Phoenix Sub Zero

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The Hiroshima missile dived for the desert floor and armed the final detonator train of the Scorpion warhead. After a descent through the low clouds, the missile broke out into the clear over the abandoned town of Bajram-Ali, Turkmenistan.

A few hundred meters east of the town center and mosque, the missile’s high explosive detonated.

The explosion, in its first millisecond, ruptured a bag of vinyl acetate monomer mixed with a dozen other chemical components; in the next it ruptured a high-pressure bottle of ethylene gas, the chemicals mixing and reacting in the high temperatures and pressures of the fireball; finally the pressure pulse reached a bag of finely ground iron filings. The explosion scattered the filings as it spread, 1,000 meters above Bajram-Ali. The iron filings drifted to the town below.

As they did, the reacting chemicals from the missile formed a thin milky atomized liquid that rained down and wetted the buildings and streets. Ten minutes later, the milky chemicals had dried into a sticky glue. The iron filings, mixed in with the glue, were stuck to the surfaces of the streets and roofs and walls of the decaying structures. Within 1,000 meters of the Hiroshima missile detonation, iron filings were glued to every horizontal and vertical surface.

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