CTBT
A condition of 1996's Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, an international ban on nuclear tests ratified by all nuclear states except India, Pakistan and (now) North Korea, was the establishment of a global network of sonic detection stations capable of identifying any illicit nuclear test. Each station contains a set of pressurized tubes that sense the air- and ground- borne vibrations that follow the shockwave of an atomic explosion. The idea is that, by interpolating the data from many such detectors around the world, the location of the explosion can be pinpointed and, hopefully, the guilty nation dealt with.
The system is how we knew that North Korea conducted a test last year and that the blast was less powerful than NK had hoped.
One of the detectors is on the Ross Ice Shelf. Earlier this week we road-tripped out to it in Pisten Bullies and set up a camp for a group coming to do some service on the tubes.
Not too much to see, though one thing that kept us excited was the clandestine nature of the facility; we weren't allowed within a few hundred feet of it. This on the honor system, of course, no soldiers down here. Apparently the sites in more civilized regions are heavily guarded, as any interference with one might cause a bit of an international squawk.
The system is how we knew that North Korea conducted a test last year and that the blast was less powerful than NK had hoped.
One of the detectors is on the Ross Ice Shelf. Earlier this week we road-tripped out to it in Pisten Bullies and set up a camp for a group coming to do some service on the tubes.
Not too much to see, though one thing that kept us excited was the clandestine nature of the facility; we weren't allowed within a few hundred feet of it. This on the honor system, of course, no soldiers down here. Apparently the sites in more civilized regions are heavily guarded, as any interference with one might cause a bit of an international squawk.