The researchers found that even nations not involved in the conflict would suffer crop failures and plummeting temperatures as soot and smoke from nuclear storms thousands of miles away would block the sun. In the first month after the nuclear explosion, average global temperatures would drop by about 13 F — a larger temperature change since the last Ice Age, experts from Louisiana State and Rutgers universities warned. As the planet grew colder, sea ice would expand more than six million square miles and 6 feet deep in some basins, blocking major ports such as Beijing’s Tianjin Port, Copenhagen, and St. Petersburg. Sea ice will spread to ice-free coastal areas, impeding shipping across the northern hemisphere – making it difficult to get food and supplies to some cities. The sudden drop in light and temperature of the oceans, especially from the Arctic to the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans, will kill the seaweeds that form the foundation of the marine food web – creating an ocean famine, effectively shutting down the fishing industry.
“We must do everything we can to avoid nuclear war”
“It doesn’t matter who’s bombing who, it could be India and Pakistan or NATO and Russia,” said Professor Cheryl Harrison, lead author from Louisiana State University’s Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences. “Once smoke is released into the upper atmosphere, it spreads globally and affects everyone. “We must do everything we can to avoid nuclear war. The effects are very likely to be catastrophic worldwide.” The study is the first to measure the impact of today’s nuclear weapons and simulate the impact of a war between the US and Russia, where 4,400 100-kiloton weapons are expected. It also looked at the effects of a war between India and Pakistan, where about 10 times fewer missiles would be expected. The researchers estimated that even the smallest war would see between 11 billion and 103 billion pounds of smoke and soot spew into the upper atmosphere, blocking light from the sun. A war between superpowers could be threefold. Ocean recovery will likely take decades at the surface and hundreds of years at depth, while changes in Arctic sea ice will likely take thousands of years and essentially be a “Nuclear Little Ice Age”.
“The world simply cannot go down this road”
“Nuclear war has dire consequences for everyone,” added Alan Robock, co-author and distinguished professor in Rutgers University’s Department of Environmental Sciences. “World leaders have used our studies in the past as impetus to end the nuclear arms race in the 1980s and five years ago to approve a treaty at the United Nations to ban nuclear weapons. We hope this new study will encourage more nations to ratify the ban treaty. “A nuclear war would be a major planetary turning point. With Russia at war in Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin threatening to use nuclear weapons, these findings are a strong warning that the world simply cannot go down this road.”
