A MUCH higher energy conventional explosive

A decade ago, I heard a fascinating tidbit about the Soviets/Russians working on an advanced high explosive that was so much stronger than contemporary HE that it was (on a log scale) roughly halfway between contemporary HE and nuclear weapons as far as blast-per-weight.

Some years after that I heard of a Swedish project that sounded similar (a mid-way to nukes super-explosive).

I DID use the search feature and didn't find anything -- so, does this ring a bell with anyone and do you have anything to say?

Originally posted by randy1945
A decade ago, I heard a fascinating tidbit about the Soviets/Russians working on an advanced high explosive that was so much stronger than contemporary HE that it was (on a log scale) roughly halfway between contemporary HE and nuclear weapons as far as blast-per-weight.

i think you are talking about "fantastic super-weapon" khrushev was reffering to in 1960s

what it does is it creates enormous EM charge in certain area. air instantly raises to enormous temperatures creating a large explosion








or opposite, lower temperature

Are you talking about the thermobaric explosive (also called Fuel/Air explosive) ?

Thanks for the prompt responses.

I am familiar with both of those (the flash events and FAE) and what I heard of did not fith those descriptions.

What I heard (and it was vague) pointed to a solid material explosive (although it is possible that the explosive mechanism was not chemical)

I can't be more specific because I heard both things in classified fora -- I was hoping someone else might recognize one or other from the admittedly vague description.