‘Doomsday Clock’ moves closest ever to midnight
- The timepiece, a symbol of the perils facing humanity, moved forward to 90 seconds from midnight amid the Ukraine war, nuclear tensions and the climate crisis
- ‘We are living in a time of unprecedented danger,’ said Rachel Bronson, head of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The “Doomsday Clock” symbolising the perils to humanity moved on Tuesday to its closest ever to midnight amid the Ukraine war, nuclear tensions and the climate crisis.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which describes the clock as a “metaphor for how close humanity is to self-annihilation”, edged its hands from 100 seconds to midnight to 90 seconds to midnight.
A decision to reset the hands of the symbolic timepiece is taken each year by the Bulletin’s science and security board and its board of sponsors, which includes 10 Nobel laureates.
The hands of the clock moved to 100 seconds to midnight in January 2020 – the closest to midnight it had been in its history – and remained there for the next two years.
In a statement, the Bulletin said it was advancing the hands of the clock by 10 seconds this year “due largely but not exclusively to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the increased risk of nuclear escalation”.
“Russia’s thinly veiled threats to use nuclear weapons remind the world that escalation of the conflict – by accident, intention, or miscalculation – is a terrible risk,” it said. “The possibility that the conflict could spin out of anyone’s control remains high.”
