Czar Bomb

1963 Jaguar E-Type

My NYC nephew and niece have rather suddenly become fascinated with cars, not surprising since they are roughly 15 and 13 years old (who keeps track of these things?). I well remember my own teenage obsessions with old MGBs and Triumph Spitfires. Bemoaning the form of today's Jaguars and Saabs, I was reminded of another shapely vehicle, circa 1961: the hydrogen bomb the Soviets built and tested in the Arctic on October 30th of that year, nicknamed, the "Tsar Bomba."

1961 Soviet FU-Type

The explosion destroyed several small island and caused earthquakes, the tremors from which could be felt by three quarters of the globe (according to the Polish journal Tygodnik Powszechny, from which the photo at left). Of course, you can't see the original Tsar Bomba, but you can see its brothers and sisters at a museum in Sarov, in the Nizegorod region, approximately 400 km from Moscow. Sarov is the nearest city to the "Los Alamos of the USSR," the mysterious and heavily fortified Arzamas-16, which is still operational as a nuclear weapons lab, among other things. You can read all about it on the GlobalSecurity.org website, possibly the most terrifying site in the world.

But let's leave all that to admire the sheer beauty of the 1960s-era design, seen in this early 60s Saab TV commercial from YouTube. Our WMDs just can't hold a candle to these.

This post dedicated to my brother James who was largely responsible for my early automobile obsessions. Ironically, he doesn't even own a car.