Today we’re dropping a big bomb
into the deepest part of the ocean.
So grab a surfboard and get ready
to hang ten on the waves
of a massive nuclear tsunami.
Welcome to the deepest,
darkest depths of the ocean.
The Mariana Trench is located
in the western Pacific ocean,
just 360 km (225 mi) away from
the island of Guam.
You’ll be traveling down 11 km (7 mi)
to Challenger Deep,
the deepest point of the trench.
Here, you could stack about
30 Empire State buildings
on top of each other
before hitting the surface.
You’d be among the brave few to venture
into these high-pressure, pitch-black
and near-freezing waters.
Joining the company of scientists,
a naval officer and even filmmaker
James Cameron.
But you’ll be carrying
the most precious cargo of all.
The biggest nuclear bomb ever made.
Back on land,
your most precious cargo lies in the device you're using to watch me.
Your data.
And if you want to protect yourself on land,
sea or air,
you'll need Bitdefender.
I spend most of my days online
and in meetings in this remote environment.
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If you don't keep your data safe,
you may have to dump your hard drive
at the bottom of this trench.
OK, wait, before you worry
about what would happen
if you exploded a bomb
at the bottom of the trench,
you’d want to figure out
how to get it there safely.
If a bomb accidentally exploded
near the surface,
it could be dangerous for many people.
You could think of it
as a massive nuclear tsunami.
Waves hundreds of meters high,
spreading out in all directions.
This could create a hazardous situation
for the islands
neighboring the Mariana Trench.
Like Guam,
Japan or the Philippines.
Luckily, these waves
would behave differently
than your regular tsunami waves.
They would break earlier.
That means they’d be smaller
and less catastrophic
when they reached land.
But still better to avoid this crisis
and get that bomb safely down
into the trench.
To do this, you’d have to protect it
from extremely high pressures.
At the bottom of the trench,
the pressure is so high
it would be like having
one hundred adult elephants on your head.
You would want to use
a special pressure vessel
to transport the bomb.
Just like Operation Wigwam.
In 1955, the U.S. detonated a bomb
at a depth of 600 m (2,000 ft).
It was twice as powerful
as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
The explosion generated a massive bubble
across the water.
And deadly radioactive contamination
spread across 13 sq km (5 sq mi).
But your bomb would be
the largest nuke ever created,
more like the Tsar Bomba.
This nuclear weapon was over 3,000 times
more powerful than Little Boy,
the bomb dropped on Nagasaki.
And you’d have to take it much,
much deeper than the Wigwam test.
At the moment of detonation,
a bubble of hot steam
would expand rapidly.
In just a few seconds,
it would cover
an area of about 1 km (0.6 mi).
On the surface,
you’d see a massive bulge in the water.
But it wouldn't reach great heights.
That’s because you
would detonate the bomb
so deep that the water pressure above
would cause the bubble to collapse.
But within a few seconds,
that bubble would shrink
and then start to expand outward again.
This expansion and contraction
would continue for three or four cycles.
This would leave the water turbulent,
hot and mixed with radioactive debris.
At least no neighboring coastal cities
would have to worry
about being wiped out by a tsunami.
But you certainly wouldn’t
see the effects ending there.
The increased temperatures
from the explosion
could create intense hurricanes.
And the turbulent waters
and radioactive material
would have adverse
effects on marine life.
There would be mass casualties
from the explosion.
And deep-sea fish
could be blinded
by the bright flash of light.
Over time, you could see unexpected
or surprising effects
on the ecosystems
near the detonation site.
There are corals as big as cars
after the 23 detonations at the U.S.
nuclear testing site on Bikini Atoll.
Not to mention an abundance of aquatic
animal life.
But you could see
mutations of marine life after a while.
Maybe this could make a real-life
Godzilla monster.
But that sounds like a story
for another WHAT IF.
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