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BOOKS
EXTRACT
The Final
Hours of Mumbai
Bombay/Mumbai,
India;
Local time: 1315;
Tuesday, 8 May, 2007
The
temperature was 36 degrees C, the day was clear with visibility of more
than 25 km and a light wind blew in from the south at 8.33 kph. It was
one of the hottest days of the year and many workers had stayed inside
their air-conditioned offices for lunch away from the heat and humidity.
Those outside
who instinctively looked towards the flash had their eyes burnt out. The
ones who survived -- and not many did -- were blinded with third-degree
burns to their eyes. The breeze whipped up into erratic gales which flung
pedestrians at more than 160 kph to their deaths. Within about 0.1 milliseconds
after the explosion, the radius of the fireball was about 14 m. The ground
at the centre exploded with heat. Tiles, granite, glass within a radius
of 1,500 m melted. Fires leapt out ... The first thought of most was to
head for water and thousands sought refuge on the sweeping beach along
Marine Drive or Sasoon Dock near the Gateway of India. The explosion had
set off tremors in the ground like an earthquake and the sea swelled angrily
around like water in an unsteady bowl. The sand exploded like popcorn,
burning their feet and driving them towards the water. As they swam out,
the fires proved to be faster and stronger. The victims were eventually
incinerated by leaping fireballs which seemed to bounce out to sea in
all directions, killing everything ...
Whether
the missile had been targeted on the Fort area so the radiation cloud
would be blown north over the highly populated areas of the city would
remain a moot point for years to come. The Chinese claimed the coordinates
were 19 degrees 02' N, 72 degrees 56' E, the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre
(BARC) at Trombay 20 km north-east of the main Fort financial district
...
The fact
was that the single 15 kiloton warhead exploded 185 m directly above Fort,
at a lower altitude but with the same velocity as the American strike
on Hiroshima. The BARC complex was put out of action and the prevailing
winds blew the fallout due north over the most heavily populated areas
of Bombay. Just about every building was destroyed from the west coast
to the east coast, the Sea of Arabia to Harbour Bay and from the southern
coastal point in Colaba north through Fort, through the Chatrapathi Shivali
Terminus to the shacks of the Mohatta market. Hardly anyone escaped alive
-- and that was only in the first hour.
The population
density in the most crowded areas of Bombay was as high as 40,000 people
per square km. Given that it was lunchtime on a working day, the number
of people in Fort was at least that. No one ever came up with even a roughly
accurate figure but, for the record, the Indian Government put the number
killed in the first hour of the explosion at 200,000.
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