5 ms·

There is essenitally no fallout from an undetonated warhead. Plutonium is not that radioactive. It's just fissile.

• ceejayoz 5y ago
  They're talking about nuclear-tipped anti-ballistic missiles; blowing up an incoming nuke with an airburst nuke of your own. We don't have them currently, but both the US and Russia have tinkered with the concept. Do it high enough up and it's got similar fallout to the atmospheric tests we used to do. Not great, but better than millions dead on the ground.
  • dragonwriter 5y ago
    > They're talking about nuclear-tipped anti-ballistic missiles; blowing up an incoming nuke with an airburst nuke of your own. High-altitude airbursts produce essentially no fallout; fallout is from tossing irradiated ground debris into the air from a ground burst or near-ground burst. Other than the missile itself and it's target, there's nothing for a high-altitude airburst to make fallout from. > We don't have them currently, but both the US and Russia have tinkered with the concept. “Widely deployed”, not “tinkered with”.