How to Use kiloton in a Sentence
kiloton
noun-
That bolide blasted apart with the energy of 2.3 kilotons of TNT.
—National Geographic, 9 Oct. 2017
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Each carries up to eight warheads of at least 100 kilotons each.
—Joe Pappalardo, Popular Mechanics, 5 Mar. 2018
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Oddly, the final setting of the nuke in The Strain is 15 kilotons, which the protagonists say is enough to take out a skyscraper but spare the city.
—Joe Pappalardo, Popular Mechanics, 2 Apr. 2018
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One kiloton is equivalent to the force produced in an explosion of 1,000 tons of TNT.
—CBS News, 6 Sep. 2017
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Comparing this range with the graph above, this means that the Waco explosion could have been a nearly one-kiloton blast.
—Kyle Hill, Discover Magazine, 18 Apr. 2013
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By comparison, the yield of the Hiroshima bomb was just 15 kilotons.
—Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 20 May 2019
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Sunday's test comes almost one year to the day of the fifth nuclear test, which was determined to have involved a 10 kiloton bomb.
—James Griffiths, CNN, 3 Sep. 2017
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North Korea's previous largest was thought to be anywhere from 10 to 30 kilotons.
—Eric Talmadge, The Christian Science Monitor, 3 Sep. 2017
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That’s far more than the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima (15 kilotons) and Nagasaki (around 20).
—Eric Talmadge, The Seattle Times, 3 Sep. 2017
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That's far more than the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima (15 kilotons) and Nagasaki (around 20).
—Eric Talmadge, chicagotribune.com, 3 Sep. 2017
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Their warheads can have a smaller impact, with a yield range that spreads from one to several hundred kilotons.
—Kristin Ven Bruusgaard, Foreign Affairs, 6 Feb. 2023
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Seismic data suggest the blast was around 120 kilotons—at least eight times more powerful than the North’s previous test a year ago.
—The Economist, 7 Sep. 2017
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The North claims the device was made domestically and has explosive power that can range from tens to hundreds of kilotons.
—Eric Talmadge, The Christian Science Monitor, 3 Sep. 2017
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The last one, in September, had an estimated yield of 20 to 30 kilotons, more than double the explosive force of any previous test.
—Ellen Nakashima, , Anna Fifield, Joby Warrick, Alaska Dispatch News, 25 July 2017
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Some respected analysts have even pegged it at 250 kilotons.
—Adam Taylor, Washington Post, 21 Dec. 2017
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The Hiroshima explosion yielded a blast of 15 kilotons.
—CBS News, 6 Sep. 2017
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The analysts also said that the explosive yield from the Sept. 3 nuclear test may have been as much as 250 kilotons, based on revised estimates of the magnitude of the tremor created by the blast.
—Choe Sang-Hun, New York Times, 13 Sep. 2017
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Right now, its strongest warhead can detonate at about 20 kilotons, similar to the bomb dropped on Nagasaki.
—Amanda Erickson, Washington Post, 8 July 2017
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But the technique has been mostly limited to explosions more powerful than 1 kiloton of TNT.
—Byjonathan O’Callaghan, science.org, 12 May 2023
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Another option would drop bombs of 70 kilotons each on a wider range of military targets if North Korea attacked South Korea.
—Fred Kaplan, Slate Magazine, 27 Sep. 2017
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The official statement suggested that the test was of a device that could be adjusted to produce explosions that range between tens of kilotons and hundreds.
—The Economist, 7 Sep. 2017
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But estimates of its yield (explosive power) varied between 10 and 30 kilotons, which even at the higher end is too little for a hydrogen bomb.
—The Economist, 7 Sep. 2017
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The explosive yield of nuclear weapon is typically measured in kilotons, or thousand tons of TNT.
—Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 1 Apr. 2019
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That’s enough to flatten a city or industrial target: by comparison, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was just 16 kilotons.
—Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 30 Jan. 2020
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Hiroshima, by way of comparison, had an explosive yield of 16 kilotons.
—Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 21 Feb. 2018
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Those were crude, comparatively simple devices that produced explosive yields measured in kilotons, or thousands of tons of TNT.
—Time, 24 July 2023
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For comparison's sake, the Hiroshima bomb is commonly assessed at about 15 kilotons.
—Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 7 Sep. 2017
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The resulting shock wave was as powerful as a 550 kiloton nuclear explosion—and the Tunguska object was probably much larger.
—Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 17 July 2019
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By comparison, the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima produced just 20 kilotons.
—Discover Magazine, 30 Oct. 2023
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The device that was detonated on Sunday is believed to have a much bigger yield than anything the North has ever demonstrated before — possibly 70 kilotons according to Japan’s defense minister.
—Eric Talmadge, The Seattle Times, 3 Sep. 2017
Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'kiloton.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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