a bomb
Ever since the dawn of time man has found new ways of killing each other. The most destructive way of killing people known to man would have to be the atomic bomb. The reason why the atomic bomb is so destructive is that when it is detonated, it has more than one effect. The effects of the atomic bomb are so great that Nikita Khrushchev said that the survivors would envy the dead (International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, 1982). These devastating physical effects come from the atomic bomb's blast, the atomic bomb's thermal radiation, and the atomic bomb's nuclear radiation. An atomic bomb is any weapon that gets its destructive power from an atom. This power comes when the matter inside of the atoms is transformed into energy. The process by which this is done is known as fission. The only two atoms suitable for fissioning are the uranium isotope U-235 and the plutonium isotope Pu-239 (OutlawLabs). Fission occurs when a neutron, a subatomic particle with no electrical charge, strikes the nucleus of one of these isotopes and causes it to split apart. When the nucleus is split, a large amount of energy is produced, and more free neutrons are also released.
This causes the subcritical mass to be compressed into a smaller volume, thus creating a supercritical mass to be formed. Because of thsidramatic change in the pressure most of the cities were destroyed. The cuclear radiation comes in the form of either Gamma rays or Beta particles. A fireball is created by the blast, which consists mainly of dust and gasses. The second type of atomic bomb is an implosion bomb. As this blast wave moves, it creates static overpressure. The blast pressure and fireball together only last for approximately eleven seconds, but because it contaitns fifty percent of the atomic bomb's latent energy a great deal of destruction occures (The Committee for the Compilation of Materials on Damage Caused by the Atomic Bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 1981). Flash burns can be either first degree burns (bad sun burns), second degree burns ( blisters, infections, and scars), or third degree burns (destroyed skin tissue). In Hiroshima the blast from the atomic bomb was measured to be about four and a half to six and seven tenths tons of pressure per square mere, while in Nagasaki the blast was measured to be about six to eight tons of pressure per square meter (International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, 1982). A firestorm is violent, has raging winds, and has extremely hightemperatures; but fortunately it does not spread very rapidly. In Hiroshima, the initial nuclear radiation was spread over a distance of approximately fifty-three hundredths of a kilometer. If this process is repeated, a self-sustaining chain reaction will occur, and it is this chain reaction that causes the atomic bomb to have its destructive power (World Book, 1990). With statistics like these it is clearly seen that Pope John Paul II was right when he said, "Any nuclear war would inevitably cause death, disease, and suffering of pandemic proportions and without the possibility of effective medical intervention.
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