Soviets Conduct 19th Nuclear Test
The Soviet Union staged an underground nuclear explosion Sunday on the steppes of Central Asia to improve Soviet military technology, the official Tass news agency said.
Tass said the explosive yield ranged from 20 to 150 kilotons. The U.S. atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945 had a yield of 20 kilotons, equivalent to 20,000 tons of TNT.
The test at the Semipalatinsk range in Kazakhstan was the Soviets’ 19th underground nuclear explosion since the Kremlin abandoned a unilateral test moratorium on Feb. 28.
The last Soviet test before Sunday was on Oct. 16, when a device with a yield of up to 20 kilotons was detonated.
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