Limited Test Ban Treaty signed

Earlier this morning we posted a piece about nuke map, a program that allows you to visually see the effects of an atomic explosion. It took until 1963 before there was enough outcry over the number of atmospheric nuclear tests causing fallout (and contaminating people, wildfire and entire regions) for the main nuclear weapon states to do something about it. Up to this point the nuclear powers had tested a 60 megaton weapon in the atmosphere. On this day in 1963, the Limited Test Ban Treaty (LTBT), which prohibits all test detonations of nuclear weapons above ground, was signed by representatives of the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The treaty was ratified by the US Senate on September 24, 1963, by a vote of 80 to 19 and went into effect on October 10, 1963. The treaty (which other nuclear powers signed at a later date), did have one or two violations in its history, notably the Soviet Union’s Chagan nuclear test, carried out on January 15, 1965 which caused fallout over Japan, and some accidental releases of fallout such as the 1970 Baneberry nuclear test in Nevada, but on the whole, the treaty has held.

Date in History: 5 August 1963