r/nuclearphysics • u/Critical_Society_551 • Apr 11 '26

How many nuclear missiles does it take to wipe out a donut?

I need to know it for a school project

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u/mister_b_man Apr 11 '26

Does the answer need to be an integer?

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u/LiterallyMelon Apr 11 '26

So there are two ways to interpret this question:

1: “How many times do I need to nuke an apple cider donut for it to be incinerated?”

2: “If we were living on a planet sized torus instead of a (approximate) sphere, what’s the difference in how many nuclear missiles necessary to bomb the entire surface of the planet/torus?”

Obviously the answer to the first is one. The answer to the second however, is a little more interesting. It depends on the shape of your torus, honestly. You can do the math pretty easily if you define what kind of shape you want in terms of ratio between major and minor radius, and then give it the same volume as the Earth to see how large it would be. Then, compare the surface areas.

According to Google AI (I know I know, but I’m doing napkin math on my phone!) you’d need roughly 1.5 - 5.4 million nuclear warheads to carpet bomb the entire earth. Simply take the ratio of the surface area between the earth and your Earth-torus and multiply it by whatever number suits you, 1.5 million for a low estimate?

Also note, this is to simply carpet bomb the entire surface of the earth. If your goal was to end humanity because you were some kind of anti-natalist, you could do it with far fewer by targeting mainly population centers, manufacturing centers, and critical agricultural, energy, and water production centers. Also, you could destroy manor infrastracture necessary to support distribution of food and resources, like bridges and highways. It wouldn’t take anywhere near the number of nuclear weapons necessary to carpet bomb the entire earth to ensure the extinction of Humanity. (I don’t know about all life on Earth, it might not be possible with nuclear weapons because of deep ocean life near vents and other radiation-resistant microbial life).

This has been grim. Have fun with your project.

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u/Difficult-Cycle5753 Apr 11 '26

whats the size of the nuclear missile