in it's own missile silo if the rocket fuel catches fire). I suppose if you built one heck of a heat shield from the stuff that spacecraft use for re-entry you MIGHT have something that would last just long enough to sink a hundred feet or so into the magma. But to do so you would have to drill through the lava dome or the side of the volcano in the first place, which would kind of negate the point of sticking a nuke in it once you were done -- it would already be erupting by then.

Your one chance of doing something really impressive I think would be if you could submerge a nuke into something like the volcano on Hawaii that has been flowing slow but steady for decades now, and blast open the internal paths enough to get the lava geysering again like it did back in the 1950's. But it is unlikely that there is enough pressure under such a volcano to make this work -- if there was, it would probably already have been going like mad just from its own forces.

As to triggering seismic activity -- if properly placed into a fault line that was already under considerable stress... yes, it can trigger an earthquake and this has happened (see the references below). But to intentionally set of a major earthquake you would probably be far better off injecting water under high pressure into the fault, causing it to "slip" -- this is what causes most natural earthquakes, a fault under increasing tension that suddenly slips because the force becomes greater than the shear strength of the materials. Nuclear explosions underground tend to shatter the rocks and everything, producing a very localized stress-relieved area -- the stressed fault connecting to this area will retract somewhat to back-fill this shattered area but the earthquake probably will not radiate far from the point of the explosion compared to what would happen in a "natural" earthquake. Again, to trigger a significant earthquake you would have to detonate your nuke in a fault that was already on the verge of letting go anyway (otherwise, the rest of the fault away from the explosion site won't have enough stress in it to move anyway so will just sit there). I think this was looked at in the 1960's as a potential "peaceful" use of nuclear power, to trigger regular expected motion along fault lines in order to prevent unexpected larger earthquakes, and the idea was rejected by geologists as being entirely unpractical.

The earthquake that recently devastated the Indian Ocean area by causing massive tsunamis had an equivalent power of about 475 megatons -- so again, as you can see, the power of a natural phenomenon is FAR, FAR greater than anything man can produce, at least so far.

Answer 2

Unless it is detonated under seawater volcano. Sea waters lower down the heat of a lava like a boiling water enough for a submarine to push in a controlled nuclear bomb to the magma and run it farther and deeper before explosion. it can create a Tsunami or earthquake. The fear on this, it can destroy an Island of their target. Affected areas are those in line with the ring of fire. In 2011, An unusual explosion crack a sea bed and send a tsunami to Asia pacific hit Taiwan, Singapore, and many more. It was said its an earthquake cause by a undersea volcano. now 2013 Japan and Philippines encounter similar event an under sea earthquake send tsunami to the Island. Is there anyone targeting small Island? A way to eliminate people before conquering their lands? This is like a cabbage tactics. weakening their opponent. starting with the small and weakest.

Answer 3

Very difficult to quantify because all volcanoes are different. Some are on thinner crust than others. Some are on hot spots (like Hawaii) which may have totally different volcanic systems and yet others are super volcanoes.

First of - super volcanoes -Yellowstone is a super volcanos. It's caldera is so huge that a nuclear weapon used here could unleash a devastating eruption that would see several cubic miles of rock go skywards and produce a very eruptive sequence that could last for months. Result- nuclear winter and possibly the end of life on Earth!!

Some like hot spot volcanoes and perhaps Etna, Stromboli, Vesuvius etc. might go into an eruptive phase but this would in all likelihood only effect a few thousand square miles.

Other volcanoes suffering a nuclear explosion might actually have their caldera and tube sealed, thus stopping the volcano erupting for years to come.

A nuclear weapon on a fault line is equally hard to predict as there are so many variables. At worst it is likely to shake a lot of fault lines loose and create a large number of earthquakes. but it would be unlikely to create much in the way of volcanic activity.

Answer 4

Bomb Volcano

Answer 5

IF it had a heat resistant shell, the explosion would naturally expand in teh direction of least resistance, that could be up the vents if open, down into the magma chamber, or laterally impact into the crust same as any other underground explosion. Whether or not it would cause teh magma dome to fracture and collapse into an eruption is uncertain, depends on the geology, depth, force of explosion, etc. Pretty much the same with a single detonation on a faultline, think about when demolition experts drop a bridge or other structure, it's the distribution of simultanoeus force, not the force at a single point, that has most effect. Are you trying to sell ocean front property in Neveda?

Answer 6

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Answer 7

I do believe that a nuke dropped in a erupting volcano would survive
since some of the ones used have a heavy iron outer casing, even
bunker busters can penetrate over 30 feet of concrete , so if the nuke
made of a iron outer shell penetrated the magma, this would produce
a tremendous ripple, remember that demo techs use water as a hydraulic
force to tear things apart, having said this magma is far denser than water
and the pressure would enormous , enough the widen the magma chamber very deep, and even reaching the metal core. that would be
very bad.

Answer 8

It would depend entirely on the location and size of bomb but
my guess is that a big enough bomb detonated in the right spot
could trigger a volcano or earthquake.....Which would not effect
the earth any more or less than any other volcanic eruption or earthquake...

Answer 9

As mighty and deadly nuclear weapons are to life, they would not cause catastropic damage to the Earth. Sure, you could create seismic activity (that is how we monitor compliance with nuclear test bans) but you would not be able to rip the Earth's crust apart or do any serious damage.

Answer 10

u would think that because of the heat in a volcano that a nuclear bomb might not survive but it could. the uranium or plutonium in the bomb when its heated to a certain point could could a nuclear explosion and probably split techtonic plates and could the land to seperate. it would also wipe out every living organism in a 100 mile radius.