>>142514
>how much should I worry about a nuclear apocalypse?
Not going to happen.
Not because of the meme that "
No one is going to use nukes", but because nukes are highly exaggerated thanks to Pedowood.
First of all, nuclear fallout occurs whenever nukes actually
STRIKE an area. The explosion physically contaminates the surrounding environment as it shoots all that dust and debris into the air.
HOWEVER, nukes do not operate like this. Nuclear weapons are designed to detonate
BEFORE they hit their target as the ensuing blast actually causes more devastation than if they strike their target directly.
But, what about the blast? The short version is that nukes are a one time weapon that can only take out an are smaller than San Francisco. Devastating, yes, but also look at what that entails. While half of San Francisco would be gone due to it being the epicenter, the rest of the city would just be destroyed in varying degrees (Either completely or none at all) as a result of the ensuing shock-waves from the blast, with everything outside of the city remaining fine (Outside of the debris that comes flying out).
Now, if
The Telegraph is to be believed, there are currently 15,000 nukes around the world, only 10k which are operable:
https://archive.fo/ruTyS
Not done. Now, despite all those nukes being available, the New START treaty from 2010 reduced those numbers even further:
https://infogalactic.com/info/New_START
To where, as of 2015, the U.S. and Russia cannot have anymore than 1500 nukes on standby, totaling up to 3k nukes that can be launched at any time. On top of that, there's there near 1300 nukes that every other country has, but no listings of how many are operable:
https://archive.fo/vMfWb
So, when you get down to it, of the original 15k nukes that are in the wild, less than a quarter can be fired at a moments notice.
But, I'm not done there. If logic would tell you anything, one of the places you would strike as a general would be all of those missile silos that are housing those nukes, of which there are around 2000, to prevent any further deployment of them. So, subtracting from around 4000 nukes that would be launched at a moment's notice, that leaves 2000 left that will be used to bomb somewhere else. Majority of which would be civilian hotspots, capitals, and military bases. But, how much devastation would could that cause just on destruction alone? If you totaled up the fact that a nuke can take out San Francisco (Which is 121 square miles), and multiplied that with the 2k nukes that would still be used, not accounting for overlap, that would cover 242,000 square miles.
To put that in perspective, that accounts for just over 2.5% of the land mass of the U.S..
Assuming even further that the nukes did strike a site directly and did send radioactive particles in the air, how would that effect the environment? Well, need look no further than the two previous blast sites of nuclear warheads, Nagasaki and Hiroshima, both of which have turned into bustling cities. Not to mention survivors of the blast like Akiko Takakura who survived just 300 meters from the epicenter of the a-bomb going off and was still alive as of 2007:
https://archive.fo/q6QJV
But, what about Chernobyl? Apparently, it's turned into one of the largest nature preserves on the planet, with thriving shrubbery and wildlife on par with state parks:
https://archive.fo/70tli
But, what about the fallout ash? You're going to experience 5 years of chaotic weather and then things go back to normal
Why? Because you have to look at previous events that happened in history, such as the eruption of Mount Tambora:
https://infogalactic.com/info/1815_eruption_of_Mount_Tambora
And Krakatoa:
https://archive.fo/W47qb
With the latter specifically of being of interest in this discussion. In the link I provided, it explains that Krakatoa's eruption was four times greater than the Tsar bomb, the most powerful bomb ever created, a bomb that was never used outside of testing:
https://infogalactic.com/info/Tsar_Bomba
In that particular event, all both of those volcanic explosions caused was a couple years of famine, a couple of the coldest winters on record, and everything went back to normal afterwards. But then again that's only looking at the most devastating explosions in history. In all honestly, most the nuclear weapons fired would be at around the Castle Bravo level:
https://infogalactic.com/info/Castle_Bravo
Which, for perspective, is just under the power of the Mt. Saint Helens eruption back in 1980:
https://infogalactic.com/info/1980_eruption_of_Mount_St._Helens
And, what happened in that particular situation? Reagan allowed people to tour the blast site three years later:
https://infogalactic.com/info/Mount_St._Helens_National_Volcanic_Monument
So, in all honest, yes, nuclear explosion would cause you to have a very bad day, but you'd get over it and move on.