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7/28/2012 12:47:33 PM
37
What Would Occur if a Super MAC Fired into the Planet?
Okay, we had the scene at the end of ONI: Sword Base, but that was likely a low-power shot.
If I recall correctly, a super MAC has a yield in the gigatons, though it may have been retconned. That's more than a hundred times the energy of the Tsar Bomba, which was already unimaginably powerful. I'm guessing it could potentially be more effective at glassing a planet than the covenant energy projectors, and possibly even causing earthquakes and tectonic disturbances(I am not a geologist).
[Edited on 07.28.2012 5:52 AM PDT]
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[quote][b]Posted by:[/b] TilledMule9946 Naw, 20 basic tactical nukes is the estimated minimum for a nuclear winter. Not all in the same area though. Maybe if you wanted to cause a NW with just one explosion you would be right.[/quote]Everyone is so much more polite here than in the Flood. OT: It depends whether or not you detonated the nuclear bombs in the atmosphere or not. On the ground, our entire nuclear arsenal could not cover all land with radiation, let alone actual blast radius. The Tzar Bomba has a fallout estimated at 1,000 km^2, and that is the biggest nuke ever made by humans. In the atmosphere, however, I believe it would be possible to irradiate all human life, but that would not be the same as blotting out the sun with ash and dust. Because a Super MAC uses strictly kinetic energy, not electromagnetic radiation, and because it would be striking in only one area, the blast yield would need to be significantly higher to cause mass extinction. EDIT- And it certainly would not "blow up the planet." [Edited on 07.29.2012 5:38 PM PDT]
