A disturbing visual tool lets people see how devastating the impact of nuclear war could be.
As the crisis between Ukraine and Russia - one of the world’s atomic weapon superpowers - intensifies, the threat of nuclear war is on some people’s minds.
Vladimir Putin has been flexing his nuclear muscles and spent Saturday watching massive nuclear drills, which involved multiple practice missile launches.
His country currently has 6,257 weapons, compared to America’s 4,018 and the UK's 225.
According to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, (ICANW): "Less than 1% of the nuclear weapons in the world could disrupt the global climate and threaten as many as two billion people with starvation in a nuclear famine.
"The thousands of nuclear weapons possessed by the US and Russia could bring about a nuclear winter, destroying the essential ecosystems on which all life depends."
Online tool Nukemap – built by nuclear historian Alex Wellerstein – helps visualise quite how devastating that reality could be.
Just one of the Topol (SS-25) weapons in Russia's arsenal could claim the lives of 337,700 people and injure 482,250 more if dropped on Dublin, according to Mr Wellerstein's modelling.
The blast range of the 800kt bomb would engulf the entire county, with its effects also being felt in bordering counties Meath, Kildare and Wicklow.
A massive Tsar Bomba - the largest nuclear weapon ever designed - would destroy much of the east coast of Ireland if it landed in Dublin. As well as claiming a projected 1,096,970 lives and injuring 611,790 people, effects of the blast would be felt as north as Co Down, as south as Co Wexford and in midlands areas like Co Offaly and and Co Longford.
Anything within 6km of its centre would be “effectively vaporised”.
The areas within 32km of the blast - including Balbriggan, Naas and Greystones - would see “most residential buildings collapse, injuries universal and fatalities widespread”.
The blast would give people 73km away - such as Kingscourt, Portarlington and Gorey - third degree burns.
Those within 91km of the bomb - like Newry, Tullamore and Ferns - could also be injured. Mr Wellerstein explains that in these areas: “Glass windows can be expected to break. This can cause many injuries in a surrounding population who comes to a window after seeing the flash of a nuclear explosion (which travels faster than the pressure wave).”
The only two times nuclear weapons have been dropped on inhabited areas was in 1945, when the US detonated two nuclear weapons over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As many as 226,000 people were killed in the atrocity.
READ MORE: Frightening map shows how much of Ireland would be blown up if a nuclear bomb hit four major cities
ICANW also points out that the impact of nuclear weapons would be felt long after the initial explosion.
The charity warns: "Nuclear weapons produce ionizing radiation, which kills or sickens those exposed, contaminates the environment, and has long-term health consequences, including cancer and genetic damage.
"Less than one percent of the nuclear weapons in the world could disrupt the global climate and threaten as many as two billion people with starvation in a nuclear famine.
"The thousands of nuclear weapons possessed by the US and Russia could bring about a nuclear winter, destroying the essential ecosystems on which all life depends."
Those who argue for stockpiling nuclear weapons say that they have led to decades of relative peace by forcing nuclear superpowers into a kind of deadlock under the fear of mutually assured destruction.
