Run probably. I mean, that’s what I would do if I saw some kind of blast cloud rising above my city. Of course, run is a bit of a general proposition. And, depending on where the thing goes off, it could be a deadly one. So many thanks to the Washington City Paper’s Mike DeBonis for sharing this amazing nuclear blast damage calculator with the world.
Here’s how it works: Select (from a rather limited) list of cities to be destroyed, plug in a yield (measured here in kilotons–which, realistic as it may be, relative to the current enemy meter, allows for only minimal damage) and hit chart. The resulting display will be–depending on your particular level of boom–a target-looking thing, which, with the aid of a handy key at the bottom of the page, will help to tell you what direction(s) to head if such bad shit should come to your close-by-major-city.
For the record, this thingy (called by its creators the “High-Yield Detonation Effect Simulator”) is fully adjustable, geographically speaking. Which means that if you know a bit about longitude and latitude you could probably do a better job of ground-zero picking than whoever set the defaults here. Especially with the Boston version, which centers the event at what looks to be the entrance to the Ted Williams Tunnel–which, being, as it is, part of this country’s biggest public works disaster, seems to be in need of no assistance in the collapsing and killing department.
(Note: I’ve posted this under the wrong date (Jan. 3 would be the one that I’m looking for). I seem unable to figure out how to change this. Oops!)
4 Comments
January 3, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Hey Mike,
Good to see you in print again! Your tag could be ‘Mr. Optimistic’. y.m.
January 3, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Interestingly enough, in the Boston default version, it seems that Clive Street would be affected, while Agassiz Park, about a 5 min walk away, would be unscathed. According to the map, it appears that the “safe zone” starts exactly at JP Licks (I’m sure there’s symbolism in that, but I can’t see it). Anyways, point being that if you need to run, you can always run over to our house.
January 4, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Sorry to say and all, but JP Licks totally beats out Agassiz Park as my bunker. Free barrels of post-apocalyptic ice cream? I’m so there.
March 21, 2008 at 10:44 am
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