Not to hijack the Ukraine thread(s) but reading them I got to wondering.

I was looking at some of the coverage of the Russians using their equivalent of our MOAB in their current outrage. Thermobaric, fuel-air, vacuum...it all seems to amount to the same idea - two stage blasts, one small to disperse the fuel for the second main blast.

Here's a graph of the effects on air pressure, from yesterday's WSJ:



Anyone else wondering, as we enter the tornado season, whether something that created a strong and odd localized change in air pressure like that might disrupt a tornado?

Fine point. Even if it worked, you'd want to use a smaller version than these high-yield weapons, and aim high, or else the cure could be worse than the disease.

No idea on the science, but doubt practicality would work even if the science was 100%.

The suddenness and erratic movement of tornados would make targeting and preparation impossible. Not to mention chance of collateral damage.

Just hook up a bunch of Dyson fans to blow it away from the house!

Bombijg a tornado would be a cool test though, I’d pay to watch, on video

Perhaps you could shut off a very small tornado, but a really big one? I’m not so sure. Some of those monsters are over a mile wide and incorporate forces that would be hard to overcome.

Maybe if it was detonated at an appropriate altitude and distance into the leading edge of the cold front? The idea is it could sap the energy like setting a back burn in a forest fire.

Edit:

Or maybe make it worse. A firenado? Tornadobomb?

"Not today Mr. ATF man."

Some research into the hundreds of nukes set off and their impact on approaching weather might net a grant for the project, tho.

I expect that answer is out there. What did the explosion in Beirut do to the weather? It didn't even knock down the grain towers.

Y'know what's worse than a massive tornado?

A massive tornado that's now on fire.

A device large enough to disrupt the tornado would probably do at least as much damage to people and structures on the ground as the tornado itself.

Bombs only work in Sharknados.

Man is yet to realize the greater power nature has than man's.

Yeah, we keep talking a tough game of how we tame, conquer and overcome nature, but we are the Chicken Hawk, and nature is Foghorn Leghorn.

We are really puny and annoying.

The immense energy that creates the tornado that you see doing the thing, is so much greater than the biggest FAE/Thermobaric device we have created.

The funnel touching the ground and creating the damage is the "tip of the dragons tail". The beast is the weather system it is emanating from, is a very large in comparison to the concentration of a bomb's energy.

You are not going to upset the temperature extremes of hot and cold, dry and moist air nor the energy potential the weather system has.

Sort of like stopping the eclectic power plant's dynamo my rubbing your feet on the carpet and grabbing the wholewatta killyavolts power line.

Well said, Mr. SigMonkey.

Don’t f*ck with Mother Nature. She’s bigger and stronger and will win, regardless!

I have wondered for years what the impact an explosive would have on a tornado if of sufficient size and detonated in the precise spot.

Would it completely dissipate the tornado?

Would the tornado simply reform again later?

How could you calibrate the precise detonation spot and charge to effectively dissipate the tornado and not over do it?

Is that spot high in the cloud deck? Lower? In the middle of the funnel?

I'm probably a borderline dangerous when bored

Pretty interesting paper from Florida State: Estimating Kinetic Energy of Tornados

They discuss kinetic energy in terms of terajoules which can be converted to kilotons or megatons.

I don't know, but I'd pay money to watch them try.

Sorry... bored again Big Grin

I think we need to figure out how to make a tornado. Then we can make one of similar intensity but rotating in the opposite direction and collide them.

A tornado battle royal if you will.


I really need another hobby....

I doubt it

Simple answer is NO.
Why, the fuel air mixture would be disrupted too much by the tornado winds-and the bomb wouldn’t work properly.

I highly doubt it would affect a tornado. The effect is too relatively localized compared to the size of the air in the tornado's region of influence. Also, the effect of the blast would be too brief. It would be like thinking that setting off a bomb in a river might change its direction.

Where would you put the bomb? The tornado is taking place high up in the cloud; what you see is simply surface material drawn into the vortex to make it visible. It has strong vorticity due to coriolis force., and strong lifting action due to low pressure.

I used to fly atmospheric research flights in thunderstorms, or thunderstorm penetrations in hardened, modified aircraft loaded up with sensors, pyrotechnics, and other gear. The idea of disrupting hurricans, thunderstorms and tornados with explosives, is laughable.

Updrafts and low pressure with rising air can be found with or without vorticity, or rotation. A tornado has both, and you'd have to find a way to stop not only the lifting action of a parcel of air which is changing dynamically as it reacts to pressure and temperature and relative humidity and latent energy variations with changes in altitude, but to the earths rotational forces as well, and the interaction with the surrounding parcels of air, and the storm system that spawns the tornado. The radar hook signature that marks the tornado, it's geographic location in relation to a convective or airmass thunderstorm or large scale mesocomplex, is far more than one might imagine, when one sees just the funnel cloud. It's a bit like trying to topple an angry, bionic elephant with the power of a neutron bomb, by trimming its toe nails.