How would mountainous landscape look like after remodelling it with nuclear warheads?

As conclusion of this question it seems that under a dense atmosphere it would be a good idea to place the main city in mountains. Just there is the inconvenient issue that top of mountains lack flat surfaces, suitable for big cities. So the idea is to create proper flat surfaces by blowing up mountain tops on a mountain range to create a long flat surface near some river valley. (hydro power, water, transport).

Feasibility study:

• when warhead size increases it derives higher and higher share of its energy from fusion, thus it becomes relatively cleaner and cheaper (per megaton)
• In Sedan test it was fine to walk unprotected at the bottom of the crater in less than a year
• Krakatau volcano explosion, equivalent of 200 Mt caused a year without summer, but otherwise Earth climate was fine

So what would be the result for nearby landscape? To be precise, I especially mean:

1) If placing a nuclear warhead (In 50 Mt range) to cut the mountain top, what would be the shape of "crater"? (Would the cut be roughly flat? Or maybe concave like in normal crater? Or maybe convex, as the sides of the mountain offered less resistance to the explosion?)

2) For landscaping purposes what would happen to ejecta? (Would it mostly fall in to nearby valley, thus creating some dam? Would it overwhelmingly be spread all over the planet, thus leaving local valley practically unchanged?)

posted over 4 years ago

Shadow1024‭

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