What damage would a Mark IX really do to a planet?

[Itzan]

The Mark IX was stated by Mitchell in Beachhead to be able to Vaporize an area of about 100 mile radius, thats 320 Kilometers in Diameter. Now the biggest bomb actually built and tested in reality, the Tsar Bomba, had a fireball of about 4.6 Kilometers in Diameter, and a Max yield of 100 Megatons. Since the Mark IX's could vaporise an area about 69 times larger, I'm going to assume it's packing about 6.9 Gigatons of power on it, at least. Now the shockwave from the Tsar Bomba was powerful enough to knock out windows in Finland, hundreds of kilometers away. Not to mention it was felt over most of the world.

So, if the Mark IX was detonated on out planet here, what would be the overall effect to it? How much of the population would be killed my it? Assuming it was detonated in the optimal position under optimal condions.

[R. Woolsey]

(...) Since the Mark IX's could vaporise an area about 69 times larger, (...)

No, the area would be ~ 4840 times larger (that's the square of 69).
For the Tsar-bomb:
100 MT TNT -> d = 4,6 km
A = r² * pi
= 2,6²km * pi = 21 km²

And now the Mark IX:
d = 320 km
A = 160²km * pi = 80424 km²

80424 km² / 21 km² = 4840
So the power also must be 4840 times more:
100 MT TNT * 4840 = 484 GT TNT = 484000 MT TNT

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._by_population
You could kill more than 34,400,000 people with that bomb.

Forgive me, if I made any spelling or grammar errors. I'm from Germany.

[Crazedwraith]

The term 'extinction event' comes to mind.

[Mister Oragahn]

The Mark IX was stated by Mitchell in Beachhead to be able to Vaporize an area of about 100 mile radius, thats 320 Kilometers in Diameter. Now the biggest bomb actually built and tested in reality, the Tsar Bomba, had a fireball of about 4.6 Kilometers in Diameter, and a Max yield of 100 Megatons. Since the Mark IX's could vaporise an area about 69 times larger, I'm going to assume it's packing about 6.9 Gigatons of power on it, at least. Now the shockwave from the Tsar Bomba was powerful enough to knock out windows in Finland, hundreds of kilometers away. Not to mention it was felt over most of the world.

So, if the Mark IX was detonated on out planet here, what would be the overall effect to it? How much of the population would be killed my it? Assuming it was detonated in the optimal position under optimal condions.

Tsar Bomba was downgraded to 50 MT, by fear of the results of a full yield detonation.

The gatebuster would have, at least, the ability to vapourize most things on the surface over a radius of 160.9 km, which makes the yield at least 812 gigatons.

That's not even close to an extinction event, but it would mess up a portion of the biosphere for some time.

[thekillman]

more like, mass extinction level event, dustcloud, 3 years of total darkness, immense residue radiation, and a new sea. or grand canyon. mutations, immense pollution.


in two words: bad idea

[Mister Oragahn]

more like, mass extinction level event, dustcloud, 3 years of total darkness, immense residue radiation, and a new sea. or grand canyon. mutations, immense pollution.


in two words: bad idea

A 100 teratons asteroid crash didn't even kill all life. The gatebuster is far below that.
But yes, it's a baaaad idea.
It starts to give some credence to Kinsey's speech.

[thekillman]

have you seen the sensor data on asuras? i mean, it was a dwarf planet judging the size of the explosions, but hey, the dust would atleast call in a month of darkness, not to mention if it accidentaly hits a supervolcano. the tectonic plates will be screwed up too. toss it in the water or even near it, and you got a supertsunami. the radiative cloud alone will be too devastating for words. the entire blast area [which is the size of my country, BTW. so above france, and next to germany, there would just be a piece of sea, and what remains of belgium and the ruhr region wont be really much. if the wind faces england, then every crop and animal there would have to be destroyed due to radiative poisoning. and fising in the entire ocean would be ill adviced, due to toxic fish, radioactive water and materials raining down from the residue cloud, and fish migrate, so its a massive AOE. if it faces germany, all of europe would be screwed from the radiative residue. not to metion the dust cloud. the shockwave, if tsara bomba does it from nova scotia to finland, then the shockwave will destroy every window in europe, and reach up to russia. a tsunami will form too, and i cant calculate the damage there. but if we dutch havent completed project New Orleans, then expect similar stuff along the coast of america.
there are no tectonic cracks nearby, but toss it onto a crack, and expect an earthquake. toss it in a volcano, and expect a lava lake with toxic gasses combined with the usual stuff. toss it on tokio and they have even less land to build on. unless its tossed onto a mountain, in which case their valleys have become MUCH bigger, even though they would be below sea level.
put it on the southpole, and expect some 8cm of water level increase

[thekillman]

and do you have ANY clue how awesomely hard it is to kill all life on earth? all those lifeforms on the bottom of the sea wont notice much. the deep, deep sea i mean

[Mister Oragahn]

...

...

I exactly told you that the gatebuster, with its yield, was no where an extinction event, and all you wrote in those last two posts pretty much supports this, contrary to your initial claim.

Ah never mind.

[thekillman]

what i meant to say is, its bad anyways. its bad, bad, bad bad bad bad bad bad bad. it wont KILL all life as i intially though[unless the planet is something like Asuras sized], but it would do ALOT of damage carrying on for dozens of generations of both animal and human

[Andru10]

A "salted" bomb, or cobalt bomb (a thermonuclear weapon with cobalt casing) could release sufficient radiation to wipe out all major life on Earth and is considered a Doomsday Weapon. I imagine a Mark IX releases a lot more radiation...

[thekillman]

look at the sensor data in First strike. its all totally red. which means superlethal radiation

[ManiacMike]

I did that a while ago to see the explosions compared to earth.

Add in the shock waves and the force the shock waves do when they collide, the planet is basically dead.

[Dragon_Heart]

Well, pretty much death to the planet's eco system and kill most of the present dominant species (humans)
The blast would cause dust clouds that would not clear for who knows how many years, the radiation would be present for millions of years also.
So, you would not be able to go anywhere near the blast radius x2 (perhaps)
since the radiation and dust clouds would spread.
If i was on that planet, i'd jump through the gate at the first chance i get.

[jnadreth]

Or raise shields