What do if airborne during nuclear war

cowman said:
No, I don't expect this to be a thing that ever happens but it's an interesting thing to think about.

Suppose I'm out in a typical single engine piston aircraft cruising along at a typical altitude... 4000-8000' or so. Suddenly I see a flash nearby but, presumably, far enough that survival is still possible.
What can I do to maximize my chance of survival? I'm thinking turn away immediately and go to full power in hopes that I can get far enough away for the pressure wave to slow down to something that won't cause structural damage. Now I could push the nose down for more speed but presumably the blast is expanding up and out from the detonation point so I might be descending into it at the same time. A climb would be the opposite dilemma... less speed but I'd be climbing away. Also, again presumably, flying away from the blast would reduce the relative impact of the pressure wave right? But when it hits would it potentially cause a stall and possibly a subsequent spin from the turbulence?

(yes I'm bored and drinking, discuss anyway).
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If you have an electronic ignition, you are BONED, prepare for a dead stick landing. No one will ever know where you are, because all of your radios will be permanently fried, as well.
Not sure how an old set of mags would handle the EMP burst.
Older aircraft without an electrical system would be fine, I believe. Though flying through a radioactive dust cloud environment could be terminal.
 
If you know the blast is coming, cover one eye with a patch. This was standard practice taught to US air force pilots circa mid 1970s.
 
Datadriver said:
If you know the blast is coming, cover one eye with a patch. This was standard practice taught to US air force pilots circa mid 1970s.
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I thought that was just prep for Talk Like A Pirate Day.

The More You Know....
 
If it's a Tsar Bomba size nuke your in for a wild ride.
 
Ryanb said:
Okay, so if I'm cruising at 8,000' and I look over to my 11 o'clock and see a nuke coming right for me, what would the proper anti-collision maneuver be?
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Aim straight towards it. That will get it over with much faster.
 
Shepherd said:
If you can see the blast, the secondary radiation caused by gamma and other high speed particles passing through the skin of your airplane will kill you in a few weeks anyway.
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Reminds me of the old three cooking question.
 
From a Junior High report. The EMP from a Hirosama sized bomb 1 mile above the US will take out all COTUS integrated circuits. A KX170B might survive. The Mags will most likely survive. They are kind of hardened. Generators will survive. The diodes in the alternator are toast. You wind up timex watch will survive.
 
Ryanb said:
Okay, so if I'm cruising at 8,000' and I look over to my 11 o'clock and see a nuke coming right for me, what would the proper anti-collision maneuver be?
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One could always go the "hero" route and deliberately intercept it to save others...
 
If I'm flying a CRJ-700/900 I'm ****ed. The engines are FADEC controlled and everything in the cockpit is a computer screen. So we'd turn into a very heavy uncontrolled brick.

If I'm flying a CRJ-200 with the old school pitot-static and caged AI we'd be fine, if it's day time. I got the three needed instruments and the engines are cable controlled. We might lose some of the other system computers depending on how EM hardened they are. So we'd at least be able to glide to a nearby airport or if we got lucky fly somewhere upwind far far away.
 
yetti said:
From a Junior High report. The EMP from a Hirosama sized bomb 1 mile above the US will take out all COTUS integrated circuits. A KX170B might survive. The Mags will most likely survive. They are kind of hardened. Generators will survive. The diodes in the alternator are toast. You wind up timex watch will survive.
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This the part that worries me about North Korea. They don't have to actually hit us. They just need a rocket that will stay together long enough to get it above the COTUS. Boom we're back to at least the early 1900s with none of the skills, tools, or infrastructure.

They're crazy enough to try it.
 
Just do what Colonel Tibbets did! Bank it hard and do the classic maneuver "get the heck out of there!"
 
Datadriver said:
If you know the blast is coming, cover one eye with a patch. This was standard practice taught to US air force pilots circa mid 1970s.
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Do not look into the blast with the remaining eye.

I spent an afternoon with the Titan Missile Museum with director Yvonne Morris. She was, in the day, a missile officer (one of the few MOAs open to female officers). She mused about the fact that when they went to the silo on alert, the car they drove was taken by the crew they were relieving. In the event of a missile launch, plans called for them to meet up at a designated distant point. How to do that out in the Arizona desert with no car puzzled her at first until she realized that such contingency plans likely were moot if there was a missile launch, to begin with.
 
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