North Carolina Nearly Nuked in 1961 by USAF

[RE]

US nearly Detonated Atomic Bomb over North Carolina – Secret Document

Journalist uses Freedom of Information Act to disclose 1961 accident in which one switch averted catastrophe



By Global Research News
Global Research, September 22, 2013
Guardian
Region: USA
Theme: Militarization and WMD
In-depth Report: Nuclear War

by Ed Pilkington

The Guardian, Friday 20 September 2013

The bomb that nearly exploded over North Carolina was 260 times more powerful than the device which devasted Hiroshima in 1945.

A secret document, published in declassified form for the first time by the Guardian today, reveals that the US Air Force came dramatically close to detonating an atom bomb over North Carolina that would have been 260 times more powerful than the device that devastated Hiroshima.

The document, obtained by the investigative journalist Eric Schlosser under the Freedom of Information Act, gives the first conclusive evidence that the US was narrowly spared a disaster of monumental proportions when two Mark 39 hydrogen bombs were accidentally dropped over Goldsboro, North Carolina on 23 January 1961. The bombs fell to earth after a B-52 bomber broke up in mid-air, and one of the devices behaved precisely as a nuclear weapon was designed to behave in warfare: its parachute opened, its trigger mechanisms engaged, and only one low-voltage switch prevented untold carnage.

Excerpt. Read full report in The Guardian

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/20/usaf-atomic-bomb-north-carolina-1961

Copyright The Guardian, 2013

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