Vela Incident - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Vela Incident was an unidentified "double flash

Effects of nuclear explosions

The energy released from a nuclear weapon detonated in the troposphere can be divided into four basic categories:*Blast—40-50% of total energy*Thermal radiation—30-50% of total energy...

" of light

Light

Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that is visible to the human eye, and is responsible for the sense of sight. Visible light has wavelength in a range from about 380 nanometres to about 740 nm, with a frequency range of about 405 THz to 790 THz...

that was detected by an American Vela Hotel

Vela (satellite)

Vela was the name of a group of satellites developed as the Vela Hotel element of Project Vela by the United States to monitor compliance with the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty by the Soviet Union, and other nuclear-capable states. It means vigil or "watch" in Spanish.Vela started out as a small...

satellite on September 22, 1979.

Some specialists who examined the data speculated that the double flash, characteristic of a nuclear explosion, may have been the result of a nuclear weapons test

Nuclear testing

Nuclear weapons tests are experiments carried out to determine the effectiveness, yield and explosive capability of nuclear weapons. Throughout the twentieth century, most nations that have developed nuclear weapons have tested them...

:
"The conclusions of the Presidential panel (the Ad Hoc Panel) were reassuring, as they suggested that the most likely explanation of the Vela detection was a meteoroid

Meteoroid

A meteoroid is a sand- to boulder-sized particle of debris in the Solar System. The visible path of a meteoroid that enters Earth's atmosphere is called a meteor, or colloquially a shooting star or falling star. If a meteoroid reaches the ground and survives impact, then it is called a meteorite...

hitting the satellite — in part because of the discrepancy in bhangmeter

Bhangmeter

A bhangmeter is a type of photometer used on reconnaissance satellites that is intended to detect atmospheric nuclear detonations.The first satellites which incorporated bhangmeters were the Advanced Vela satellites...

readings. Others who examined the data, including Defense Intelligence Agency

Defense Intelligence Agency

The Defense Intelligence Agency is a member of the Intelligence Community of the United States, and is the central producer and manager of military intelligence for the United States Department of Defense, employing over 16,500 U.S. military and civilian employees worldwide...

(DIA), the national laboratories, and defense contractors reached a very different conclusion — that the data supported the conclusion that on 22 September 1979, Vela 6911 had detected a nuclear detonation."

However, it has never been ruled out that the "double flash" signal might have been a spurious electronic signal that was generated by an aging detector in an old satellite. No corroboration of an explosion, such as the presence of nuclear byproducts in the air, was ever made, even though there were numerous passes in the area by U.S. Air Force planes that were specifically designed to detect airborne radioactive dust.

It was also noted that some meteoroid

Meteoroid

s as they enter the atmosphere produce explosive bursts measured from several kilotons of TNT (the Eastern Mediterranean Event

Eastern Mediterranean Event

The Eastern Mediterranean Event was a high-energy aerial explosion over the Mediterranean Sea, around 34°N 21°E on June 6, 2002. This explosion, similar in power to a small atomic bomb, has been related to an asteroid undetected while approaching the Earth. The object disintegrated and no part was...

) to megatons of TNT (the Tunguska Event

Tunguska event

The Tunguska event, or Tunguska blast or Tunguska explosion, was an enormously powerful explosion that occurred near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in what is now Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, at about 7:14 a.m...

). In such cases the physical manifestations are normally distinct from those that were observed, since single meteors do not produce the double flash characteristic of a nuclear detonation. However, there was also speculation that the single satellite had recorded an exceptionally rare combination of natural phenomena, i.e. that the detectors had functioned properly, but the event was non-nuclear.

Detection

The "double flash" was detected on September 22, 1979, at 00:53 GMT, by the American Vela Hotel satellite 6911, which carried various sensors that had been designed specifically to detect nuclear explosions. In addition to being able to detect gamma rays, x-rays, and neutrons, the satellite also contained two silicon solid-state bhangmeter

Bhangmeter

sensors that would be able to detect the dual light flashes associated with a nuclear explosion—to be specific the initial brief, intense flash, followed by the second longer flash.

The satellite reported the characteristic double flash of an atmospheric nuclear explosion of two to three kilotons, in the Indian Ocean

Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering approximately 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by the Indian Subcontinent and Arabian Peninsula ; on the west by eastern Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and...

between The Crozet Islands

Crozet Islands

The Crozet Islands are a sub-antarctic archipelago of small islands in the southern Indian Ocean. They form one of the five administrative districts of the French Southern and Antarctic Lands.-Geography:...

(a very small, sparsely inhabited French possession) and the Prince Edward Islands

Prince Edward Islands

The Prince Edward Islands are two small islands in the sub-antarctic Indian Ocean that are part of South Africa. The islands, named Marion Island and Prince Edward Island, are located at ....

which belong to South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

at 47°S 40°E.

There was, and remains, much doubt as to whether the satellite's observations were accurate. The Vela Hotel 6911 satellite was one of a pair that had been launched on May 23, 1969, over ten years before the "double-flash" event, and this satellite was already more than two years beyond its so-called "design lifetime". This satellite was known to have a failed electromagnetic pulse

Electromagnetic pulse

An electromagnetic pulse is a burst of electromagnetic radiation. The abrupt pulse of electromagnetic radiation usually results from certain types of high energy explosions, especially a nuclear explosion, or from a suddenly fluctuating magnetic field...

(EMP) sensor, and it had developed a fault (in July 1972) in its recording memory, but that fault had cleared itself by March 1978.

Additionally, early technical speculation also examined the possibility that the Vela had recorded a combination of natural phenomena, such as lightning

Lightning

Lightning is an atmospheric electrostatic discharge accompanied by thunder, which typically occurs during thunderstorms, and sometimes during volcanic eruptions or dust storms...

in conjunction with a meteor strike

Meteorite

A meteorite is a natural object originating in outer space that survives impact with the Earth's surface. Meteorites can be big or small. Most meteorites derive from small astronomical objects called meteoroids, but they are also sometimes produced by impacts of asteroids...

. Other early news media articles of the time discussed the possibility of a large extraterrestrial object strike, such as an asteroid

Asteroid

Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...

, occurring. The Vela satellite's flash detectors were sensitive to lightning superbolts, which resulted in two scientists, John Warren and Robert Freyman from the Los Alamos National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Laboratory is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security , located in Los Alamos, New Mexico...

(then called the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory) immediately flying to and investigating a rare, overland superbolt occurrence on Bell Island, Newfoundland in April 1978. Their observations of the event, called the 'Bell Island Boom', noted building structural damage, dead farm animals and destroyed electrical devices amongst other evidence (the superbolt's blast was heard 55 kilometers away in Cape Broyle, Newfoundland). The Bell Island Boom was among some 600 "mystery booms" that occurred along the North American eastern seaboard from late 1977 to mid-1978.

Nonetheless, the initial assessment by the National Security Council

United States National Security Council

The White House National Security Council in the United States is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the...

(NSC), with technical support by the Naval Research Laboratory in October 1979 was that the American intelligence community had "high confidence" that the event was a low-yield nuclear explosion, although no radioactive debris had ever been detected, and there was "no corroborating seismic

Seismology

Seismology is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves through the Earth or through other planet-like bodies. The field also includes studies of earthquake effects, such as tsunamis as well as diverse seismic sources such as volcanic, tectonic, oceanic,...

or hydro-acoustic

Acoustics

Acoustics is the interdisciplinary science that deals with the study of all mechanical waves in gases, liquids, and solids including vibration, sound, ultrasound and infrasound. A scientist who works in the field of acoustics is an acoustician while someone working in the field of acoustics...

data." A later NSC report revised this position to "a position of agnosticism" about whether a test had occurred or not. The NSC concluded that responsibility for a nuclear explosion, if any, should be ascribed to the Republic of South Africa. Later, the Administration of President Carter

Jimmy Carter

James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...

asked the Office of Science and Technology Policy

Office of Science and Technology Policy

The Office of Science and Technology Policy is an office in the Executive Office of the President , established by Congress on May 11, 1976, with a broad mandate to advise the President on the effects of science and technology on domestic and international affairs.The director of this office is...

(OSTP) to convene a panel of instrumentation experts to re-examine the Vela Hotel 6911 data, and to attempt to determine whether the optical flash detected came from a nuclear test.

Several U.S. Air Force

United States Air Force

The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

WC-135B

WC-135 Constant Phoenix

The WC-135 Constant Phoenix is a special purpose aircraft derived from the Boeing C-135 and used by the United States Air Force. Its mission is to collect samples from the atmosphere for the purpose of detecting and identifying nuclear explosions...

surveillance aircraft flew 25 sorties over that area of the Indian Ocean soon after the "double flash" was reported, but they failed to detect any sign of nuclear radiation. Low levels of iodine-131 (a short-half-life product of nuclear fission) were reportedly detected in the thyroid glands of sheep in the southeastern Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n States of Victoria and Tasmania soon after the "detection" of the light flashes. Studies of wind patterns confirmed that fall-out from an explosion in the southern Indian Ocean could have been carried from there to southwestern Australia.

The Arecibo ionospheric observatory and radio telescope

Arecibo Observatory

The Arecibo Observatory is a radio telescope near the city of Arecibo in Puerto Rico. It is operated by SRI International under cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation...

in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

detected an anomalous ionospheric wave during the morning of September 22, 1979, which moved from the southeast to the northwest, an event which had not been observed previously by the scientists.

Office of Science and Technology evaluation

An independent panel of scientific and engineering experts was commissioned by Frank Press

Frank Press

Frank Press is an American geophysicist.Born in Brooklyn, New York, Press was science advisor to President Jimmy Carter from1976 to 1980,and president of the U.S. NationalAcademy of Sciences from 1981 to 1993...

, who was the Science Advisor to President Carter and the chairman of the OSTP, to evaluate the evidence and determine the likelihood that the event was a nuclear detonation. The chairman of this science panel itself was Dr. Jack Ruina

Jack Ruina

Jack P. Ruina was professor of electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1963 until 1997 and currently is a professor emeritus at MIT...

of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

, and also the former director of the U.S. Department of Defense's Advanced Research Projects Agency. Reporting in the summer of 1980, the panel noted that there were some key differences in the detected optical signature from that of an actual nuclear explosion, particularly in the ratio of intensities measured by the two detectors on the satellite. Also, although the brightness of the flash was explainable only if the flash had occurred in a cloud-free area, the lack of any nuclear debris found by 25 Air Force WC-135 flights through the area could be explained if the detonation had occurred at a heavily overcast site.

"Based on our experience in related scientific assessments," it was their collective judgment that the signal was spurious. The science panel's conclusion was that the signal "was probably not from a nuclear explosion, although we cannot rule out that this signal was of nuclear origin." The now-declassified report contains details of the measurements made by the Vela Hotel satellite. The science panel was not able to reach a definitive conclusion on the origin of the "light flashes". The best analysis that they could do of the data suggested that, if the sensors were properly calibrated, any source of the "light flashes" was about 30 meters from the satellite (and hence it was a small event close up, not a big event far away). This was consistent with the hypothesis that a micrometeoroid

Micrometeoroid

A micrometeoroid is a tiny meteoroid; a small particle of rock in space, usually weighing less than a gram. A micrometeor or micrometeorite is such a particle that enters the Earth's atmosphere or falls to Earth.-Scientific interest:...

had struck the satellite, ejecting a small cloud of dusty debris into space, and this had reflected sunlight into the sensors.

The fact that the explosion was picked up by only one of the two Vela satellites seems to support the science panel's assertion. The Vela satellites had previously detected 41 atmospheric tests - by countries such as France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

and the PRC

People's Republic of China

China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...

- each of which was subsequently confirmed by other means, including testing for radioactive fallout. The absence of any such corroboration of a nuclear origin for the Vela Incident also suggests that the "double flash" signal was a spurious one.

Victor Gilinsky (former member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Nuclear Regulatory Commission

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is an independent agency of the United States government that was established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 from the United States Atomic Energy Commission, and was first opened January 19, 1975...

) attempted to cast doubt on the science panel's findings, arguing that its members were politically motivated. There was some data that seemed to confirm that a nuclear explosion was the source for the "double flash" signal. There was the "anomalous" traveling ionospheric disturbance that was measured at the Arecibo Observatory

Arecibo Observatory

The Arecibo Observatory is a radio telescope near the city of Arecibo in Puerto Rico. It is operated by SRI International under cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation...

in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

at the same time, but that is many thousands of miles away in a different hemisphere of the Earth. A test in Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

conducted a few months later found some increased nuclear radiation levels. However, a detailed study done by New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

's National Radiation Laboratory found no such evidence of excess radioactivity, and neither did a U.S. Government-funded nuclear laboratory. Los Alamos National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Laboratory is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security , located in Los Alamos, New Mexico...

scientists who worked on the Vela Hotel program have professed their conviction that the Vela Hotel satellite's detectors worked properly.

Possible responsible parties

If a nuclear explosion did occur, it occurred within the 3000-mile-wide (4,800 km diameter) circle covering parts of the Indian Ocean

Indian Ocean

, the South Atlantic

Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions. With a total area of about , it covers approximately 20% of the Earth's surface and about 26% of its water surface area...

, the southern tip of Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

, and a small part of Antarctica.

Israel

Well before the Vela Incident, American intelligence agencies had made the assessment that Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

probably possessed its own nuclear weapons

Nuclear weapons and Israel

Israel is widely believed to be the sixth country in the world to have developed nuclear weapons and to be one of four nuclear-armed countries not recognized as a Nuclear Weapons State by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty , the others being India, Pakistan and North Korea...

. According to journalist Seymour Hersh

Seymour Hersh

Seymour Myron Hersh is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and author based in Washington, D.C. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine on military and security matters...

, the detection was the third joint Israeli-South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n nuclear test in the Indian Ocean, and the Israelis had sent two IDF ships and "a contingent of Israeli military men and nuclear experts" for the test. Author Richard Rhodes

Richard Rhodes

Richard Lee Rhodes is an American journalist, historian, and author of both fiction and non-fiction , including the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Making of the Atomic Bomb , and most recently, The Twilight of the Bombs...

also concludes the incident was an Israeli nuclear test, conducted in cooperation with South Africa, and that the United States administration deliberately obscured this fact in order to avoid complicating relations with South Africa. In the 2008 book The Nuclear Express: A Political History of the Bomb and its Proliferation Thomas C. Reed

Thomas C. Reed

Thomas Care Reed was the 11th Secretary of the Air Force from January 2, 1976 - April 6, 1977 under Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter.-Early life:...

and Danny B. Stillman stated their opinion that the "double flash" was the result of a joint South African-Israeli nuclear bomb test. David Albright

David Albright

David Albright, M.S., is the founder of the non-governmental Institute for Science and International Security , its current president, and author of several books on proliferation of atomic weapons. Albright holds a Master of Science in physics from Indiana University and a M.Sc. in mathematics...

stated in his article about the "double flash" event in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists that "If the 1979 flash was caused by a test, most experts agree it was probably an Israeli test".

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa did have a nuclear weapons program

South Africa and weapons of mass destruction

From the 1960s to the 1980s, South Africa pursued research into weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. Six nuclear weapons were assembled...

at the time, and it falls within that geographic location. Nevertheless, since the fall of apartheid

History of South Africa in the apartheid era

Apartheid was a system of racial segregation enforced by the National Party governments of South Africa between 1948 and 1994, under which the rights of the majority 'non-white' inhabitants of South Africa were curtailed and white supremacy and Afrikaner minority rule was maintained...

, South Africa has disclosed most of the information on its nuclear weapons program, and according to international inspections and the ensuing International Atomic Energy Agency

International Atomic Energy Agency

The International Atomic Energy Agency is an international organization that seeks to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy, and to inhibit its use for any military purpose, including nuclear weapons. The IAEA was established as an autonomous organization on 29 July 1957...

report, South Africa could not have constructed such a nuclear bomb until November 1979, two months after the "double flash" incident. Furthermore, the IAEA reported that all possible South African nuclear bombs had been accounted for. A Central Intelligence Agency

Central Intelligence Agency

The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...

(CIA) report dated January 21, 1980, that was produced for the United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

The U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency was established as an independent agency of the United States government by the Arms Control and Disarmament Act , September 26, 1961, a bill drafted by presidential adviser John J. McCloy. Its predecessor was the U.S. Disarmament Administration, part...

concluded that:

The United Nations Security Council Resolution 418 of 4 November 1977

United Nations Security Council Resolution 418

United Nations Security Council Resolution 418, adopted unanimously on 4 November 1977, imposed a mandatory arms embargo against apartheid South Africa. This resolution differed from the earlier Resolution 282, which was only voluntary...

introduced a mandatory arms embargo against South Africa, which also required all states to refrain from "any co-operation with South Africa in the manufacture and development of nuclear weapons".

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

had carried out a nuclear test

Nuclear testing

in 1974 (see Smiling Buddha
Smiling Buddha
The Smiling Buddha, formally designated as Pokhran-I, was the codename given to Republic of India's first nuclear test explosion that took place at the long-constructed Indian Army base, Pokhran Test Range at Pokhran municipality, Rajasthan state on 18 May 1974 at 8:05 a.m....

). The possibility that India would test a weapon was considered, since it would be possible for the Indian Navy

Indian Navy

The Indian Navy is the naval branch of the armed forces of India. The President of India serves as the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy. The Chief of Naval Staff , usually a four-star officer in the rank of Admiral, commands the Navy...

to operate in those waters so far south, however, this was dismissed as impractical and unnecessary (given the fact that India had signed and ratified the Limited Test Ban Treaty or LTBT in 1963, and had complied with it even in its first test).

France

Since the "double flash", if one existed, could have occurred not very far to the west of the French-owned Kerguelen Islands

Kerguelen Islands

The Kerguelen Islands , also known as the Desolation Islands, are a group of islands in the southern Indian Ocean constituting the emerged part of the otherwise submerged Kerguelen Plateau. The islands, along with Adélie Land, the Crozet Islands and the Amsterdam and Saint Paul Islands are part of...

, it is possible that the French

France

were testing a small neutron bomb

Neutron bomb

A neutron bomb or enhanced radiation weapon or weapon of reinforced radiation is a type of thermonuclear weapon designed specifically to release a large portion of its energy as energetic neutron radiation rather than explosive energy...

or other small tactical nuclear bomb.

Subsequent developments

Since 1980, some small amounts of new information have emerged. However, most questions remain unanswered:

Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory report "Evaluation of Some Geophysical Events on 22 September 1979," LA-8672, issued in April 1981 notes:

In October 1984, a National Intelligence Estimate
National Intelligence Estimate
National Intelligence Estimates are United States federal government documents that are the authoritative assessment of the Director of National Intelligence on intelligence related to a particular national security issue...

on the South African nuclear program noted: A shorter form of this wording was used in a subsequent National Intelligence Council
National Intelligence Council
The National Intelligence Council is the center for midterm and long-term strategic thinking within the United States Intelligence Community . It was formed in 1979...

memorandum of September, 1985.

In February 1994, Commodore
Commodore (rank)
Commodore is a military rank used in many navies that is superior to a navy captain, but below a rear admiral. Non-English-speaking nations often use the rank of flotilla admiral or counter admiral as an equivalent .It is often regarded as a one-star rank with a NATO code of OF-6, but is not always...

Dieter Gerhardt
Dieter Gerhardt
Dieter Felix Gerhardt was a Commodore in the South African Navy and commander of the Simon's Town naval dockyard. In 1982, he was arrested and convicted as a Soviet spy together with his second wife, Ruth.-Cold War:...

, a convicted Soviet spy
History of Soviet espionage
Coming to power as a clandestine organization, having been schooled in the secret police tactics of the Czarist Okhrana the new Soviet government of the Soviet Union tended to overestimate the degree to which the other European powers of the day, especially the United Kingdom, were plotting its...

and the commander of South Africa's Simon's Town
Simon's Town
Simon's Town , sometimes spelled Simonstown; is a town in South Africa, near Cape Town which is home to the South African Navy. It is located on the shores of False Bay, on the eastern side of the Cape Peninsula. For more than two centuries it has been an important naval base and harbour...

naval base at the time, talked about the incident upon his release from prison. He said: Gerhardt further stated that no South African naval vessels had been involved, and that he had no first-hand knowledge of a nuclear test.

On April 20, 1997, the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz
Haaretz
Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...

quoted the South African Deputy Foreign Minister, Aziz Pahad
Aziz Pahad
Aziz Pahad is a South African politician, who served as Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1999-2008, he currently serves as an MP for Johannseburg West Highlands.-Education:...

, as supposedly confirming that the "double flash" from over the Indian Ocean was indeed from a South African nuclear test. Haaretz also cited past reports that Israel had purchased 550 tons of uranium from South Africa for its own nuclear plant in Dimona
Dimona
Dimona is an Israeli city in the Negev desert, to the south of Beersheba and west of the Dead Sea above the Arava valley in the Southern District of Israel. Its population at the end of 2007 was 33,600.-History:...

. In exchange, Israel allegedly supplied South Africa with nuclear weapons design information and nuclear materials to increase the power of nuclear warheads. This statement was confirmed by the United States Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa, but Pahad's press secretary stated that Pahad had said only that "there was a strong rumor that a test had taken place, and that it should be investigated". In other words – he was merely repeating rumors that had been circulating for years. David Albright
David Albright
David Albright, M.S., is the founder of the non-governmental Institute for Science and International Security , its current president, and author of several books on proliferation of atomic weapons. Albright holds a Master of Science in physics from Indiana University and a M.Sc. in mathematics...

, commenting on the stir created by this press report, stated:

In October 1999, a white paper that was published by the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee in opposition to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty bans all nuclear explosions in all environments, for military or civilian purposes. It was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 September 1996 but it has not entered into force.-Status:...

stated:

In his 2006 book On the Brink, the retired C.I.A.
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...

clandestine service officer, Tyler Drumheller
Tyler Drumheller
Tyler Drumheller is the former chief of the CIA covert operations in Europe, who has said that the CIA had credible sources discounting some weapons of mass destruction claims before the 2003 Invasion of Iraq. He received and discounted documents central to the Niger yellowcake forgery prior to...

, wrote of his 1983–88 tour-of-duty in South Africa:

Some American information related to this incident has been declassified in the form of heavily redacted reports and memoranda following applications made under the Freedom of Information Act
Freedom of Information Act (United States)
The Freedom of Information Act is a federal freedom of information law that allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure...

; on May 5, 2006, many of these declassified documents were made available through the National Security Archive
National Security Archive
The National Security Archive is a 501 non-governmental, non-profit research and archival institution located in the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.. Founded in 1985 by Scott Armstrong, it archives and publishes declassified U.S. government files concerning selected topics of US...

.

Cultural references

The Vela Incident formed the basis for a novel by Abe Ariel titled The Last War. The novel describes the test of an Israeli neutron bomb on an uncharted island.
The Vela Incident is the basis of a 2005 novel by Scott E. Douglas, Moby and Ahab on a Plutonium Sea: The Novel Which Ended the Cold War.
The Vela Incident is briefly featured at the beginning of Richard Hermann's book, Firebreak
The West Wing
The West Wing (TV series)
The West Wing is an American television serial drama created by Aaron Sorkin that was originally broadcast on NBC from September 22, 1999 to May 14, 2006...

episode The Warfare of Genghis Khan
The Warfare of Genghis Khan
"The Warfare of Genghis Khan" is the 101st The West Wing episode and 13th of the fifth season. It originally aired on NBC February 1, 2004. Events circle around the detection of a nuclear detonation over the Indian Ocean. Written by Peter Noah and directed by Bill D'Elia, the episode contains guest...

has a plotline that is very similar to the Vela Incident.
John Douglas-Gray in his thriller 'The Novak Legacy' ISBN 978-0-7552-1321-4

External links

Report on the 1979 Vela Incident 1 September 2001
1979 South Atlantic "Flash" is Consistent with a Nuclear Explosion, According to Newly Declassified Energy Department Documents 1 March 2001
Israeli Nuclear Weapons Testing
The Vela Incident Nuclear, Test or Meteoroid?, National Security Archive
National Security Archive
The National Security Archive is a 501 non-governmental, non-profit research and archival institution located in the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.. Founded in 1985 by Scott Armstrong, it archives and publishes declassified U.S. government files concerning selected topics of US...

Electronic Briefing Book No. 190, 5 May 2006
Ad Hoc Report -September 23, 1980 at the foia.abovetopsecret.com website

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Detection

Office of Science and Technology evaluation

Possible responsible parties

Israel

South Africa

India

France

Subsequent developments

Cultural references

See also

External links