| One Million Pounds of TNT (20X40 Feet) |
In 1965 the U.S. Navy theorized that it could simulate the effect of nuclear weapons on ships by exploding a huge dome of TNT (trinitrotoluene). The simulation was necessary because the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963 prohibited atmospheric nuclear weapons testing. The test ban was certainly a very good thing. By 1963 the United States had conducted more than 1,000 nuclear tests. The largest weapon test was code named Castle Bravo. The Castle Bravo device was expected to yield an explosive effect equal to 5 megatons of TNT. Unfortunately, the yield was 3 times more powerful than the designers' prediction, resulting in a 15 megaton explosion. The unanticipated yield was 1,000 times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, and it contaminated seven thousand square miles of the Pacific Ocean.
