Red Hammer 1994

The split-second pause was broken by a loud cracking noise heard for tens of miles as the vicious blast wave rolled smoothly outward like a stone thrown in a still pond, traveling at the speed of sound. After the initial scorching flush of ultraviolet rays in the first tenth of a second, the nuclear cloud caught its breath then belched forth the full fury of its thermal energy in the visible and infrared wavelengths in a second horrific thermal pulse lasting several se-conds. Combustible material out to almost two miles was instantly incinerated, long before the arrival of the blast wave or the sound of the detonation. The fireball jerked violently upward, sucking up the weapon debris and dirt, rising at hundreds of feet per second. A close observer would swear the earth was vomiting its molten core. Cooling rapidly, it formed an expanding, reddish-brown nuclear cloud of vaporized material and water vapor, later to be dumped as lethal fallout far downwind from the explosion.

The monstrous detonation dug a crater over 180 feet deep and nearly 750 feet across. It was rimmed with a neat, concentric bank of pulverized ejecta that extended the total disfigurement of the earth to a third of a mile in diameter. The surrounding landscape out to three-quarters of a mile from ground zero was mangled, looking like the surface of the moon.

At one point eight seconds, the blast wave, now traveling at over seven hundred miles per hour, had surged to one mile, exerting twenty pounds per square inch of overpressure and packing unbelievable 490 mile per hour winds. Only 60 percent of the thermal energy had been deposited in those brief two seconds, but any exposed, living organism was cremated by over two hundred calories per centimeter squared, bursting into flames like dry wood long before they would be swept away by the rushing winds. To the east, the Twin Bridges Marriot was obliterated, while to the south the invisible tidal wave of death devastated the Crystal City complex, leaving only twisted steel skeletons amid the flames, smoke, dust, and flying debris. Not a living soul was left.

The shock front rushed inexorably onward, unstoppable by any man-made object. At three seconds, it skimmed over the still surface of the Potomac, boiling the waters, collapsing the near ends of the numerous bridges to the east and twisting the rest into unrecognizable forms. Its ferocity roiled the surface of the Tidal Basin, only superficially scarring the smooth, rounded, Jefferson Memorial, while the boxy Lincoln Memorial to the northeast lay decapitated. To the southeast, the busy Washington national airport was literally blown skyward by hurricane winds with parked airliners popping like firecrackers from detonating fuel, shredded into kindling.

The first prominent federal office buildings, the Department of State, the Federal Reserve, the Bureau of Engraving, survived the vicious onslaught. Their massive granite block construction withstood the attack of eight psi overpressure and 240 mile per hour winds, standing scarred by thermal energy and debris. Their windows had all been blown out, with all interior walls and furnishings torn to pieces and in flames.

At six point five seconds, the deadly destruction extended past two miles. The deluge slackened, unleashing its energy over greater and greater surface areas for each linear increment of travel. Overpressure was a mere five psi, enough to trash residences and light commercial structures and shatter windows and blow unfortunate inhabitants out of tall commercial buildings. Those in the open would become airborne at over thirty feet per second, thrown about like rag dolls, battered and broken. Death would come from impact or by flying debris, if they hadn’t been hideously burned by over 70 kilocalories per square centimeter. Surviving structures provided protection from the ravages of thermal effects, which need uninterrupted line-of-sight to kill. This only meant fewer prompt casualties, but more lingering deaths. The benefit of a ground burst with a reduced destructive radius was offset by the hellish fallout which would curse downwind survivors for weeks.

The shock front traversed the Ellipse and visited the White House, leaving a scene reminiscent from storms, which occasionally pounded the East Coast. Trees were ripped out by their roots, charred, denuded of leaves. Debris covered the grounds, now brown and gray in the rapidly fading light. The majestic house was scorched, pitted and marred, with a few windows curiously intact. It stood defiantly amid smoldering ruin. Vehicles were thrown about on the surrounding streets, some protruded bizarrely from adjacent buildings.