Doomsday Clock One Minute Closer to a Global Apocalypse

The Doomsday Clock is a clockface with no workings. Its time changes depending on how close to doomsday the Earth is considered to be by a panel of experts. They assess the dangers facing mankind and then decide where the hands of the clock should be set. The news is published in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

The Doomsday Clock moved one minute closer and is now five minutes away from global apocalypse according to scientists at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in Washington on Tuesday.

You can read the entire timeline here.

The closest the hands have been to midnight was in 1953 when the hands were just two minutes away from midnight, the closest the scientists believe we have ever been to a massive technological catastrophe.

After much debate, the United States decides to pursue the hydrogen bomb, a weapon far more powerful than any atomic bomb. In October 1952, the United States test its first thermonuclear device, obliterating a Pacific Ocean islet in the process; nine months later, the Soviets test an H-bomb of their own. “The hands of the Clock of Doom have moved again,” the Bulletin announces. “Only a few more swings of the pendulum, and, from Moscow to Chicago, atomic explosions will strike midnight for Western civilization.” (source)