So rather than lobbing it in by missile, shooting it from an outsized cannon, or dropping it from a bomber, they just left a bomb sitting there in plain sight, with a timer, giving the enemy an opportunity to disarm it. It’s nice to see A-Sig is following the James Bond Conventions and operating by Dr. Evil rules.
Actually, Robert, I like how Dr. Taintor’s body language shifts between panels 1 and 4 so that even though he says the exact same words, the delivery changes from abject terror to fanboy enthusiasm!
I think that *is* the intended joke. Exact same words but completely different and (successful) change in attitude. (IMO it worked very well… but, I suppose, it could have been missed.)
“It’s these changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes.
Nothing remains quite the same.
With all of our running and all of our cunning,
If we couldn’t laugh we would all go insane.”
HT seems strangely unconcerned about a nuclear bomb in the middle of his sphere of influence. Which means that Anasigma and the rest of the world should be even more concerned
The authors could be following actual science. The Chernobyl disaster showed us that nukes have surprisingly little effect on plants. (Not none.) Animals return from other places. (This is apparently a uniquely biological use of the word “return”. It means other animals, from other places, move in to replace the ones that have left. [Doesn’t need to be leaving because of death, so it’s proper to just say “left”.])
It’s also possible they’re not. After all, Mad Science is only peripherally related to Real Science.
Chernobyl wasn’t a nuke. And look up the “Red Forest” some time. It’s called that because after the incident, all the trees in it died. Things grow there now because forty years later most of the radiation has decayed away.
All y’all (along with Dr. Taintor) seem to be operating on the assumption that this device really is an actual nuke. It’s equally possible – and perhaps even more probable – that this device is a decoy. It may be that the actual nuke hasn’t even been deployed yet. They’ll all be distracted with this thing when the real one drops.
Unless the Biomass is unusually sensitive to radiation, a nuke is simply not a threat to it.
A much more dangerous threat would be a bioweapon, say a fungus or an intelligent slime mold that was engineered to eat the Biomass and evade its defenses. A crop duster would be a far greater menace.
Nukes are oversold. Sure, they are instant death to cities, but remember that cities
concentrate people and their support structures in a very small area and thus are perfect targets. For more than that limited application you need thousands of them for doing things like causing Nuclear Summer by poisoning the ozone layer with the nitrous oxides created inside the fireball . BTW Nuclear Winter is now passe. It has been proven by practical example that the soot cloud stays well within the troposphere and gets rained out.
Lots of plants can survive fires by growing back from underground roots. To fry stuff several feet underground you need to be pretty close to the central fireball. In any case, if the Biomass has grown to a few thousand square miles by this point (say, as big as Connecticut) there aren’t any single bombs large enough.
(There isn’t any theoretical limit on how powerful you can make a fusion bomb, but after a certain point it gets too large to move).
“(There isn’t any theoretical limit on how powerful you can make a fusion bomb, but after a certain point it gets too large to move).”
Indeed, BMunroe, and this bomb doesn’t look even close to that big. Unless this is a distraction, or a new technology that allows for a very compact, but very powerful bomb, I suspect the Biomass may find it to be merely a tasty treat. My money is on A-sig accidentally being responsible for a significant expansion of the biomass. This is how the apocalypse happens.
The fireball of a nuclear blast is only a hundred yards wide or so. It’ll kill the idiots clustering around the weapon looking at it, but I’m pretty sure the Biomass is a lot bigger than that by this point.
Somebody (AS) just gave HT a nuke. An older type meant to rely on not being found, a electromechanical timer & a physical safeing method. (yes, there is a SADM training film). If it’s un-madded, the yield would be a 1 kt groundburst. Initial exposure of 1000 rad approx 1.4 km across with a 3rd degree burn of a little less.
Bad for forests and cities alike. (yes, the Red Forest died) The biomass now has a nuclear weapon.
Ah, so that’s why we geeks act as we do… heavy overdoses :p
Little meat things? So Dr. Taintor is still more or less human? o_O
Correct. He is merely interfaced to it, gaining Total Situational Awareness. He needn’t become part of the biomass unless he wants to.
So rather than lobbing it in by missile, shooting it from an outsized cannon, or dropping it from a bomber, they just left a bomb sitting there in plain sight, with a timer, giving the enemy an opportunity to disarm it. It’s nice to see A-Sig is following the James Bond Conventions and operating by Dr. Evil rules.
Agreed!
Perhaps H.T. can convince Dr. Pierson to do the deed?
Didn’t seem to make much difference. Better increase the dosage a tad.
Actually, Robert, I like how Dr. Taintor’s body language shifts between panels 1 and 4 so that even though he says the exact same words, the delivery changes from abject terror to fanboy enthusiasm!
I think that *is* the intended joke. Exact same words but completely different and (successful) change in attitude. (IMO it worked very well… but, I suppose, it could have been missed.)
“It’s these changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes.
Nothing remains quite the same.
With all of our running and all of our cunning,
If we couldn’t laugh we would all go insane.”
HT seems strangely unconcerned about a nuclear bomb in the middle of his sphere of influence. Which means that Anasigma and the rest of the world should be even more concerned
The authors could be following actual science. The Chernobyl disaster showed us that nukes have surprisingly little effect on plants. (Not none.) Animals return from other places. (This is apparently a uniquely biological use of the word “return”. It means other animals, from other places, move in to replace the ones that have left. [Doesn’t need to be leaving because of death, so it’s proper to just say “left”.])
It’s also possible they’re not. After all, Mad Science is only peripherally related to Real Science.
Chernobyl wasn’t a nuke. And look up the “Red Forest” some time. It’s called that because after the incident, all the trees in it died. Things grow there now because forty years later most of the radiation has decayed away.
All y’all (along with Dr. Taintor) seem to be operating on the assumption that this device really is an actual nuke. It’s equally possible – and perhaps even more probable – that this device is a decoy. It may be that the actual nuke hasn’t even been deployed yet. They’ll all be distracted with this thing when the real one drops.
Unless the Biomass is unusually sensitive to radiation, a nuke is simply not a threat to it.
A much more dangerous threat would be a bioweapon, say a fungus or an intelligent slime mold that was engineered to eat the Biomass and evade its defenses. A crop duster would be a far greater menace.
Nukes are oversold. Sure, they are instant death to cities, but remember that cities
concentrate people and their support structures in a very small area and thus are perfect targets. For more than that limited application you need thousands of them for doing things like causing Nuclear Summer by poisoning the ozone layer with the nitrous oxides created inside the fireball . BTW Nuclear Winter is now passe. It has been proven by practical example that the soot cloud stays well within the troposphere and gets rained out.
… I suspect the massive nuclear fire IS a threat to a biomass.
Lots of plants can survive fires by growing back from underground roots. To fry stuff several feet underground you need to be pretty close to the central fireball. In any case, if the Biomass has grown to a few thousand square miles by this point (say, as big as Connecticut) there aren’t any single bombs large enough.
(There isn’t any theoretical limit on how powerful you can make a fusion bomb, but after a certain point it gets too large to move).
“(There isn’t any theoretical limit on how powerful you can make a fusion bomb, but after a certain point it gets too large to move).”
Indeed, BMunroe, and this bomb doesn’t look even close to that big. Unless this is a distraction, or a new technology that allows for a very compact, but very powerful bomb, I suspect the Biomass may find it to be merely a tasty treat. My money is on A-sig accidentally being responsible for a significant expansion of the biomass. This is how the apocalypse happens.
The fireball of a nuclear blast is only a hundred yards wide or so. It’ll kill the idiots clustering around the weapon looking at it, but I’m pretty sure the Biomass is a lot bigger than that by this point.
They’ve spotted an actual nuke. An actual one, not a fluke. But a near-fatal dose calms him to comatose, and H. T. can just make a rebuke.
Sometimes nuking a sapient swamp just scatters infectious biomass all over your world.
This.^
Somebody (AS) just gave HT a nuke. An older type meant to rely on not being found, a electromechanical timer & a physical safeing method. (yes, there is a SADM training film). If it’s un-madded, the yield would be a 1 kt groundburst. Initial exposure of 1000 rad approx 1.4 km across with a 3rd degree burn of a little less.
Bad for forests and cities alike. (yes, the Red Forest died) The biomass now has a nuclear weapon.
Not related to today’s comic but
BABY COBRA!!!!!
https://twistedsifter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/aww-gist-breadcrumbs-4.gif
(Via Twistedsifter.com )
Hugs!