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Access anywhere, anytime: Nuclear power, Ice Camp, and Rickover’s enduring standard of excellence
Admiral William Houston
As U.S. Navy submarines surface through Arctic ice during Ice Camp 2026, they demonstrate more than operational proficiency in one of the harshest environments on Earth. They reaffirm a technological truth first proven in August 1958, when the USS Nautilus completed its submerged transit of the North Pole: nuclear power enables access anywhere, anytime.
The Arctic is unforgiving, with vast distances, extreme cold, shifting ice, and no logistical infrastructure. Conventional propulsion is constrained by fuel, air, and endurance. Nuclear propulsion removes those constraints. Only a nuclear-powered submarine can operate anywhere in the world’s oceans, including under the polar ice, undetected and at maximum capability for extended periods. Nuclear power provides sustained high speed and the endurance to reposition across the globe without refueling.
F. F. Fondeur, W. R. Wilmarth, T. B. Peters, S. D. Fink
Nuclear Technology | Volume 151 | Number 3 | September 2005 | Pages 297-302
Technical Paper | Radioisotopes | doi.org/10.13182/NT05-A3652
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The stability of mercury fulminate under gamma-ray irradiation and in a high-alkalinity sludge environment was determined. Both differential scanning calorimetry and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy were used to characterize mercury fulminate. Mercury fulminate completely decomposed in a gamma-ray source (0.86 Mrad/h) after a dose of 208 Mrad. This exposure equates to ~2.4 to 4 yr in Savannah River Site tanks. Mercury fulminate decomposed in contact with high-alkalinity wet sludge. This study suggests that any mercury fulminate or closely related energetic species decomposed long ago if it ever formed in the tank farm.
