US tests superbomb
The US has tested the superbomb it hopes will frighten Iraq into submission. Dramatic pictures shows a massive mushroom cloud billowing into the sky over the test range as it explodes.
The giant device contains 21,000lb of high explosive, nicknamed the "Big Blue" or the "Mother Of All Bombs", dwarfs the huge daisy cutter bombs used against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The Pentagon intends the test to act as a warning to Iraq of what the US could inflict. Military planners believe just the sight of the bomb exploding could frighten Iraqi soldiers into surrendering.
US base spokeswoman Karen Roganov, who watched the explosion from a rooftop 30 miles away said: "It looked like a white mushroom cloud, almost like cotton or smoke you'd see from a fire ... we did not feel anything. We saw the cloud and several seconds later we heard a boom."
An aircraft dropped the bomb on a test range at Eglin Air Force Base in northwest Florida.
Senior Airman Nicholasa Brown said the explosion sounded "just like thunder".
Asked about the test last night, US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld would not say whether it would be used in Iraq. He also declined to discuss its capabilities, but he admitted: "This is not small."
The weapon could wipe out an armoured brigade or a military base in one blow and has a satellite guidance system which means it should explode within 20 yards of its target.
It spreads a flammable mist then ignites it, producing a highly destructive blast. Shock waves are said to be felt for ten miles.
The US insists the bomb will not be dropped near cities or high-population areas. It will be aimed at military targets such as Republican Guard base camps. Before it is dropped, another plane will scatter leaflets warning that it is on its way, urging those below to surrender.
Although the weapon will be roughly equivalent to a small nuclear device, it will still have less than one thousandth of the power of the Hiroshima atomic bomb.
A second version of the bomb, which buries itself up to 100ft underground before detonating, is also being developed to attack bunkers and tunnels.
