RDS-3

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Nuclear test
Joe 3
nation Soviet Union 1923Soviet Union Soviet Union
Test location Semipalatinsk nuclear weapons test site
date October 18, 1951
Test type Above-ground test
Test height 380 meters
Weapon type fission
Explosive power 42 kT

RDS-3 (Russian: РДС-3 for Реактивный Двигатель Специальный , Reaktiwny Dwigatel Spezialny, also "Object 501M") is the name of a Soviet nuclear weapon .

development

The Soviet atomic bombs RDS-1 and RDS-2 were based on plutonium . Since only a relatively low explosive force could be achieved with this principle, the Soviet Union forced uranium enrichment . When highly enriched uranium became available, the KB-11 development office began developing the RDS-3 around July Borissowitsch Chariton . The bomb contained 7 kg of highly enriched uranium and 3.5 kg of plutonium.

test

On October 18, 1951 at 9:52 a.m., the use of such a weapon from an airplane was tested for the first time in the Soviet Union . It was dropped from a Tu-4A of the 72nd independent bomber squadron flying at a height of 10 km above the Semipalatinsk nuclear weapons test site and exploded at a height of 380 m. The bomb developed an explosive force of 42 kt TNT. The aircraft was piloted by Captain Konstantin I. Oosachow and copilot Wasili I. Koorejew. To be on the safe side, another Tu-4 with a dummy FAB-1500HE bomb and two Lavochkin La-11s accompanied the Tu-4A to the vicinity of the dropping point. The second Tu-4 was to take the lead if the targeting systems of the plane armed with the atomic bomb should fail. With the help of a series of sound-modulated radio signals to the Tu-4A and the dropping of the dummy bomb, the exact time and place of the drop should be transmitted to it.

Series production and further development

This first successful nuclear test under real operational conditions induced the Soviet leadership to immediately start series production of the RDS-3 and to accelerate the conversion of individual Tu-4s into nuclear weapon carriers. By March 1952, three RDS-3 were produced. Series production of the RDS-3 began in 1953 with around 20 pieces per year. The RDS-3I was a further developed version of the RDS-3 with an external polonium- 210-beryllium neutron initiator , which was supposed to increase the explosive power of the bomb by better timing the chain reaction. The first test of this version took place on October 23, 1953, with an explosive force of 62 kt was measured. The RDS-3T was a modernized version of the RDS-3.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Database of nuclear tests, short version: USSR: Database of nuclear tests, short version: USSR , accessed July 16, 2017.
  2. ↑ a b S. J. Zaloga : The Kremlin's Nuclear Sword - The Rise and Fall of Russia's Strategic Nuclear Forces, 1945-2000. Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001, ISBN 1-58834-007-4 .
  3. ↑ Rainer Göpfert: “Maria” and “Tatjana” - The testing of nuclear weapons by the air forces of the USSR . In: Flieger Revue Extra . No. 36 . PPVMedien, 2012, ISSN  2194-2641 , p. 11 .
  4. ^ Jefim Gordon , Dmitri Komissarow, Wladimir Rigmant: Tupolev Tu-4: The First Soviet Strategic Bomber . Schiffer, 2014, ISBN 978-0-7643-4797-9 , pp. 6 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  5. ^ Matthias Uhl: War for Berlin? The Soviet military and security policy in the second Berlin crisis 1958 to 1962. Publications on SBZ / GDR research in the Institute for Contemporary History . Walter de Gruyter, 2008, ISBN 978-3-486-70737-3 , p. 26 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  6. ^ Oleg Bukharin, Frank Von Hippel: Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces . MIT Press, 2004, ISBN 978-0-262-66181-2 , pp. 72–73 ( limited preview in Google Book search).