I've heard of using dynamite to put out an oil well fire, but this...

[Graham1973]

Russian newsreel footage of the first(?) time a nuclear weapon was used to put out an oil well fire. Sadly this version has no sound.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVrosCy3I20

 

[Michel Van]

here version with sound
just skip the first 25 second of optical garbage

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpPNQoTlacU


It seem that for copy right problem, those videos have there audio track removed

 

[CJGibson]

Oooerr! blowout and it's just caught fire.
Call Krasnyy Adair
0:43 -Install a open diverter over the well. Then install diverter flare booms
0:51 - close diverter and send fluids to diverter flare booms
1:03 - back pressure causes a subsurface blowout and fluids escape to surface. Uncontrollable fires result.
1:38 - drill a relief well (that'll take a while)
1:55 - Insert device
2:00 - pump cement to seal off the relief well.
2:30 - Clear area
2:39 - set off device
2:55 - shockwave etc collapses casing and seals off well.
3:13 - job done. Clean up site (ahem)
trebles all round.

 

[Graham1973]

The AtomicArchive channel on YouTube has posted a 'high-resolution' (720p) version of the film in Russian with English subtitles.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KJ6p4JVN4g

 

[Graham1973]

Just found a report dating from the 1990s covering the whole Soviet 'Atoms For Peace' program. The use of nuclear explosives to deal with oil/gas well fires appears on page 40, the video shows the first of these explosions, the fire started in 1963 and was put out in 1966...

https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/514386

 

[moin1900]

Firefighting with nuclear charges...

-Creation of Firebreaks by Blasting with
Subsurface Nuclear Explosives

COUNTERMEASURE CONCEPTS FOR USE AGAINST URBAN MASS FIRES FROM NUCLEAR WEAPON ATTACK

COUNTERMEASURE CONCEPTS FOR USE AGAINST URBAN MASS FIRES FROM NUCLEAR WEAPON ATTACK

New concepts for the extinguishment or control of urban mass fires from nuclear-weapon attack are proposed and evaluated. A synoptic, illustrative modus operandi is given to illustrate application of each of these conceptual countermeasures in extinguishing or controlling fires. The generation...

apps.dtic.mil