Apparently, there’s a missing American Hydrogen Bomb somewhere in Greenland:
The United States abandoned a nuclear weapon beneath the ice in northern Greenland following a crash in 1968, a BBC investigation has found.
Its unique vantage point – perched at the top of the world – has meant that Thule Air Base has been of immense strategic importance to the US since it was built in the early 1950s, allowing a radar to scan the skies for missiles coming over the North Pole.
The Pentagon believed the Soviet Union would take out the base as a prelude to a nuclear strike against the US and so in 1960 began flying “Chrome Dome” missions. Nuclear-armed B52 bombers continuously circled over Thule – and could head straight to Moscow if they witnessed its destruction.
(…)
But on 21 January 1968, one of those missions went wrong.
The New York Times at the time reported it this way:
The Defense Department said that some of the wreckage had been observed on the ice by helicopters and that other pieces of the plane might have burned into or through the ice.
The Pentagon announcement made it clear that the bombs had not been found. It was not certain whether they had scattered on top of the ice cap or fallen with the bomber into several hundred feet of water.
And that was the last we heard, for the most part, until the BBC picked up the story recently:
By April [1968], a decision had been taken to send a Star III submarine to the base to look for the lost bomb, which had the serial number 78252. (A similar submarine search off the coast of Spain two years earlier had led to another weapon being recovered.)
But the real purpose of this search was deliberately hidden from Danish officials.
One document from July reads: “Fact that this operation includes search for object or missing weapon part is to be treated as confidential NOFORN”, the last word meaning not to be disclosed to any foreign country.
“For discussion with Danes, this operation should be referred to as a survey repeat survey of bottom under impact point,” it continued.
So far, the remaining parts of the bomb have apparently never been found.
