‘Fast Food Nation’ Author Eric Schlosser on his new book about Nuclear Bombs and how close we have come to disaster.

Nuclear weapons are still held in massive stock piles all around the world. The fact that none of these have accidentally destroyed large sections of human populations is something of a miracle. That’s the contention of Eric Schlosser, author of the bestsellers Fast Food Nation and Reefer Madness. His new book is called ‘Command and Controls’ which details the history of America’s nuclear history and how perilously close the world has come to nuclear ruin. 

We’ve long believed that the closest the world has ever come to nuclear disaster has been the Cuban Missile Crisis. But Schlosser shows, through years of research, that there were many closer shaves. For instance a B52 Bomber was flying across America and nearly detonated simply because the pilot had brought some rubber cushions on the plane that day! The plane caught fire and crashed with its load of nuclear weapons. Every safety mechanism on the bombs it was carrying failed, except a basic switch. Had that switch been in a different position most of the citizens of America’s North Eastern states would have been wiped out.

This is just one of many tales of near misses in a book that shows that the science of nuclear weaponry is in the hands of accident-prone humans. The science behind nuclear weapons is truly frightening; Schlosser tell us that Hiroshima was levelled by an amount of uranium weighing less than a dollar bill.

And what should be most troubling to us is that thousands of these weapons are still held all over the world where there are also a high number of industrial accidents every year in places like Pakistan and India.

You can hear the sobering interview  on Futureproof from 10am this Saturday.