unforum

[vfozi]

[rhesusmonkeyboy]

While us normal folk think "nuclear weapons" immediately, my buddy in the military ( who is not a big wig or anything ) does state we've got plenty that'll really level some shit.

I'd think along those lines, also the EM from a modern nuclear device would leave magnetic media totally done, as well as not allow for Rob's whisper at the end of the film!

I got the feeling that Hammer-Down just means unleashing all our powerful non-nuclear weapons in succession on an area ... hence the popular "fuel air bomb" theories.

Aren't those the ones that kind of pull at your insides with the near-vacuum they leave?

The nuclear dust cloud would kill tons afterwards, and we've come a long way since Hiroshima and Nagasaki, unfortunately.

[vfozi]

i don't really think the "nuclear weapons would erase magnetic media" argument is that convincing.

like, you're willing to accept the existence of a the cloverfield monster, the little parasite mini-monsters (or are they babies?), marlena swelling up and popping, the monster swatting off the head of the statue of liberty, the fact that they survived an extremely gnarly helicopter crash, the fact that the monster was basically following them around like it had a homing beacon, etc etc etc

none of which makes any sort of technical sense, but all of which makes makes the story better.

so i'm willing to ignore what i know about EMP effects and heat and so on (hell, and even the odds of finding a camcorder tape in the wreckage of manhattan - did they ever find so much as an intact computer or cell phone in the WTC wreckage?) and accept the nuke theory just because it makes a much darker and more satisfying story.

if i was a filmmaker, and i'd already gone all the way, killing all but one of my main characters dying, and inserted the tragic irony of rob rescuing beth only for the two of them to die together under a bridge, and having the cloverfield tape be taped over rob & beth's special day, then i'd just be like let's go all the way, super-dark "the hills have eyes" style, and i'd totally have the military nuke NYC. because that would fit in so much better w/ the whole "OMG i can't believe what just happened" tone of the movie.

[AktionT4]

It was nuked....


Why?


If you grew up in the 1970's and went to school back then - the air raid sirens are quite familiar.


When Rob and Beth are speaking into the camera under that bridge, you hear 2 distinct sirens that are EXACTLY the same as the civil air defense sirens one would hear during a nuclear attack.


The sirens are the giveaway that it was indeeed nuked...

[rhesusmonkeyboy]

Like Return to the Planet of the Apes

[dronetek]

[Aquastorm]

If the Americans bombing Dresden back in World War II knew what the results were going to be, I bet they'd probably say "God help us" too.

If the "lots of small bombs" don't work, then explain why a A-10 firing mere 30mm cannon shells would be such an effective tank killer even though a much larger cannon shell cannot penetrate the same tank?

On a related note, a massive indiscriminate bombing hell bent on getting every single pound of explosive the American arsenal can offer at MGP is not going to work. You don't want to scratch the surface, you want to hit it with something so that it penetrates the beast. If you manage to land a lucky shot and blast a hole through the carapace, then you might have a chance.

It's the same reason why the guys had to drill a hole into the astreoid in Aarmageddon.

If they used a bunker-buster on it, it might work, provided that it hits a hard point, since a MGP might actually have a fleixible carapace which means that the bunker-buster might not be effective in penetrating.

[Ivo]

[dronetek]

[eblkheart]

I find it interesting that some people would think that we would never detonate a nuclear device in NYC in a movie or what have you. Thing is, its already been done. The movie "Fail Safe" which is a pretty scary and semi-accurate movie for the time, does this in the film in the end.

As for Air Raid Sirens, there are different tones for this. I grew up in the midwest and we all know about the wavering sound that is for weather warnings. However, the air sirens going off were for the most part, steady, which (if I remember right, we had signs all over the squadron where I was stationed at showing the distinction of three signals) is a signal for attack.

Over all though, I have no idea what happened, but I am leaning toward a Nuclear Release, but the details were wrong to be shown as a nuclear explosion, like I had explained earlier in my first post.

There was a question of fallout and radiation earlier in regards to a post that "Rose" left. The situation would be similar to a point, but your also comparing apples and oranges. Chernobyl was spewing out massive amounts of gamma radiation from the reactors saturated the area before the Soviet officials started to evacuate the area and admitted problems when it was picked up outside of the then Soviet Union. 20some years later, people can go in there now, but only for short times (they offer tours to the area) But the area won't be inhabitable for sometime, I believe 300-700 years for humans. Notice though that people still do live in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, including at ground zero granted they were smaller bombs (15-20KT estimated). There is still background radiation, but its very minimal from what I understand.

Fallout from the bomb do spread out, but depending on the size of the explosion (and other factors also), it can dissipate after so many miles from the explosion contaminating the area for a short time. Again, size and weather variables make a difference in what happens with the fall out.

But as for what the military would do in this situation and decisions what to use, it far fetch of what we think what they could use against something like this. In the 1953 adaption of "War of the Worlds" (another paramount studios film) the nuclear device was the last resort. My thought on using a nuclear device against it would be pretty damn strong due to the damage from the heat and the PSI it could create since it seemed that in the film nothing else was putting a dent into it. That's my 2 cents on that.

[spaceventure]

heres a video of the ending
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSrV4UOaCJA

[DBZEROGRAVITY]

did anyone consider that "god save us" means "holy shit, the first bombs didn't work" or "i hope this next set of bombs will put the monster down". god save us doesn't necessarily HAVE to mean nukes. how stupid would we be to nuke our own soil without testing every other possible weapon and avoid radiation pouring over the city? i know sometimes our gov't makes dumb decisions (which i won't get into right now) but they're not that fucking stupid...i don't believe those were nukes at all until jj says it himself

[dronetek]

[SpaceBass]

What about a neutron bomb? From what I understand, they're built to kill organic matter through radiation while destroying less physically than regular nukes (but still way more than conventional non-nuclear bombs). If one were exploded at ground-level, and Rob and Beth were on the outskirts of the blast range while still well within the lethal radiation range, the camera probably would have survived while they didn't. This could also explain why the physical effects of the blast did not seem to be that severe at their location. They were still talking after the collapse, right? But probably not for long.

[rjharris1960]

There is no way in hell that the military would detonate a nuclear bomb in Manhattan. That would cause radioactive fallout in Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, Long Island, Jersey City, and all of the other places that surround Manhattan. It just doesn't make sense to put that many people and that much infrastructure at risk.