List of nuclear weapons tests of France

The List of nuclear weapons tests of France consists of all the atomic tests the French executed in the areas of Reggane and In Ekker in Algeria and the Mururoa and Fangataufa Atolls in French Polynesia, from 13 February 1960 through 27 January 1996. These totaled to 210 tests with 210 device explosions, 50 in the atmosphere.^[1]

List

France's nuclear testing series summary - Link to world summary of nuclear weapons tests

Series or years	Years covered	Tests [Summ 1]	Devices fired	Devices with unknown yield	Peaceful use tests	Non-PTBT tests [Summ 2]	Yield range (kilotons) [Summ 3]	Total yield (kilotons) [Summ 4]	Notes
Reggane	1960	4	4			4	1 to 65	78
In Ekker	1961–1966	18	18		4	5	0 to 127	286
1966-1970	1966–1970	22	22			22	0 to 2,600	8,044
1971-1974	1971–1974	24	24			24	0 to 955	2,082
1975-1978	1975–1978	29	29			2	0 to 64	259
1979-1980	1979–1980	22	22				0 to 112	474
1981-1982	1981–1982	22	22				0 to 56	195
1983-1985	1983–1985	25	25				small to 80	537
1986-1988	1986–1988	24	24				2 to 103	625
1989-1991	1989–1991	21	21				0 to 118	755
1995-1996	1995–1996	6	6				8 to 97	231
Totals	1960-Feb-13 to 1996-Jan-27	217	217		4	57	0 to 2,600	13,567	Total country yield is 2.5% of all nuclear testing.

1. Includes all tests with potential for nuclear fission or fusion explosion, including combat use, singleton tests, salvo tests, zero yield fails, safety experiments, and bombs incapacitated by accidents but still intended to be fired. It does not include hydronuclear and subcritical tests, and misfires of a device which was subsequently fired successfully.
2. Number of tests which would have been in violation of the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963, such as atmospheric, space or underwater tests. Some "peaceful use" cratering tests which should have been violations were protested, and later quietly dropped.
3. "Small" refers to a value greater than zero but less than 0.5 kt.
4. Some yields are described like "< 20 kt"; such are scored at one half of the numeric amount, i.e., yield of 10k in this example. "Unknown yield" adds nothing to the total.

References

1. Norris, Robert S. (1996). "French and Chinese Nuclear Weapons Testing" (PDF). Security Dialog (Sage Publications) 27 (1): 39–54. Retrieved August 16, 2014. Discrepancies between those totals and the table below consist in two undocumented tests mentioned in other sources and five safety tests in an area near In Ekker named Adar Tickertane.

Sources

• Yang, Xiaoping; North, Robert; Romney, Carl (August 2000). "CMR Nuclear Explosion Database (Revision 3)". SMDC Monitoring Research.
• Andryushi, LA; Voloshin, N.P.; Ilkaev, R.I.; Matushchenko, A.M.; Ryabev, L.D.; Strukov, V.G.; Chernyshev, A.K.; Yudin, Yu.A. Mikhailov, V.N., ed. "Catalog of Worldwide Nuclear Testing". Retrieved 2013-03-04.
• Wm Robert Johnston, PhD. "Johnston Archive of Nuclear Weapons". Retrieved 2013-12-31.