U.S. scrambles to study deadly radioactive blast

U.S. intelligence officials are racing to understand a mysterious explosion that released radiation off the coast of northern Russia last week, apparently during the test of a new type of nuclearpropelled cruise missile hailed by President Vladimir Putin as the centerpiece of Moscow’s arms race with the United States.

U.S. officials have said nothing publicly about the blast on Thursday, possibly one of the worst nuclear accidents in Russia since Chernobyl, although apparently on a far smaller scale, with at least seven people, including scientists, confirmed dead. But the Russian government’s slow and secretive response has set off anxiety in nearby cities and towns — and attracted the attention of analysts in Washington and Europe who believe the explosion may offer a glimpse of technological weaknesses in Russia’s new arms program.

Thursday’s accident was followed by what nearby local officials initially reported was a spike in radiation in the atmosphere. Late Sunday, officials at a research institute that had employed five of the scientists who died confirmed for the first time that a small nuclear reactor had exploded during an experiment in the White Sea, and that the authorities were investigating the cause.

U.S. intelligence officials have said they suspect it involved a prototype of what NATO calls the SSCX9 Skyfall. That is a cruise missile that Putin has boasted can reach any corner of the earth because it is partly powered by a small nuclear reactor, able to weave an unpredictable path at relatively low altitudes, and eliminating the usual distance limitations of conventionally fueled missiles.

That makes them virtually unstoppable for the existing U.S. antimissile systems in Alaska and California, which are designed to intercept intercontinental ballistic missile warheads in space, traveling a largely predictable path.

Yet for all the hype, Russia’s early tests of the cruise missile appeared to fail, even before last week’s disaster.