Video Footage Shows Soviets Plugging Gas Leak With Controlled Nuke Explosion
Posted by Jim Hoft on Monday, May 31, 2010, 11:51 AM
The Soviets had a way of dealing with out of control gas and oil leaks – With nuclear explosions.
Business Insider discovered this archived video recently:
Amazing Archival Footage Of A Soviet Nuke Plugging A Leaking Gas Well
Here’s some vintage USSR propaganda showing us how they extinguished a gas leak fire. The same technique could be used for the oil leak in the gulf. The Russians used nukes to put out fires like this a total of 5 times.
Could you imagine the reaction on the left if Obama nuked the oil-spitting hole?
Especially after he already bombed the moon?
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Published February 8, 2012 at 8:42 pm - 106 Comments
BlendXD commented:
I’m not an engineer or anything, but I’ve had this thought in my head for weeks. Any chance conventional weapons could ‘plug the damn hole’? If not, could a small tactical nuke would do the job?
sdfsfd commented:
Create an implosion.
Kathy from Kansas commented:
But all the Soviet explosions were underground, weren’t they? Situation might be very different underwater. And I sure don’t like to think of my dear Gulf being polluted with a lot of radioactivity. I’d like to know what kinds of isotopes, and with what kinds of half-lives, and at what kinds of concentrations, we’d be talking about here.
Neoavatara commented:
An implosion should do the job. The thickness of the bore is not significant compared to the depth of the ground. The question for BP, I bet, is whether they could use this site ever again…probably not easily.
kate commented:
Who believes the Russians?!?!?!
Kenny Solomon commented:
Nuke The Whales !
Joe Bean commented:
Environmentalists would never allow it. Especially the ones already working in the Obama administration.
In addition, BP is running the show not Obama and his administration. BP does not have access to nuclear utilities in order to carry out such an approach.
It’s been what? 40 days and Obama still has not setup a comprehensive and organized effort to work on this ecological disaster. Even Americans who normally do not pay attention to politics at a deep level until election time are starting to analyze and pay attention to this matter. This is not good for Obama.
Stuart commented:
Blow off a nuke and you might end up with a lot of carbon 14 when the oil gets irradiated. C-14 has a long half life and when dispersed in the water could show up in a lot of undesired places. The Russian method probably would work a lot better on land then in the deep ocean.
Would the water work as a moderator to any extent? I don’t know. Its been a long long time since I had all of that military NBC training.
Does any one of you readers have the training to answer my questions or call BS? I really would like to know.
jonyjoe101 commented:
sounds like a great idea. Tactical nukes have there peaceful “civilian” uses. Maybe we can buy one dirt cheap from the iranians.
So far everything else we have used has failed. Like Einstein once said “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. It’s where we’re at right now with the great obama in charge.
Opaobie commented:
Too many unknowns to try such an approach “cold turkey” without accurate data, including the dispersment of the radiation. Such an explosion under thousands of feet of water and mud and whatever is below that is a complete gamble. Would the strata they hope to collapse and bend to shut off the flow react the same way the strata under dry ground did? What is the strata like within the zone that could be affected? Are there weak sections or air or gas pockets or other pools of oil that could collapse forming giant chambers and caverns and create a monster sink hole? Would the shock wave create a monster tsunami? I wouldn’t try it based on just those unknowns, but with more data, maybe it is feasible…and I am a physicist.
bg commented:
++
makes me wonder what would have happened
had the explosion cut the gas conduit in half..
==
Patriotic commented:
Interesting video Jim.
The USA has very powerful conventional bombs, that are NOT nuclear also.
At least you, along with the rest of many Americans, are helping to balance the complaining, with some talk of solutions.
As conservatives, we care deeply about the environment. All of us want to take care of our environment. All of us as a nation are sickened by what is happening in the gulf.
Unfortunately, our way of life, and our dependency on oil is a fact of life.
The liberals are just as dependent on oil as conservatives are…they just like to blame conservatives for anything related to oil, while consuming away. Environmentalists are much to blame for why we have to drill in such difficutl depths, and why we are dragging on new nuclear power plants.
————————–
It is interesting how, at those pressures, it is impossible to screw a plug, deep into the well bore hole. From what I’ve read, the static pressure coming out of the well head is around 10,000 psig…and this pressure is fighting against the roughly 2500 psi of water column above it, at a 5000 foot depth.
So a bomb blast would not be used to make the well cave in on itself, but rather be blasted from deep down, and to the side, to push the hard rock over, like pinching off a pipe. Interesting.
Opaobie commented:
The $64,000 questions are: how deep should the explosive be placed, how far to the side, how much explosive, what kind of explosive, ???????
…and how long will it take to set up all the necessary equipment to drill a hole and set up the explosive?
…oh, and ya gotta get permission from El Supremo if you can get someone to bother him during his multiple vacations.
pamlinson commented:
Good luck with the Greenie weenies.
Chris Vehr commented:
The big question is not how many human lives are impacted in a good way by a successful explosion, but how much wildlife is impacted by an explosion of this kind? After all, the left does not care about humans, but if the humans harm just one prairie dog or diamondback rattler (or in our case, a squid or some plankton), watch out!
pamlinson commented:
I hope this catastrophie is the final nail in the Obama coffin.
shibumi commented:
Not a good idea.
There have to be other ways of stopping this underwater volcano than to use nuclear weapons. We don’t know the fallout issues, we would be exposing the Gulf to radiation, and we don’t know what this would do to the New Madrid Fault.
Using nukes could indeed be worse than the oil volcano.
JKB commented:
And the last time we set off a nuclear device a mile underwater was when?
It’s a last effort because after that, the entire well will be beyond any other effort due to damage. If the current cut and cap attempt is risky, think about a nuke. The entire GOMEX will have a radiation plume circulating just like the oil. Eventually, in the Gulf Stream and up the East Coast then to Europe. The oil is bad but nuclear products are worse.
And all done when eventually, the relief well be come online with a high potential to stop the well. Let’s look at ways to handle the spill before we do something stupid.
Valerie commented:
“….gas leak fire”
The key word is “fire,” not “leak.”
The shock wave from the nuke would blow away the oxidizable gases and disperse the burnables. It would not necessarily do anything to the leak, except maybe make it worse.
Robert commented:
First, the federal government has to decide whether they can pile up some sand dikes near the shore.
They might make that decision sometime in the next year or so.
It would take them about 15-20 years to decide whether to explode a nuclear bomb or not.
Brad commented:
I’m shocked at how many commenters seem to have not watched or not comprehended the video they are commenting about!
David commented:
You’re such a loon. The notion that this cartoon and write up proves anything scientifically is not just ludicrous, its National Enquirer-like. I lean to the right but to throw the left under the buss, or the ‘environmentalists’ because they aren’t endorsing this is like watching The Twilight Zone. Get off of my ‘team’. You give the right the nicname Right Wing Wacko. You allow the door to be opened to those who want to criticise genuine thought. You’re poor thought and left wing paranoia are un-American.
Me commented:
It’s really disheartening to see people that probably consider themselves to be conservative show such ignorance of science in their fears of nuclear reactions. A nuke isn’t Satan incarnate, folks, it’s just a physical process. Granted, a powerful one, but that’s why it’s useful.
The device wouldn’t be deployed in water. WATCH THE VIDEO! It would be far below the ocean floor. It looked to be about 2/3 of the depth of the well, which on a 5000 foot well would be over 3000 feet. After the blast there was NO radiation detected at the surface, which means there would be none to circulate throughout the ocean. And the additional pressure of 5000 feet of water would add to the compression of the formations.
As to half-lives, that just means the radiation is released slower, so it is less dangerous because of dissipation. It’s like a sparkler vs. a firecracker. They could have the same total energy, but the sparkler releases it slower, so it lasts longer. There is ambient radiation all around us, and it is only dangerous when it crosses a concentration threshold (Kathy, you were on the right track there).
Opaobie, you make it sound like their engineers have no idea what the geology is surrounding the well. Nothing could be further from the truth. They have to have extensive knowledge of the entire profile before they even drill. There are only certain formations that have high probabilities of crude deposits, and their seismic analyses would have been done before they drilled one foot. As to the tsunami, there is a long history of underwater nuclear detonations, so the effect would be predictable.
Valerie, the nuke didn’t just blow out the fire. It pinched the well by compression, “blocking the flow of gas”. That means the leak stopped. You can tell because the fire didn’t go out all at once, it died down as the gas above the pinch burned off.
Obviously an operation of this type would require extensive prior analysis. But let’s put aside the decades of liberal anti-nuclear brainwashing we have been subjected to and analyze the scenario objectively.
What amazes me about Deepwater Horizon isn’t the accident, it’s the technology. In 2009 it held the record for the deepest oil well in the world at over 35000 feet, including 5000 feet of water. That’s about 7 miles! They were pushing the envelope, and an accident happened. If we are going to shut down entire industries because an accident happened, guess what, Skippy. You just shut down progress. Go back to living in a cave, because every step of progress we have ever made carried risk, and sometimes that risk goes south. But without it, we are just unusually intelligent chimps.
Richard Bagg commented:
I say nuke it… then detroit next
Opaobie commented:
Me #26, read what I posted before you criticize it.
Opaobie, you make it sound like their engineers have no idea what the geology is surrounding the well. Nothing could be further from the truth. They have to have extensive knowledge of the entire profile before they even drill. There are only certain formations that have high probabilities of crude deposits, and their seismic analyses would have been done before they drilled one foot. As to the tsunami, there is a long history of underwater nuclear detonations, so the effect would be predictable.
I said “I” don’t know what the strata looks like or what is around or within it and suggested a few questions that should be answered before experts tried this technique. The fact that they know a great deal about the area and chose to drill exactly where they did does not presuppose they considered the possibility of sometime later having to drill another hole nearby and insert and detonate an atomic bomb with no negative consequences.
As to the possibility of creating a tsunami, predicting them and their formation and movement and consequences is still difficult; look at the recent ones caused by sudden, unanticipated earthquakes and volcanoes, and how quickly they formed and moved and wreaked havoc and death with no way to stop them or to prepare those in their paths to take action in a timely enough manner. Even those who had time to prepare could not stop them from crashing ashore and doing great destruction.
Maybe BP and other experts have already considered the technique we are discussing and discounted it as too dangerous or as having too little of a probability of success. I’m just suggesting that there are a great deal of unknowns, any one of which could lead to disaster if not properly addressed.
clyde commented:
the russian well shaft did not require that it be pressurized. the pipein deep water must have water in it or it would likely collapse at 2500 psi out side the pipe and atmosheric pressure on the inside.no current a-bomb is designed to function at that extreme pressure.
Cindy commented:
shortly after the BP disaster in April a russian paper had an article of what they believed happened and how we could stop the oil flow.
http://www.eutimes.net/2010/05/us-orders-blackout-over-north-korean-torpedoing-of-gulf-of-mexico-oil-rig/
We do know that Obama sent SWAT TEAMS to the Gulf. We do know that Obama pretty much IGNORED the South Korean attacked in March when the South Korean ship was attacked and the South Korean crew members lost their lives.
We do know now that Obama is starting to blame North Korea for the sinking of the South Korean ship…NOW THEY CARE ABOUT SOUTH KOREA??? Now they have “courage” to point fingers???? Why now?
And a side note. All these volcanic eruptions, in europe and now guatemala and all these earthquakes too, it makes you wonder what’s going on?
I don’t think we need a nuclear option, if America has the HAARP capabilities then I think they should target a small area in the gulf and create an earthquake, and collapse debris upon the opening.
Okay, I am done being paranoid.
Jess commented:
Has anybody estimated how much methane is trapped in the deposit this well was drilled into? I’ve heard bits and pieces from various sources that indicate there’s a lot. I’d like to hear some serious industry speculation on how much gas would be released in a nuclear explosion.
Permian-Triassic extinction event anyone?
Me commented:
Oh, here we go.
Lighten up, Opaobie. I did read your post, that’s why I criticized it. Don’t take it personally. You’re starting to sound like Phil Jones, for cryin’ out loud.
My concern about your statement is that it implied that they would even try such a thing without answering those types of questions first. Your profile indicates a background in aerospace safety, so I understand your thorough risk assessments. My point is they would already have an extensive knowledge of the geology of the area, so some of the specific concerns would be moot.
I would like to see them seriously consider the nuclear option just to do the research for future situations where it might turn out to be the best option. I’m just so tired of people’s irrational fear of nuclear reactions.
Me commented:
Jess, the video indicates the blast occurs at a layer that is “below gas impermeable strata”, meaning that no gas would be released.
Opaobie commented:
Me, the technology and equipment were already available to prevent a blowout from becoming the disaster that it did. Rather than trying to hypothesize a very dangerous and unpredictable “after the fact” solution for future use, it would be better to install a blowout preventer that didn’t have so many single-point failure modes.
I don’t think you would get a lot of support from the people along the Gulf coast whose livelihoods would be destroyed if this very risky and untested solution were proposed vs. more conventional sealing and recovery methods even though they may take a bit longer. When dealing with potential catastrophies, as we say in some quarters, “Failure is not an option”.
Opaobie commented:
My point is they would already have an extensive knowledge of the geology of the area, so some of the specific concerns would be moot.
moot?…or extensive knowledge of the geology of the area might raise concerns that rule this method out, and that’s my point. We don’t know what they know, and they may already know it would be too risky or that the conditions for success are not there.
Me commented:
To focus on what should be done better next time doesn’t stop this leak. As to the nuclear option being “dangerous and unpredictable”, the Russians were able to do it 5 times successfully without incident. That’s a better track record than BP has so far.
The livelihoods of the people along the Gulf are already in jeopardy, and getting worse every day that goes by without a solution. The minimal damage scenario is a solution with a proven track record implemented as soon as is safely possible. I’m not saying the nuclear solution is the best, I’m saying it should be objectively considered, which it can’t be if people are going to react irrationally to the nuclear boogieman.
The catastrophe is not “potential”, it is here: it’s called a massive oil spill. Failure apparently is an option because BP’s efforts have all failed so far. I’m for implementing the best option, whatever that is.
Me commented:
Moot because either the vulnerabilities exist, in which case they won’t do it, or they don’t, in which case it is a viable option. Either way our opinion is irrelevant, therefore moot. “What they know” could also be that nuclear would be the best option, but they won’t do it because of 50 years of anti-nuclear hysteria as the result of liberal brainwashing, thereby condemning the people of the Gulf to another 3 months of chocolate pelicans.
You’re a “gotta have the last word” kinda guy, aren’t you? Your type makes life worth living. All I did was correct some misconceptions with facts and you’re turning it into a personal jihad. The Type A personality has strengths. The ability to concede is not one of them.
Opaobie commented:
Me (or “Id” or whatever you want to call yourself), Let’s recount the bidding.
You said “I would like to see them seriously consider the nuclear option just to do the research for future situations where it might turn out to be the best option.”
I answered that with a less dangerous and “off-the-shelf” recommendation to use the right equipment in the first place if testing for a future situation to deal with a blowout after the fact was the purpose for trying the nuclear option. This is not the place to conduct testing. Is your reason to urge them to use the nuclear option to plug the leak now or to do some testing to see if it will work on the next similar leak?
Now you criticize me by saying To focus on what should be done better next time doesn’t stop this leak.
Make up your mind, is it to fix this leak or to test some methods to deal with a future leak? I don’t know whether it will work, only BP has the data to make an informed assessment and decision, but when the amount of risk potential exists as is clear in this situation, the decision can’t be taken lightly. We can speculate back and forth on whether they should or shouldn’t, but it is only speculation. Ultimately, they will do what they think best.
The catastrophe I was talking about is the one that could be caused by setting off a nuclear device and its unintended consequences, not the current oil spill. Making it worse is a possible outcome of using a nuclear device, and it has to be weighed in the decision making process. The fact (if it is fact) that the Russians accomplished it five times on gas wells drilled on dry land is not sufficient correlation for this situation to predict that it would work, even though the theory seems sound enough.
The rest of your amateur Freudian analysis of me or people whom you think have been brainwashed by liberal fears of nuclear reactions is uncalled for and doesn’t deserve any more response than this. Why you would attack me or anyone else posting opinions and observations is a mystery, but I don’t really care. I’m not the least bit troubled by insecurity, and I hope you grow out of yours. Feel free to close out this topic, I’ve said everything I know about it.
Opaobie commented:
I do have a bit more on the topic. Gas is compressible, so the shock wave striking the pipe inside the casing and pinching it closed in the Russian gas well video is very understandable. The pressure of the gas is much lower than the pressure of the oil spewing from the blown well in the Gulf, too. Apparently the pipe was able to withstand the shearing force and pinch together rather than rupture, a significant point for the success of the operation. Otherwise, if it simply ruptured, it would create a sprayer effect at the point where the pipe was severed, and instead of one stream of gas, there would be an uncontrolled cone with the apex at the rupture and expanding circumferentially as it rose toward the surface. It could create hundreds of mini “wells” at the surface where they originally had only one.
Would it work with incompressible liquid, with some gas intermixed, but mostly liquid under 25,000 psi (or whatever they finally decide it is)? What if instead of pinching the pipe, it ruptured it in several places along with the cement casing? That high pressure liquid and gas would then be forced out in all directions and could cause numerous new leaks as it was forced out and then found paths up to the floor of the Gulf above it. That would create a nightmare scenario. Maybe BP has considered that possibility, or maybe the original explosion sent a shock wave down the riser and the pipe and this phenomenon is already underway. Does BP have other video of the area showing other leaks that they have not yet released?
M Shaw commented:
Published this yesterday am. I think nuclear may be the best solution.
http://www.psychicalsolutions.com/blog/?p=589&cpage=1#comment-60
Bradley commented:
I will send $100 to the first person that can find specific information regarding any of the five times this has been done by the russians. This story appeared in k.pravda, a russian tabloid which has as much journalistic integrity as the weekly world news. It is being desseminated by a blogger who has little interest in checking facts, and has now been picked up by the various wackadoo forums. There is no historical documentation of this beyond a joke video. Please, feel free to prove me wrong.
bg commented:
++
pardon if the obvious question has already been asked, but..
IF THE US IS NOT ALLOWED TO DRILL..
AND OBAMA IS FULLY INTENT ON LESSENING
THE RELIABILITY ON FOREIGN OIL IMPORT..
NOT TO MENTION THE OIL NEEDED TO MAKE UP
FOR THE LOSS OF ACCESS TO US OIL AS IT IS..
WHERE WILL THE OIL SUPPLY WE NEED BE COMING FROM??
wouldn’t be from O’s South American dictator bud Chavez, or that Saudi Arabian kingpin who helped sponsor his Harvard ed now could it?? /sarc/
==
bg commented:
++
Bradley @ 7:20 am #42
not exactly what you asked for, but then again, you darn well know
it would be nearly possible to dig up that specific info don’t you.. :p
Energy expert: Nuking oil leak ‘only thing we can do’
[Weapons labs in the former Soviet Union developed special nukes for use to help pinch off the gas wells. They believed that the force from a nuclear explosion could squeeze shut any hole within 82 to 164 feet (25 to 50 meters), depending on the explosion's power. That required drilling holes to place the nuclear device close to the target wells.
Live Science reports:
"A first test in the fall of 1966 proved successful in sealing up an underground gas well in southern Uzbekistan, and so the Russians
used nukes four more times for capping runaway wells."]
==
bg commented:
++
Nuke That Oil Well
[One prominent energy expert known for predicting the oil price spike
of 2008 says sending a small nuclear bomb down the leaking well is “probably the only thing we can do” to stop the leak. Matt Simmons, founder of energy investment bank Simmons & Company, also says that there is evidence of a second oil leak about five to seven miles from the initial leak that BP has focused on fixing. That second leak, he says, is so large that the initial one is “minor” in comparison.
Obama seems to have avoided getting involved in fixing
this spill, for fear of being tarred with its failures. May 28:
Obama … said that his administration is doing all it can, but that, when
it comes to plugging the leak, “the federal government does not possess superior technology to BP.”
But I’ll bet BP doesn’t have nukes. If nukes are the answer,
then leaving the fix to BP has definitely made things worse.]
*sigh*
==
bg commented:
++
ran across the following and thought
it not only informative, but related..
ht Grant @ 5:33 PM via TPC
Imax Fires of Kuwait (part 1 of 4)
Imax Fires of Kuwait (part 2 of 4)
Imax Fires of Kuwait (part 3 of 4)
Imax Fires of Kuwait (part 4 of 4)
==
Me commented:
Opaobie:
Get. A. Life.
You’re in way over your head, man. Your OCD analysis is a total waste of time because there are too many variables for anyone in our position to say conclusively one way or the other. My original post was just to correct some misconceptions, like people’s irrational fears of nuclear reactions, so that we would be open minded about considering it as a possible option. After that, it’s the call of BP and the gubmint. They are the only ones who have sufficient access to the specifics.
Your claim that I am being inconsistent is, of course, ridiculous. It is possible to approach this situation to BOTH fix this leak AND research the method for future use. Here’s how, for the creatively challenged. They start to research the specifics, and learn along the way, as humans are wont to do. If they get to a dead end with an unresolvable problem, they have still advanced the ball for next time. If they take it all the way and find it is the best solution, use it, it works, and there is great rejoicing, so much the better. VOILA! By considering a solution in an open minded way, we have expanded our information base, and we may even solve the problem to boot. See? That didn’t hurt, did it?
But if we don’t even consider the option because of a superstitious fear of nuclear whatsits, we lose on both counts. Your biggest problem is you see disagreement as a personal attack. Grow up. BTW, I think you have said quite a bit more than you know about it.