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The SADM (B54) demolition charge version of the W54 in its carry bag. SADM hard carrying case A U.S. Army Special Forces paratrooper with the Green Light Teams conducts a high-altitude low-opening military freefall jump with a MK54. The W54 (also known as the Mark 54 or B54) was a tactical nuclear warhead developed by the United States in the ...
SADM in its carry bag SADM hard carrying case A U.S. Army Special Forces paratrooper conducts a high-altitude low-opening military freefall jump with an MK–54 SADM. The Special Atomic Demolition Munition (SADM), also known as the XM129 and XM159 Atomic Demolition Charges, [1] and the B54 bomb [2] was a nuclear man-portable atomic demolition munition (ADM) system fielded by the US military ...
Atomic Demolition Munitions W7/ADM-B (c. 1954–1967) T4 ADM (1957–1963) Gun-type; W30/Tactical Atomic Demolition Munition (1961–1966) W31/ADM (1960–1965) W45/Medium Atomic Demolition Munition (1964–1984) W54/Special Atomic Demolition Munition (1965–1989) Missile and Rocket warheads. W4 for SM-62 Snark cruise missile (cancelled 1951)
The Mk 30 Mod 1 Tactical Atomic Demolition Munition (TADM) was a portable atomic bomb, consisting of a Mk 30 warhead installed in a XM-113 case. The XM-113 was 26 inches (660 mm) in diameter and 70 inches (1,800 mm) long, and looked like corrugated culvert pipe. The whole system weighed 840 pounds (380 kg).
Later, the Special Atomic Demolition Munition (SADM – sometimes designated the B54) was developed and saw service between 1964 and 1989. SADM was so different from the W54 warhead that consideration was given to renaming the weapon with its own unique mark number. Mod numbers between the Mark 54/W54 and B54/SADM are not shared.
Green Light teams often consisted of three men who trained using actual atomic weapons. Green Light Team member Billy Waugh recalled being launched subsurface from the U.S. nuclear attack submarine USS Grayback while carrying an actual atomic weapon, a W54 SADM. [6]: 102 Green Light Teams wore fatigues without military markings or insignia.
Small, two-man portable or truck-portable tactical weapons (sometimes misleadingly referred to as suitcase nukes), such as the Special Atomic Demolition Munition and the Davy Crockett recoilless rifle (recoilless smoothbore gun) have been developed, but the difficulty of combining sufficient yield with portability could limit their military ...
The lightest nuclear warhead ever acknowledged to have been manufactured by the U.S. is the W54, which was used in both the Davy Crockett 120 mm recoilless rifle-launched warhead and the backpack-carried version called the Mk-54 SADM (Special Atomic Demolition Munition). The bare warhead package was an 11 by 16 inches (280 by 410 mm) cylinder ...