Underground nuclear tests
in the hexagon
November 14, 2002
I reproduce below two articles recently published in the press. The first was sent to me by Serge Acquatella:
Nice-Matin
November 14, 2002, "In Brief" section, page 14:
UNEXPLAINED NOISE IN WESTERN VAR:
An odd phenomenon, still unexplained, occurred yesterday around 2:30 PM. A rumbling followed by a weak tremor lasting three to four seconds surprised residents from St-Cyr to La Valette. Fire stations were inundated with calls from anxious people. No damage has been reported. The Strasbourg geological center, which records every seismic tremor on national territory, detected no anomalies.
The second excerpt was sent by Christophe Giudicci and comes from La Provence, also dated November 14, 2002:
A HUGE NOISE HEARD
Yesterday afternoon, a mysterious tremor was felt in the region.
And what if the aerial origin were being kept secret?
At 2:26 PM yesterday, the phone lines of the operational centers of the Bouches-du-Rhône firefighters in Marseille, the Var firefighters in Toulon, and the naval firefighters battalion of the Phocéan city were flooded with calls. At the gendarmerie station in Plan-de-Cuques, east of Marseille, as well as in apartments in the southern districts and in Saint-Cyr, Bandol, and Toulon, windows shook. The testimonies collected by emergency services converge: a loud noise resembling a shockwave was felt. A real "bang," a heavy rumbling. Many people immediately thought it was a seismic tremor, a small earthquake along a crustal fault line, since the Southeast is directly exposed. Not at all! At the Institute of Physics of the Globe in Strasbourg, where every outburst of Earth’s inner fury is meticulously recorded, "nothing was detected on our instruments. It’s truly very strange, because if it had been a shockwave, we would have registered it." At the Cadarache Atomic Energy Research Center (CEA), no explanation is available. Could it be the collapse of an underground gallery near the Gardanne coal mines? Unlikely, since this mysterious noise—which "made our windows and door shake," as a couple living in the Bonneveine district of Marseille testified—was also strikingly evident along the Toulon harbor.
That leaves the aerial hypothesis. Physicists in Strasbourg confirm: "It didn’t come from the ground; the origin must therefore be aerial." Military? The air gendarmerie at Istres air base knows nothing about it. Last night, at the Aix-en-Provence air navigation center, they stated: "At that time, no supersonic aircraft was flying over the region, neither civilian nor military."
I believe certain things must be explained to the French people.
In 1995, I published a book with Albin Michel titled "Les Enfants du Diable" (The Children of the Devil). In fact, I had written this book many years earlier, on commission from publisher Olivier Orban, but he, despite signing a contract with me, refused to publish it upon reading it. I think he "went ballistic" upon reading it. Everyone has their limits of credibility, perception, interpretation, and understanding. If you read the book, you’ll see it begins with a reference to the story of Cassandra. She was a Trojan woman struck by Apollo with the gift of foreseeing the future, but without being believed. Until Troy’s destruction by the Greeks, she spent her time wandering the city, vainly pleading with its inhabitants to listen. Only her brother, a priest in the temple, believed her. But then the gods sent enormous serpents that emerged from the sea and suffocated him.
It’s been twenty-five years since I’ve been warning about things before they happen. In 1976, I was the first European to use the word "terawatt." No one believed me. The same happened in 1983 with the "nuclear winter," and so on. Today, I’m about to release a book, in a few weeks, discussing the fantastic American lead in "space force," based on operational hypersonic vehicles for twelve years already—and already, some fool is calling it "technological delirium." I hope he won’t be facing me on a TV talk show if I’m invited. Ignorance and incompetence are starting to seriously tire me.
The times are dangerous. Often, I think I’d prefer not to know everything I know. But I do know these things. So I speak, I write.
You’ve seen on my website a number of files concerning "cutting-edge weapons," which have actually been developed worldwide for decades. You’ll find files on:
Microwave weapons,
Electromagnetic weapons,
Climate weapons,
Seismic weapons, etc.
In 1996, the French government announced that France would renounce underground nuclear testing at Mururoa, after "a few final qualification shots." From then on, France would continue developing its thermonuclear weapons through "simulations" performed on computers and on a facility called "Megajoule," currently under construction at Barp, near Bordeaux.
In fact, you’re being lied to. But this is nothing new. On my website, I’ve explained that the Megajoule project is completely bogus. Not only will these experiments never work, but even if hydrogen fusion via laser were to function, it would have absolutely nothing to do with nuclear bombs (which rely on lithium hydride fusion). Yet no one moves, no one reacts. What are our Nobel laureates—Charpak and others—waiting for to raise these questions in the mainstream press? What are our courageous science journalists doing, clinging to their ejection seats? How is it that for six years no one has noticed that Megajoule is merely a "screen project" (for which a thousand salaries are still budgeted for 2008, which is quite impressive at a time when we’re told research funding is being cut)? Are our physicists blind and deaf?
I don’t understand. On my website, I included a letter addressed to Kovacs, the project’s director.
To date, no journalist has contacted me.
No television network has considered doing a report there.
No one finds it strange that Kovacs hasn’t replied to a letter sent months ago, in which I posed very precise questions. Is there no French journalist with enough courage to challenge a project directly emanating from the military? Possibly…
I’ll explain. You’ve now all heard about these "new weapons," which are only "new" because suddenly these things reach your ears or appear before your eyes. You’re discovering microwave weapons powered by "flux-compression generators" invented by the Russians (A. Sakharov) in the 1950s. How they work: such a system directly converts explosive energy into electromagnetic energy. The variations are infinite. In space, such systems can send "plasmoids" resembling smoke rings at thousands of kilometers per second. Near the ground, they can fry electrical and electronic installations. Range? Power? It all depends on the energy source and the explosive used.
You can’t possibly imagine that countries developing these weapons limit themselves to chemical explosives. Systems driven by the detonation of "small nuclear bombs" have been tested for decades, and in certain countries these toys are already operational. So what will the French do, suddenly becoming so "eco-conscious"? Do you think we’ll run all this on paper or in our computers? Do you think Megajoule (which will never work) could be used to design or pilot miniaturized electromagnetic weapons?
Are you an idiot, or what?
France cannot stop its nuclear tests, and since 1996 it has never ceased doing so.
Where? How?
Where? That remains to be determined—investigation ongoing. Several sites are under suspicion. How? We’re beginning to understand. The key is successfully dampening the explosion’s shockwave. A bomb equivalent to 1,000 tons of TNT creates a cavity in the ground of a few tens of cubic meters. When no precautions are taken, the shock is brutal. The ground is compressed and heated to high temperature. A strong seismic signal is emitted. Everything near the bomb is simply vaporized. Then heat dissipates. The gas trapped inside this sphere, whose inner part is vitrified by intense radiation, cools down. As it cools, it draws rock toward the center. The rock fractures. The cavity collapses. When the explosion occurs relatively close to the surface, this collapse tends to spread, forming the typical depression seen in underground nuclear explosions. Look at photos of the Nevada test site, adorned with 900 such formations.
As long as military authorities felt no need to conceal this activity, they didn’t drill deeper than necessary—1,500 meters for a megaton charge, but only 150 to 300 meters for a kiloton charge. Then suddenly, underground nuclear test bans appeared. All countries adopted a policy of wisdom. The Americans became wise, the Russians became wise, the British became wise. In reality, they began detonating bombs at greater depth—1,000 meters. Then they employed various techniques to reduce the bomb’s seismic signal. That’s why seismographs don’t detect it. We’ve long been able to reduce this signal so it gets lost in the background noise of Earth’s natural seismic activity.
How? There are many solutions. Anything goes to prevent rock from being hit directly by the shockwave. First, the relatively small device can be enclosed in a vacuum chamber. This allows the plasma created during the thermonuclear device’s ignition to expand freely. Then, the bomb is surrounded by a composite medium. For example, a spherical cavity can be filled with small plastic balloons, a few centimeters in diameter, filled with water. The shockwave vaporizes them, but the vaporization of water partially absorbs the shock energy by converting it into heat. The latent heat of vaporization of water is high. Finally, around all this, maximum systems are installed to absorb the tremor. Sound waves can be reflected downward using a concrete slab. But certain media, especially mines, behave like natural acoustic dampeners. The lignite mine at Gardanne, near Marseille, could provide excellent attenuation due to its lignite layer. It’s enormous—extending westward to the Etang de Berre, eastward to the Sainte Baume, northward approaching Aix, and southward reaching Marseille. Only the western part near Vitrolles is still being mined. Carbonification is the slow transformation of plant matter into carbon. Coal is the final product, peat is barely begun carbonification. Lignite, fibrous, lies between the two. An excellent acoustic damper. Moreover, the Gardanne basin, sedimentary in nature, resembles a layered cake, with alternating layers of limestone and marl. This structure makes it extremely difficult for sound waves to travel straight to the surface. Instead, they progress horizontally, bouncing repeatedly off layers with different acoustic impedances. The seismic tremor thus becomes insignificant.
So what remains?
Low frequencies. You know very well, when your neighbor plays rock music and you do your best to protect yourself, yet in the end the low frequencies still pound your ears. It’s the same with underground nuclear explosions. In the PACA region, this has been going on for 15 years. Press echoes have been numerous. People speak of a "mysterious vibration." It can’t be a shockwave linked to a supersonic aircraft’s sonic boom: it lasts too long. The boom is tied to the passage of a shockwave—or rather, two, for those familiar with fluid mechanics. Bang-bang!
A few weeks ago, I was interviewed by Canadian television about the book I’m releasing in January. Underground explosions will be discussed in it. What did these French-speaking Canadians, who visited my site, tell me? That North Americans also hear "mysterious vibrations," particularly along the U.S. West Coast. They have the same phenomenon as us—and are asking the same questions. Isn’t that strange?
In the USA, there’s plenty of space, and in Russia too. There are deserts. The British have vast territories in Australia, which they’ve long used for underground nuclear tests. We don’t have deserts, but we have mines. If France has conducted underground explosions in the Gardanne mine, God help us. This is a region with high seismic activity. Reaction products are trapped during explosions. In a mine, they could be drained. Gases might rise through fissures and fractures. Did you know a powerful underground river runs through the mine, flowing into the Mediterranean? What if this flow became polluted? Then you’d simply have to wait ten thousand years before eating fish or sea urchins again.
Ah, I’ve learned the mine will be permanently decommissioned and then flooded. If explosions occurred, they were at a depth of a thousand meters. Once flooded, the mine becomes convenient—no one will ever be able to go back and check.
People keep asking me:
- So, your investigation—where is it?
They come for updates, like showing up at a meal with cutlery in hand and a napkin around their neck, eyes shining. But no one does anything. You’re all asleep while they prepare a nightmare future for you. In Bordeaux, the army is quietly mocking you and spending your money on a project that won’t work—something any first-year physicist can understand. In Toulouse, Jean-Jacques Vélasco seriously ponders the 11% of "unresolved cases." In Lyon, the Mérieux Level 4 laboratory still stands proudly on its stilts, brimming with the world’s most dangerous bacterial and viral strains—and a single old anti-tank rocket could scatter them (it would have been wiser to bury this dangerous lab in some remote place, surrounded by barbed wire). Everyone couldn’t care less.
I don’t know what to think anymore. I know some people aren’t indifferent to my writings. The number of daily visits is proof of some interest. My books have been read by people.
What can we do?
Today, there are 366 Don Quixotes who have co-signed the open letters I’ve written and sent to various windmills.
Some testimonies about the recent event:
Josette, in her villa in Aubagne, noticed "the dining room chandelier moving strangely." A family from Saint-Cyr-sur-mer was terrified: "Everything vibrated—the walls, the ceiling, the windows. It was very impressive, and we quickly fled the house in panic. I thought it was an earthquake," said the woman. This phenomenon is not due to a seismic tremor—information confirmed again yesterday by the Institute of Physics of the Globe in Strasbourg, where no instrument recorded it. The event was heard on Tuesday. Striking fact: all these testimonies refer to events occurring almost simultaneously. A reader from St-Cannat claims: "I thought my car parked in front of the gate was exploding." At the Rognes school, students reported "abnormal shaking of the windows." At the Toulon Maritime Prefecture and the Taverny Air Operations Command Center, no aircraft passage capable of causing this "bang" was reported. The admiral believes "it couldn’t have been a sonic boom, as the detonation heard was too long." It wasn’t a 20-mm training shot by the army near Toulon either. Even though humid air amplifies sounds, such an impact couldn’t be heard in Marseille! And a senior officer declared: "This noise is astonishing and incredible." Indeed.
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