Question about power of a hurricane

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cancunkid
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Question about power of a hurricane

#1 Postby cancunkid » Wed Sep 21, 2005 6:27 pm

Okay I read on here a while back that a hurricane expends in 10 minutes energy equal to all the nuclear weapons on earth. Does anyone know where I can find this information in print other than this site? I am arguing how stupid the idea of bombing a hurricane is to someone who is just not getting how huge and powerful a hurricane is. Anyone know where I can find the information on the power of a hurricane in terms of nuclear bombs?
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dolebot_Broward_NW
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#2 Postby dolebot_Broward_NW » Wed Sep 21, 2005 6:51 pm

http://www.habitablezone.com/space/messages/394196.html

Somewhere around 10,000 megatons output per 24 hour period. This is just an estimate, unknown what the windspeeds and such are, but I would imagine it was a rather average hurricane.

Since the largest weapon ever created was "Tsar Bomba" by the USSR and had an output of 58 megatons, in order to even MATCH the power of a hurricane, you would need to detonate 172 of the devices over 24 hours. It is questionable as to whether they were even made. Look at the table. Our worldwide nuclear yield doesn't even come close to that number.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/nuclear/multimeg.html

In all likelihood ADDING heat to a hurricane in a futile attempt (to do what, BLOW AIR apart?) will likely end up making in stronger by heating the immediate ocean water, it will ADD energy to a very energetic storm, and lets not even talk about irradiated water flying around at 165 mph spreading contamination over the entire earths surface.

These days (post cold-war), our nukes are typically measured in kilotons, not megatons, and our MIRV delivery systems aren't well suited to blast a single target with EVERYTHING WE'VE GOT.
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Greg
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#3 Postby Greg » Wed Sep 21, 2005 7:14 pm

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cancunkid
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#4 Postby cancunkid » Wed Sep 21, 2005 7:28 pm

Thank you both. It was exactly what I needed. I hate arguing without something to back it up.
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