Atomic bomb lost Off Georgia in 1958?

[Revtim]

@barbitu8

http://archives.postandcourier.com/archive/arch04/0204/arc02081574705.shtml

http://archives.postandcourier.com/archive/arch04/0704/arc07211832205.shtml

This site appears to require username/passwords.

[commasense]

Guess what: that’s not the only one that’s missing. See here.

March 10, 1956, Over the Mediterranean Sea
A B-47 bomber carrying two nuclear weapon cores in their carrying cases disappeared over the Mediterranean Sea. … Despite an extensive search, no trace of the aircraft, the nuclear weapon cores, or crew, were ever found.

July 28, 1957, Over the Atlantic Ocean
A C-124 transport aircraft that was having mechanical problems jettisoned two nuclear weapons without their fissile cores off the east coast of the United States. … Although neither weapon detonated, both are presumed to have been damaged from impact with the ocean surface and to have sunk almost instantly. Neither the weapons nor debris were ever found.

February 5, 1958, Savannah River, Georgia
[The one in the OP.]

September 25, 1959, Off Whidbey Island, Washington
A U.S. Navy P-5M aircraft carrying an unarmed nuclear depth charge without its fissile core crashed into Puget Sound near Whidbey Island, Washington. The weapon was never recovered.

January 24, 1961, Goldsboro, North Carolina
In what nearly became a nuclear catastrophe, a B-52 bomber on airborne alert carrying two nuclear weapons broke apart in midair. The B-52 experienced structural failure in its right wing and the aircraft’s resulting breakup released the two weapons from a height of 2,000-10,000 feet. One of the bomb’s parachutes deployed properly and that weapon’s damage was minimal. However, the second bomb’s parachute malfunctioned and the weapon broke apart upon impact, scattering its components over a wide area. According to Daniel Ellsberg, the weapon could have accidentally fired because “five of the six safety devices had failed.” Nuclear physicist Ralph E. Lapp supported this assertion, saying that “only a single switch” had “prevented the bomb from detonating and spreading fire and destruction over a wide area.”

Despite an extensive search of the waterlogged farmland where the weapon was believed to have landed, the bomb’s highly enriched uranium core was never recovered. In order to prevent any discovery of the lost portion of the weapon, the Air Force purchased an easement which required that permission be obtained before any construction or digging could begin in the area.

[This is the one I knew about before finding this link.]

December 5, 1965, Aboard the USS Ticonderoga (CVA-14) in the Pacific Ocean
An A-4E Skyhawk strike aircraft carrying a nuclear weapon rolled off an elevator on the U.S. aircraft carrier Ticonderoga and fell into the sea. Because the bomb was lost at a depth of approximately 16,000 feet, Pentagon officials feared that intense water pressure could have caused the B-43 hydrogen bomb to explode. It is still unknown whether an explosion did occur. The pilot, aircraft, and weapon were lost.

Spring 1968, Aboard the USS Scorpion (SSN-589) in the Atlantic Ocean
Although the Pentagon has not publicly released details of the accident, it probably refers to the nuclear powered attack submarine USS Scorpion that was lost at sea. The sub, carrying unidentified nuclear weapons, was last heard from on May 21, 1968.

Looks like threemae and Northern Piper may be gone longer than they expected.

[Tuckerfan]

Oh great, now the terrorists will know where to look! You’ve doomed us all! :eek:

[strangecurrencies]

The Goldsboro incident Commasense mentioned happened less than 10 miles from where my family lived, (I was four years old at the time), at a little rural crossroads called Faro. It gives me the willies to think about what might have been (or who might not have been ) :eek: even now. Here is a fascinating account of it, with pictures: http://www.ibiblio.org/bomb/index.html

[barbitu8]

@Revtim

This site appears to require username/passwords.

Well, someone actually tried to link to those sites. OK. Those columns are copyrighted, but under the “fair use” doctrine, I will quote snippets, omitting facts already posted and other facts I deemed not important.

Duke, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, and Parker, a Tybee Island treasure hunter and former boat-racer, think they have found a hydrogen bomb in the shallows of Wassau Sound, about 20 miles from downtown Savannah.

An Air Force bomber dropped the weapon in 1958 after a mid-air collision with a fighter. Crews searched for the bomb without success, and for the next 46 years the military deemed it “irretrievably lost.”

Duke and Parker say the bomb is neither lost nor irretrievable.

They don’t know exactly where it is but think they have identified its general location based on radiation readings and data they’ve collected over the past several years. “We could find it in less than a day,” Parker says over the boat’s din, adding he thinks it’s buried under a few feet of mud. Pinpointing its location would require money and more sophisticated equipment, they say.

Their claims have fueled a new debate about whether the old bomb is a threat to public safety or, as the Air Force says, is relatively benign and better left alone. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Duke and Parker say, make this debate all the more pressing.
[snip]
Despite a good deal of evidence to back up the Air Force’s position, Duke and Parker aren’t convinced [that there is no danger]. Based on a declassified document they acquired and their own investigation, they think the bomb might be armed with its plutonium trigger or contain other plutonium components. At the very least, it contains weapons-grade uranium they say shouldn’t be left unguarded.[snip]
They say financial considerations are secondary. As the boat closes in on the target, Duke says one of the most serious threats facing the nation is the possibility that terrorists could obtain enough weapons-grade uranium to build an atomic bomb. “This is not a hobby,” Duke says. “I believe this is a threat to the USA.”
[snip]
Meanwhile, Doug Keeney, a military historian, had been doing research on “Broken Arrows,” the military’s name for lost nuclear bombs.

A friend at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., sent him a box of recently declassified letters, including one written in 1966 about the Savannah bomb.

The letter was written by W. J. Howard, then-assistant Secretary of Defense, to a congressional committee interested in lost nuclear bombs.

In the letter, Howard identified two incidents in which “complete” nuclear bombs, bombs with plutonium capsules installed, were lost. One involved a fighter that fell off an aircraft carrier near Japan in 1965. The other was the one in 1958 near Savannah.
[snip]
Mullins said several agencies other than the Air Force, including the Navy and the Department of Energy, looked at the matter three years ago. “We did as much of an independent look as we could without violating the release of classified information.”

Air Force records show that crews didn’t use live nuclear weapons on training missions during that time, he said.

The military carefully tracks each nuclear bomb. “We know where that weapon went from the time it was built, to the time it was destroyed, what was done to it, when it stood on alert, and what we found was that it was not anywhere near the capsule at the time of the flight,” Mullins said.

Mullins is backed up by Eric Longabardi, an investigative reporter who has done several exposes on the Pentagon, including a documentary for the History Channel called “America’s Lost Bombs.”

Longabardi said he uncovered documents showing that plutonium capsules weren’t stored at the Homestead, Fla., base, the base where Richardson and his B-47 crew were stationed. “I’m not a big apologist for the DOD, but in this case, they’re telling the truth. The bomb isn’t going to go mushroom,” he says.

The missing bomb contains highly enriched uranium, Mullins said. The exact amount is classified. He is adamant that terrorists can’t recycle the missing bomb’s uranium into a new atomic bomb. Why that’s the case, he won’t say.
[snip]
If they or someone else does find the bomb, Duke says, it puts the Air Force in a dilemma: If the bomb is safe, why not dig it up? But if it’s too dangerous to dig up, why are they saying it’s safe?

Most documents support the Air Force’s contention that the bomb was not armed with a plutonium capsule.

Still, the debate is an important one. When armed, the Mark 15’s explosive power was 100 times greater than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. The suspected location is about 100 miles from Charleston.

The military searched for the bomb in 1958 but gave up after three months.

In recent months, the Tybee bomb story has received international attention, and a National Geographic crew documented Tuesday’s search, Duke said.

The search took place in Wassau Sound, a shallow area near Tybee beach. “We launched at dawn, and the water was like glass.” Duke and four others put a string of sea buoys in a radiation hot spot and then went back and forth with radiation detection equipment. “That’s how we established ground zero.”

[The_Long_Road]

December 5, 1965, Aboard the USS Ticonderoga (CVA-14) in the Pacific Ocean
An A-4E Skyhawk strike aircraft carrying a nuclear weapon rolled off an elevator on the U.S. aircraft carrier Ticonderoga and fell into the sea. Because the bomb was lost at a depth of approximately 16,000 feet, Pentagon officials feared that intense water pressure could have caused the B-43 hydrogen bomb to explode. It is still unknown whether an explosion did occur. The pilot, aircraft, and weapon were lost.

How much does that suck? You are sitting in the aircraft when it rolls off the carrier and you sink to the bottom of the ocean. I wonder if the guy was knocked out on impact or was aware of the entire descent until he drown/was crushed.

[busterpickle]

I mean, it’s not like a standard fishing trawler could pick one up, right? You’d definately need one of those larger ships designed to recover heavy loads from down below.

Plus, years of corrosion in salt water would possibly make it rather brittle? Would you really want to lift up a crusty old bomb with the risk of contaminating the water and sea life in that area. Or, yourself? Probably would want to encase it in cement then lift it. I would.

Probably best left alone like the military said.

[ralph124c]

Now that the Airforce has abandoned all efforts to find this bomb, is it MY property if I am able to find and raise it? How much is 500 lb. of uranium worth? Perhaps I could make money by exhibiting the bomb at county fairs around the country…I like the idea of people being able to ride the bomb like Slim Pickens in DOCTOR STRANGELOVE…yee-hah!

[mks57]

@ralph124c

Now that the Airforce has abandoned all efforts to find this bomb, is it MY property if I am able to find and raise it? How much is 500 lb. of uranium worth? Perhaps I could make money by exhibiting the bomb at county fairs around the country…I like the idea of people being able to ride the bomb like Slim Pickens in DOCTOR STRANGELOVE…yee-hah!

No, not without the federal and state licenses needed to possess high explosives and a destructive device. I’m sure the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would require a license for the highly-enriched uranium.

[Ranchoth]

Well, how far off the coast did the thing get lost? Maybe if (BIG “if.” Unlikely “if.”) it’s in international waters…

Eh, you’d probably have better luck trying to get the nukes off the wreck of the Scorpion, which we actually know the location of. (Good luck trying to covertly salavage something two miles down, though.)

[barbitu8]

@Ranchoth

Well, how far off the coast did the thing get lost?

As per my cite:

about 20 miles from downtown Savannah.

[Mr.Blue_Sky]

@electronbee

Probably best left alone like the military said.

That’s what a lot of the locals want.
(I live in Savannah, btw)

[Colophon]

You know, I’d have thought that by now somebody would have pounced on the obvious set up and treated us to a lame parody of the “All your base” thing. You know a craze has died when even a “missing nuclear bomb” thread doesn’t kick it into life…