U.S. steps up N-bomb tests

Press, 27 October 1982, Page 21

U.S. steps up N-bomb tests

NZPA Washington The United States, which maintains it is still committed to a comprehensive test ban treaty, has detonated more nuclear weapons so far in 1982 than in any other year since 1970. There have been 17 announced explosions at the Nevada test site so far. the biggest number since 30 nuclear devices were detonated in 1970. according to United States Energy Department figures.

Other detonations were not announced, but available Energy Department figures show the busiest day was September 23 when three separate tests were conducted.

“Basically, we are trying to put more modern weapons into the stockpile and we are trying to make our weapons safer,” said Mr James Cannon, a spokesman for the Energy Department, the agency in charge of pro-

ducing and testing nuclear explosives. All United States testing is done underground at the Nevada site, north-west of Las Vegas. Above-ground tests were halted after a limited test ban treaty was negotiated in 1963. The United States and the Soviet Union signed a treaty in 1976 limiting underground tests to 150 kilotons, the equivalent of 150,000 tonnes of T.N.T. That amounts to about 10 times the power of the bomb the United States dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.

Although the treaty has not been ratified bv the Senate, the United States adheres to its limits.

This year. concerned officials said they would not resume negotiations on a comprehensive test ban until the Soviet Union agreed to new procedures to verify limited test bans already in effect.