Killing a Tornado

Kitsune · Post by **Kitsune** » 2005-05-04 07:09pm

I was watching Nova last night and it was about storm chasers.
One of the statements was that there is no way to stop a tornado.

I am curious about the truth of this. The idea I am thinking about is extreme but I am just talking on the theoretical side.

What happens if you thow a small nuke and detonate it in the middle of a tornado. Would it disrupt the storm.

Castor Troy · Post by **Castor Troy** » 2005-05-04 07:13pm

Wierd, I was just wondering about detonating a bomb as well. I mean, a tornado is just wind movements, and I assume that a large enough blast would disrupt it.

BlkbrryTheGreat · Post by **BlkbrryTheGreat** » 2005-05-04 07:25pm

Kitsune wrote:I was watching Nova last night and it was about storm chasers.
One of the statements was that there is no way to stop a tornado.

I am curious about the truth of this. The idea I am thinking about is extreme but I am just talking on the theoretical side.

What happens if you thow a small nuke and detonate it in the middle of a tornado. Would it disrupt the storm.

It would work... but its impractical. To draw an analogy, its like burning your house down to get rid of the termites.

Zero · Post by **Zero** » 2005-05-04 09:05pm

A better analogy would be burning the neighborhood down to eliminate termites... a nuke would be a bit much. The radioactivity remaining would also suck... it just wouldn't make sense. A smaller bomb, perhaps.

Kitsune · Post by **Kitsune** » 2005-05-04 09:12pm

Zero132132 wrote:A better analogy would be burning the neighborhood down to eliminate termites... a nuke would be a bit much. The radioactivity remaining would also suck... it just wouldn't make sense. A smaller bomb, perhaps.

Well, I was wondering about smaller bombs as well but was just testing teh supreme level of it.

wolveraptor · Post by **wolveraptor** » 2005-05-04 09:27pm

I think he was just wondering about what would happen, not about practical methods of tornado prevention.

Anyways, a nuke would obviously do the trick. Hell, it might even blow the cumulonimbus apart, if you detonate it right. And I'm fairly certain that radiation in the upper atmosphere would be less harmful than on Earth.

Enola Straight · Post by **Enola Straight** » 2005-05-04 10:43pm

What if a C-130 flew over the epicenter of the funnel and dumped a shitload of dry ice or silver bromide or some other shit which radically changes the local temperature and humidity?

Post by **LadyTevar** » 2005-05-04 11:20pm

Enola Straight wrote:What if a C-130 flew over the epicenter of the funnel and dumped a shitload of dry ice or silver bromide or some other shit which radically changes the local temperature and humidity?

Now that's an interesting idea. But I don't know if that would be enough to stop the rotation.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2005-05-05 02:39am

What if we set up a huge projection of Battlefield Earth? The supreme suckage of that movie might disrupt the tornado.

It might even have the double benefit of luring Scientologists into the tornado. Two loons with one stone as it were.

Utsanomiko · Post by **Utsanomiko** » 2005-05-05 02:52am

[Sgt Ermey]No, no, NO! You gotta nuke the tornado! You gotta fly a B2 overhead and you drop a goddamn fifty-kiloton atomic warhead down the sonnovabitch twister's EYE![/Sgt Ermey]

SpacedTeddyBear · Post by **SpacedTeddyBear** » 2005-05-05 03:07am

Take all the electric fans in the area, turn it to the highest setting, and point it towards the tornado.

Rye · Post by **Rye** » 2005-05-05 07:10am

I always liked the idea of having a really enormous metal plate or something and just sticking that right through the tornado, killing the air flow.

Terr Fangbite · Post by **Terr Fangbite** » 2005-05-05 09:20am

Remind me not to go to the midwest. These nuclear tests to determine if you can stop a tornado seem worse than just dealing with it.

Ra · Post by Ra » 2005-05-05 02:33pm

If not a nuke, would a Daisy Cutter suffice?

- Ra

Lancer · Post by **Lancer** » 2005-05-05 02:43pm

Ra wrote:If not a nuke, would a Daisy Cutter suffice?
- Ra

why not an MOAB? that's got a yield around a kiloton.

Post by **Beowulf** » 2005-05-05 03:31pm

Matt Huang wrote:
Ra wrote:If not a nuke, would a Daisy Cutter suffice?
- Ra
why not an MOAB? that's got a yield around a kiloton.

Err... More like 10 tons... 18,700 pounds of HE. I'm giving the benefit of the doubt, and saying it's filled with something stronger than straight TNT.

Kitsune · Post by **Kitsune** » 2005-05-05 04:42pm

Beowulf wrote:Err... More like 10 tons... 18,700 pounds of HE. I'm giving the benefit of the doubt, and saying it's filled with something stronger than straight TNT.

Can you imagine that you have a Tv show where they are talking about how a tornado is unstoppable and they are filming a Tornado. Suddently, a bomber drops one into a Tornado, blowing it apart. You are left with a gaping mouthed TV host.

Post by **Surlethe** » 2005-05-05 06:08pm

Kitsune wrote:Can you imagine that you have a Tv show where they are talking about how a tornado is unstoppable and they are filming a Tornado. Suddently, a bomber drops one into a Tornado, blowing it apart. You are left with a gaping mouthed TV host.

If it's that 50 kt nuke, there probably wouldn't be much left of the camera. But that'd be pretty damned cool to see, nonetheless:

"And here, we see the tornado in full swing, twisting across the prairie --"

*Bright flash of light; camera goes dead*

"-- Jesus Fucking Christ, what was that?!"

Marksist · Post by **Marksist** » 2005-05-05 07:03pm

What if we set up a huge projection of Battlefield Earth? The supreme suckage of that movie might disrupt the tornado.

Damn man, that's the funniest thing I've heard all day.

wilfulton · Post by **wilfulton** » 2005-05-05 10:03pm

The MOAB is filled with Tritonal, which is about 18% more powerful than TNT. Here's a little bit that I found on almighty Google:

"The MOAB is built by Dynetics and contains approximately 18,000 pounds of tritonal. Tritonal is a mixture of TNT (80%) and aluminum powder (20%). The aluminum improves the brisance of the TNT -- the speed at which the explosive develops its maximum pressure. The addition of aluminum makes tritonal about 18% more powerful than TNT alone. "
-howstuffworks.com

Looks like the equivalent of about 21,240 lbs of TNT. Still enough to really ruin your day.

Zero · Post by **Zero** » 2005-05-06 07:45am

I must wonder what degree of force it would take to disrupt a tornado enough to actually stop it. Most ideas mentioned here are either hillarious, or use a bit too much force to be practical. What kind of force would it take?

Ra · Post by Ra » 2005-05-06 11:59am

Practically, since a tornado is heat transfer gone out of control, any force that would equalize the temperature would suffice. Heat up the cool upper atmospheric air, or cool down the lower air. How one is to heat up the upper atmosphere effectively enough to kill a tornado is beyond my expertise, but that would be far easier than cooling the lower air down.
- Ra

Montcalm · Post by **Montcalm** » 2005-05-06 12:10pm

In this French comic book(Bande Dessinée) they blow two nukes in a tornado.

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