When the Soviet 50-megaton test-bomb exploded on Novaya Zemlya last October, it set the earth's whole atmosphere vibrating. Last week in London, Seismologists Eric Carpenter, George Harwood and Thomas Whiteside reported how the bomb waves looked when they were recorded on the microbarograph at Britain's Atomic Weapons Research Establishment.
The bomb exploded at 8:33 a.m. British time. By 11:44 a.m., the first air wave reached England, having taken 3 hr. 11 min. to travel from Novaya Zemlya at the speed of sound—about 700 m.p.h. At 4:40 p.m. on the next day, the barograph pen jiggled again, recording the air waves that had...
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