With North Korea and Iran flexing their muscles and telling us how much they love us here in the United States, and with Russia acting like a drunk guy at the bar just looking for a fight with his buddy China, the threat of a nuclear attack on U.S. soil doesn’t seem that far fetched these days.

Prepping for a nuclear attack and trying to survive a nuclear disaster is really what started prepping back in the 60’s with the Russians and the Cuban missile crisis. Even though dropping a bomb on Hiroshima ended World War 2, it also made other countries take notice and say “Hey! I want one of those!”

Even though they didn’t use the word “prepping” back then, and I’m not sure who actually coined the phrase “prepping” the principals were the same. Today the stakes are much higher, today there are threats like pandemics, terrorism and financial crisis that people living in the 50’s and 60’s would have laughed at.

Technology has advanced so much since then that the game has changed. We are not worried about what country has the capability of producing a nuke, we are worried about which countries and which extremist groups.

Even though the perception of preppers is of us wearing the now Iconic gas mask, thanks to shows like Doomsday Preppers, the reality is this is one area quite a few of us are lacking in. Other than some a few extras, the supplies are basically the same, the important part is knowing the facts about surviving a nuclear disaster, and the possible impact it will have on us.

SPP116 Surviving a Nuclear Disaster

Types of Nuclear Weapons

Before we start to plan on how to survive a nuclear strike, we need to know what some of these weapons will do. Even though the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima was devastating, it is small potatoes compared to what is possible today. And even though countries have been scaling down on their nuclear weapons, we still have the ability to decimate a country many times over.

Reference: A nuclear weapon’s explosive power is measured in yield, which is expressed in tons of TNT. 1 Kiloton = 1,000 tons of TNT, and 1 Megaton = 1 million tons of TNT… A little hard to wrap your head around right?

Fission vs Fusion: When it comes to nuclear weapons not all are created equal, this is why it is impossible to say exactly what might happen. Not only do you need to factor in the type and quality of the bomb, you need to factor in how many were used, and where they were used.

Fission: This type of nuclear weapon is commonly referred to as an Atomic Bomb, these can be as small as 1kt (Kiloton) up to several hundred Kilotons. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 was 15 kiloton’s, and the second, dropped on Nagasaki, was 20 kiloton’s.

Fusion: These are thermonuclear weapons or H-Bombs (Hydrogen Bombs) with extreme explosive powers are obtained through the process of nuclear fusion. H-Bombs are nearly all achieved through the initial detonation of an atomic bomb or combination of fusion and fission.

Without getting too technical it is the process of forming a heavier nucleus from two lighter ones. This fusion requires incredibly high temperatures. This article here explains the process in more detail.

The website NuclearSecrecy.com has what they call a Nuke Map which allows you to pick from several size nuclear bombs, and then detonate them (virtually of course) in your area. You can set the wind direction, air burst or surface detonation, and get a good idea about how much damage each weapon will do.

Dirty Bombs: These bombs are what you might see from terrorists,