Surviving In A Nuclear Winter Wonderland

In light of recent events, it seems only appropriate to bring up the theory which helped stop the arms race during the Cold War and helped bring logical and reasonable influence into the reduction of nuclear weapons during a time of great distress — nuclear winter.

Nuclear winter, or later referred to as nuclear autumn, was a widely accepted idea of an overall global cooling, or global freezing effect after the detonation of nuclear weapons, with the ash, which is primarily made of silicon atoms blocking the sun’s rays from reaching humans and photosynthesizing crops.

As one could imagine, this would mean not only dealing with nuclear fallout, decontamination, but complete famine stemming from complete agricultural failure, for every animal on the globe including the entirety of the human species.

Though it would put an end to global warming, life could not exist under the freezing temperatures that come with nuclear winter, ranging from an overall 2-3 degree temperature drop over every part of the Earth.

The theory was originally based around the aftermath of just tens of thousands of nuclear explosions around the world, keep in mind there were 64,500 nuclear warheads in existence during the Cold War era, with two puerile nations, the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR), not willing to back down, much like today.

The situation was described by Carl Sagan as “A room awash in gasoline, and there are two implacable enemies in that room, one has 9,000 matches, the other has 7,000 matches, each of them is concerned about who’s ahead, who’s stronger, well that’s the kind of situation we are actually in.”

Though sense eventually seeped into the minds of Reagan and Gorbachev, ridding the world, and other nations, of a majority of their nuclear arsenal, today’s situation is starkly contrasting, with two leaders who seem to value pique and self-preservation rather than the common good of the people they are presently responsible for.

Forty years later, the US is stuck in the same situation as it once was with the Soviet Union, yet this time President Donald Trump has lead us to the brink of nuclear war and catastrophe over various unplanned announcements and Tweets, which now govern the future of every nation on Earth.

To make matters worse, Trump, who has never taken North Korean relations seriously, has said he will cast “fire and fury” on North Korea, heavily insinuating, and almost blatantly stating the use of nuclear weapons to take down “Rocket Man”, Kim Jong Un who, as seen in current events, does not take small threats lightly.

The equally misguided dictator has officially stated that these tirades from Trump’s inflated ego are a deceleration of war in which he would enjoy to take part of, mutually declaring war on the United States.

A fundamental point made by scientists and ambassadors for peace back in the 70s still holds true today; what prerogative do two relentless nations have to destroy the planet, and all forms of life residing on Earth?

This planet is the only home the entire human race has ever known, and by allowing two power-hungry men to destroy, as far as we know, the only place that can harbor life is as irresponsible as it is catastrophic.

Nuclear ash doesn’t discriminate when it’s host is erupted at mass. Even a small nuclear war set off at the other side of the planet could become every single human being’s painfully intricate affair in the days leading a nuclear disaster, a future in which may be less fiction than it is fact.