The race for the worlds biggest bomb

The image below is a screen grab from a documentary I was watching and thought I should share it.

After the WWII ended, the cold war started and so did the arms race, the space race, the race to conquer the oceans, the race for the north and south poles, the race in cartography[accurately mapping out entire ocean surface(sea bed)] on the world, the speed race, so on and so forth., This was obviously between the USA and Russia primarily. As the tensions started initially, entire masses of known as well as unknown countries had to pick a side like kids in a primary school saying - if you talk to X, I wont talk to you!

Anyways, one of the most important races among the ones mentioned above, was the race for owning the loudest bang and the biggest buck - race to build, own and show off the biggest bomb ever built by mankind. The USA had gotten a head start in the race but it was not the one to finish it. Russians ended up building something so huge, that when it was tested in a remote Siberian territory of the vast Russian landmass, the shock-wave generated circled the entire earth three times!

The picture posted below was taken in 1946 when the USA kicked out the 165 islanders of an island called Bikini Atoll situated to the south-west of Hawaii in the Pacific ocean. Very frequently when we see the video of a nuclear explosion, we fail to realize the enormity of the mushroom cloud, the stem and the burst area because there is nothing around to compare it with. That is where this picture come in. If you see closely enough, you will find an entire flotilla of 93 ships used for testing the true effect and power of the atomic explosion and its scale.

The longest ship visible in the snap below is something called a battle-cruiser and is the biggest class of fighting ship with a displacement of 40,000tons and above. This single ship during WWII had 18 BIG guns simultaneously firing shells/bullets which were ~1 meter or more in length and 5.5" thick. The ship must have been easily around 170mts in length. Think how long 170 meters is in terms of the street you live on. And then, look at the stem of the explosion below the mushroom cloud for comparison.