As absurd as it may seem, the United States with the Chariot Project they attempted to carry out excavations for a new port in Alaska using 5 underground thermonuclear bombs. We are at the end of the Second World War and the USA found itself with a huge know-how in the matter of nuclear weapons but – fortunately – without any military targets to hit. How then could this technology be used for civilian purposes? Among the various ideas, one managed to achieve particular success over the years: using these weapons to dig large portions of land in a short time. According to theAtomic Energy Commission (AEC) it would have been enough to bury an adequate number of bombs and BOOMresults would have been achieved in a few moments which, with traditional methods, would have required weeks of work.
The Chariot project and the 5 nuclear bombs
The idea behind the project was to build a new port in the valley of Ogotoruk, in Alaska north-western. To do so they would have been buried 6 hydrogen bombs. The first four they would have had a power of 100 ktons and, once detonated, they would dig the entrance to the port; the others twofrom 1 megaton eachthey would have instead given birth to a maneuver dock for boats.
However, the AEC itself soon realized that this quantity of explosives would be excessive and therefore in 1959 the action plan was scaled down: it was decided to use only 5 bombs instead of 6 and the two powers were respectively lowered to 20 And 200 kton. Below is a map of their hypothetical layout in the area:
The choice of location was not accidental: at the time the AEC declared that it had chosen one on purpose remote area, covered by snow, with little wildlife (again according to their words) and without birds – which have already migrated elsewhere. The only problem was characterized by the presence of Inuit populations who lived in the area and who – as we will now see shortly – were one of the main causes of the stop to the project.
The problems with the Inuit
The populations who inhabited the area, as it is easy to imagine, they strongly opposed the projectespecially after learning of the not exactly rosy results of the explosions in Bikini Atoll. Their grievances were such that they pushed the AEC to postpone the project: the agency’s objective was to carry out demonstration tests to convince the local population and public opinion of the goodness of their work. In fact, according to them, the benefits would have far outweighed the “minimal risks” linked to the explosion… too bad the studies didn’t go exactly as expected. The fallout of radioactive material would have spread into a direction impossible to predict with certainty. If it had gone towards the interior of the country, for example, it could have contaminated not only the aquifers but, according to biologists, also the hunting areas essential to the survival of that population.
The AEC then conducted a test in Nevada through the Project Sedan of 1962: the objective was both to demonstrate the effectiveness of the excavation and to demonstrate that the amount of radiation on the surface would not be that high. The first objective was fully achieved: the crater of the explosion was hugeas clearly visible from the following video.
As for radiation, however, they were recorded levels well above expectations. At this point it is needless to say that public opinion, biologists and Inuit communities pushed the Government to stop this plan: it would have brought the Inuit communities to their knees, and this could not be tolerated. Precisely for this reason in 1962 the project was suspended and in 1970 was officially cancelled.
Having reached this point one might ask: why did the Government try so desperately to complete this project with nuclear weapons? Wouldn’t it have been simpler to put the idea aside and carry out the excavation with traditional techniques?
Beyond Chariot: The Plan for the New Panama Canal
Probably building a port in the traditional way would have been simpler, but we must keep in mind that the Chariot Project it was only a first test within a much larger program, theOperation Plowshare. If this new excavation technique had been successful, the Government would have used it to build a new Panama Canal. This infrastructure – also nicknamed “pan-atomic channel” – would have arisen in Central-South America. We do not know for sure what its location would have been, but the two most quoted positions were respectively a short distance from Panama Canal or near the Atrato and Trunado rivers in Colombia.
In any case, with the shelving of the Chariot project and the subsequent laws regarding nuclear tests, the idea of creating large works with this typology seems today rather remote and that of the port in Alaska remains just a curious anecdote to tell.
