Radioactive hazard resulting from the explosions of a ‘clean’ hydrogen bomb and of a conventional fission bomb

An estimate is made of the danger to the world population arising from the creation of long-lived radioactive isotopes in nuclear explosions and from their dissemination over the globe. An ordinary fission bomb and a clean hydrogen bomb, taken to be a deuterium-tritium reaction, are considered. With a hydrogen bomb the principal agents are 14C and ⁸H, and with an ordinary bomb ⁹⁰Sr, ¹³⁷Cs and 1°C. The doses delivered to the gonads and bones are calculated, and this leads to figures for the number of people born subsequently with hereditary defects and the number of cases of leukaemia (cancer of the blood). In this calculation the distribution of radioisotopes in animate and in inanimate matter is taken into account. The special aspects of a ground-level hydrogen explosion are considered. The total amount of energy liberated in radioactive decay by products of the explosion is three times greater in the case of a deuterium-tritium bomb than for an ordinary bomb. However, taking an estimate over the whole period of decay of the reaction products, it is found that ten-megaton bombs of the two types give rise to roughly the same dose of radiation to the tissues, and claim approximately the same number of victims. In round figures we expect: Deuterium-tritium bombFission bomb Dose to the tissues50,000 x 10⁻⁶ r40,000 x 10⁻⁶ r, Dose to the bones50,000 x 10⁻⁶ r88,000 x 10⁻⁶ r Number of mutations (in a population of 2·5 x 10⁹)50,00040,000 Number of cases of leukaemia (in a population of 2·5 x 108)15,00026,000 Thus on the score of radiation injury to the world population, a clean hydrogen bomb operating by the reaction of. deuterium and tritium cannot be considered less dangerous than an ordinary atomic bomb.