Nuclear weapons are among the most devastating weapons ever created, with the potential to wipe out human civilization in a single strike. According to the UN, the risk of nuclear conflict is now higher than it has been in decades. Experts are increasingly asking: What would happen if nuclear war broke out today? The Future of Life Institute (@futureoflifeinstitute) recently shared a chilling 3D-simulated YouTube video illustrating the catastrophic aftermath of such a scenario, and it’s leaving viewers deeply unsettled.
According to their YouTube description, The Future of Life Institute (FLI) is a nonprofit focused on reducing catastrophic risks posed by advanced technologies like AI, biotechnology, and nuclear weapons. In this video, they depict a terrifying scenario: a nuclear war between Russia and the U.S. The simulation uses computer models to illustrate the devastating, post-apocalyptic consequences of such a conflict.
“When one side fires a nuclear missile and the other side detects them and fires back before impact,” the narrator explains in the video. He then goes on to describe an example in case the US submarine would launch ballistic missiles from the west of Norway. These missiles would start striking Russia after about 10 minutes. Then the Russians from the north of Canada would start hitting the US a few minutes later. The video continues to demonstrate that the very first strikes would be high-altitude Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) attacks, frying electronics and power grids, creating an electromagnetic pulse of tens of thousands of volts per meter. “Each impact creates a fireball about as hot as the core of the Sun,” the narrator reveals, and adds that it is “followed by a radioactive storm cloud.”
These intense explosions would vaporize people nearby. Fires would erupt. The fire would prompt the formation of a blastwave that would spread and damage buildings. Glass skyscrapers would melt and everything made of asphalt would turn into flammable hot liquid. But this isn’t the worst part. According to the video, the worst part is “nuclear winter,” which is caused by the black carbon smoke from nuclear firestorms. The firestorms usually spew plumes of black smoke up into the stratosphere far above any rain clouds that could wash out the smoke. High-altitude jet streams are so fast that it would take only a few days for the smoke to spread across much of the northern hemisphere.
As a result, the Earth would become freezing-cold, and the smoke would block out the Sun, causing a total collapse of life on the planet. “It [nuclear war] has no winners, only losers,” the narrator says, concluding the video.
Pran Nath, a professor from Northeastern University told Northeastern News that the aftermath of a nuclear war has three stages. “When the nuclear blast occurs, because of the chain reaction, in a very short period, a lot of energy and radiation is emitted,” Nath says. “In the first instance, a huge flash occurs, which is the nuclear reaction producing gamma rays. If you are exposed to it, people, for example, in Hiroshima were essentially evaporated, leaving shadows.” The second phase is a shockwave and heat blast or a fireball that would travel around the speed of sound, around 760 miles per hour. The third phase is the fallout in which the mushroom cloud is created, as also explained by the video above.
“We can and must, however, do everything we can to avoid nuclear war. The effects are too likely to be globally catastrophic,” proclaimed Assistant Professor Cheryl Harrison from LSU Department of Oceanography & Coastal Sciences in a 2022 study about the effects of nuclear war. She described that not just the buildings or the people, a nuclear war would put an end to the life in oceans as well, eating up algae and hence, destroying marine life forever. It would be the next “Nuclear Little Ice Age,” as per the LSU study.
