with the number of nuclear weapons in the world now, and how old a lot are, how is it possible we’ve never accidentally set one off?

Question

Title says it. Really curious how we’ve escaped this kind of occurrence anywhere in the world, for the last ~70 years.

In: Engineering

Answer 1

That actually is a *big concern*.

The simple answer would be “maintenance”–if you drain the propellant, inspect the weapon for faults, do preventative maintenance on it, replace components (or the whole weapon system) and monitor it for stability, it stays safe.

Let it sit for decades, without *any of that*, and you get a potentially dangerous situation.