Wait there was a nuclear test less than a year ago?
Edit: Wikipedia says the most recent test was on 2017/09/03,
making this photo taken on 2018/04/01Edit 2: I found the article this photo is from with more context. TL:DR it was reset back in 2022 bc the US conducted two clandestine tests.
I wouldn’t call the US tests “clandestine”. They’re subcritical, meaning they don’t generate any nuclear yield. They also report when they do these in the annual NNSA reports.
I was gonna say, if clandestine, how on clock?
They learned of it after it happened per the article.
Interesting, they were “sub critical” tests. I mean that really shouldn’t count…puts them on par with actual detonations (which Russia is clearly prepping to do soon with tactical nukes).
Why shouldn’t they count? It’s literally testing a nuclear weapon. The clock does not say: “Time since the last detonation of a nuclear weapon”.
Edit: But one could argue that nuclear weapons get tested all the time without any kind of detonation. These should count too IMHO.
Edit: just read another article on the tests. They happen to design new weapons with them which makes them not tests to see if the nukes still work like I thought.
Why shouldn’t they count? It’s literally testing a nuclear weapon.
It’s not considered a nuclear weapon test under the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, so I think it’s fair to argue the clock shouldn’t be reset for a subcritical test.
There’s a statue in Dachau concentration camp of an emaciated man that reads something like: “In memory of the dead and a warning to the living”.
It seems we have ignored both warnings.
They’re gonna feel reeeaaal silly when they run out of digits in… ~200 years.
That’s an optimistic outlook. Given the drastically shifting political landscape, do you really think the clock will still be standing in 200 years?
If it is they probably need to reset those numbers.
