[Webstral]

I'll add a non-canon interpretation of the strikes against oil refineries in the SF Bay Area. Note that 4 refineries in the Bay Area get hit. Three get hit with 500kt weapons, while Richmond gets hit a 1.5Mt device. My explanation is that 4 weapons are deployed against these targets--perhaps from a single MIRV launched by a Soviet boomer. One of the MIRVs fails. Soviet BDA (battle damage assessment) reveals the failure of the strike against Richmond. A follow-on attack is launched from a separate platform.

The three .5Mt strikes against Benicia, Martinez, and Avon are probably overkill for these targets. If one uses Alex Wallerstein's Nukemap, one can see that the strike on Martinez probably would start catastrophic fires at Benicia and Avon. Still, the Soviets like to be thorough. It's just blind luck that the one refinery physically separated from the others was missed while the overlapping attacks all succeeded.

Let us imagine that for whatever reason the Soviets follow up the failed attack on Richmond with an ICBM with a single warhead. The launch vehicle selected is less accurate than more modern platforms. Whoever makes the decision to use the ICBM with a single warhead reasons that the higher yield of the warhead will compensate for the greater CEP.

The warhead, set for ground burst, detonates about 750 meters northwest of the intended ground. The actual ground zero is directly to the east of a long ridge that runs along the western edge of Richmond. This ridge is a set of low, joined hills running from Point Richmond to Point San Pablo over a distance of 8-9km. These hills are nothing impressive, as the highest point is less than 250m above the water line. The Richmond Bridge, which links Richmond with San Rafael in Marin County, makes landfall on the Richmond side at a "pass" in the ridge. The refinery is almost entirely on the eastern side of the ridge, though a few storage tanks are on the ridge itself and even on the western side. Also, some of the loading/offloading facilities are on the western side of the ridge.

Ground zero is in the mouth of Castro Creek, almost in the center of the U-shaped bowl formed where the creek meets San Pablo Bay. Until the moment of detonation, this 1km-wide area is defined on the west by the ridge line as it descends to San Pablo Point, on the east by the low shoreline typical of most of San Pablo Bay, and on the south by the dock and refinery facilities.

The fireball of the 1.5Mt explosion overflows the 1km basin of the mouth of Castro Creek and extends into the Bay and onto dry land. All of the water in the basin vaporizes instantly, along with millions of gallons from the creek itself and the adjacent San Pablo Bay proper. The northern parts of the refinery are caught up in the fireball. Lethal radiation and overpressure of 20 psi reach nearly to I-580 where it emerges from the pass on the south and right into the neighborhoods of North Richmond in the east. Virtually everything is destroyed outright. Overpressure of 5 psi, sufficient to destroy most residential structures, reaches the centers of San Pablo and Richmond, almost 6km from the epicenter.

The thermal pulse travels even further. Moving in a straight line to the southeast, the thermal pulse ignites fires and causes severe burns as far away as Albany and Kensington. Directly to the east, every part of Richmond and San Pablo is affected. To the northeast, Pinole and even Hercules are seared by heat intense enough to cause third degree burns in every person caught out in the open.

Towns in southern Marin which are technically within the thermal pulse radius are spared by the effects of topography on the blast. The epicenter is right at the surface of the Bay. The fireball in the mouth of Castro Creek is partially contained by the ridge line on the western boundary of the Richmond refinery. Although huge amounts of soil and rock are vaporized by the fireball, the sheer volume of rock in the low hills repels the air blasts and redirects the pressure wave upwards. Consequently, the effects of the blast on the Richmond Bridge, which is south and west of the ridge, are very much reduced. The mass of the low hills completely blocks the thermal pulse radiating west, southwest, and south below the level of the ridge. Thus San Rafael--and in particular those parts of the city along San Rafael Bay--is spared almost all of the effects of the nuclear blast which might otherwise be expected to cross the San Pablo Bay, make landfall at San Quentin state prison, and continue up the valley to the center of San Rafael. Similarly, Corte Madera and Larkspur, which otherwise would be completely exposed to the pressure wave and thermal pulse, are almost completely spared the effects of the blast. Those parts of Tiburon on the northeast face of the Tiburon Peninsula likewise suffer little ill effect, while those portions of Tiburon on the side of the peninsula and towns further west that are even more sheltered by low peaks in the coastal range are virtually unaffected though theoretically within the overpressure and thermal radiation radii of the 1.5Mt detonation at the Richmond refinery.

The first strikes at Benicia, Martinez, and Avon cause tremendous damage throughout central Contra Contra County and southwestern Solano County. Highly accurate strikes by the first three reentry vehicles wipe out the refineries and associated facilities at these three locations. Firestorms quickly engulf Concord and Walnut Creek to the south, Port Chicago to the east, Port Costa and Crockett to the west, and Vellejo to the northwest. Topography and the very wet El Nino winter of ’97-’98 serve to limit the damage compared to the devastation that reduces greater Los Angeles to ashes and rubble. While towns nearest the strikes suffer tremendous damage, the hills and marshes separating clusters of towns in Contra Costa and Solano Counties serve as effective fire breaks.

The strike at Richmond is particularly devastating due to the high population density of western Contra Costa County. Firestorms rage throughout Richmond, San Pablo, and the adjoining municipalities. By the time they have run their course, everything north of University Avenue in Berkeley has been consumed by fire. A virtually unbroken heap of smoldering ruin characterizes the Contra County shoreline from the western edge of Pittsburg, west through Martinez and inland to include almost the entire urban area in the valleys occupied by Concord, Walnut Creek, and Clayton; through the smaller towns lining the Carquinez Strait, along the southeastern shore of San Pablo Bay, and throughout the entire flat and densely developed area between the hills and the shore of greater San Francisco Bay south to Berkeley. On the Solano side of the Bay, Benicia has been annihilated, while Vallejo has been burned to the ground.

Seen in a larger context, these strikes virtually paralyze the San Francisco Bay Area and its 8.5 million inhabitants. Direct loss of life is significant but not overwhelming—less than 1 million. Loss of fuel for transportation, damage to the electrical grid, and the breakdown of order cause far more casualties over the next 2 years. Interstate 80, linking Sacramento with Oakland and San Francisco, is impassible through sections of Vallejo and virtually all of San Pablo, Richmond, El Cerrito, Albany, and much of Berkeley. By April 2001, the population of the 10 Bay Area counties has dropped to 3 million.