This page shows a simulation of the Topol (SS-25) (currently in Russian arsenal) (800 kt) nuclear bomb (800 kt) detonated over San Francisco, CA, USA. The map displays the estimated fireball, the zones of heavy, moderate and light blast damage, thermal radiation and ionizing radiation. Click «What does that mean?» for a detailed legend, or run your own detonation on the main page.
The 800-kiloton warhead of the Topol (SS-25) is the kind of weapon a strategic missile actually carries today — about 50 Hiroshimas, delivered in roughly 30 minutes. On this map it is an airburst, the height chosen to maximise the area of heavy blast damage. The fireball is about 1.8 km across; total destruction (20 psi) reaches roughly 2.6 km, residential collapse (5 psi) about 6.5 km, third-degree burns on exposed skin about 11.5 km, and broken windows with flying-glass injuries (1 psi) about 20 km.
What that means in San Francisco
Centred on downtown San Francisco, the 2.6 km zone of total destruction covers the Financial District, Union Square, Chinatown, North Beach and the Embarcadero. The 6.5 km collapse ring reaches the Mission, the Castro, the Marina, Alcatraz and the eastern span of the Bay Bridge; burns to 11.5 km cover almost the entire city out to Golden Gate Park, the Sunset's inner streets and Hunters Point, and cross the bay to Treasure Island. The 20 km ring of broken windows takes in Oakland, Berkeley, Alameda, Daly City and Sausalito.
About 800,000 people live in the city proper and about 3 million inside the outer ring. San Francisco's hills — Twin Peaks, Nob Hill, Potrero — matter here: switch on terrain shadows to see which western neighbourhoods would be shielded from the flash. The Bay absorbs a large part of the blast energy to the east. For the whole Bay Area in one ring, see the 100-megaton version.
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