1962

The novel Fail Safe by Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler reveals the frightening consequences of relying on technology to prevent a nuclear catastrophe. Canada's first full-scale nuclear power plant begins to provide electricity in Rolphton, Ontario. Twenty years after the first controlled nuclear fission reaction, the U.S. has 200 atomic reactors in operation, while the United Kingdom and the USSR have 39 each.

June 4
A nuclear power source atop a Thor rocket booster falls into the Pacific Ocean when the booster has to be destroyed.

June 20
A second Thor rocket booster fails, and the nuclear power source falls into the Pacific.

September
As part of a campaign to reduce the US vulnerability to nuclear attack, President John F. Kennedy advises Americans to build fallout shelters. President Kennedy's letter in the September issue of Life magazine sets off a wave of "shelter-mania" which will last for about a year.

October 16-29
The Cuban Missile Crisis . A tense standoff begins when US reconnaissance discovers Soviet missiles in Cuba. The US blockades Cuba for thirteen days while President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khrushchev work out a behind-the-scenes deal in which the Soviet Union publicly removes its missiles from Cuba and the US privately removes missiles from Turkey. The crisis brings the two nations to the brink of nuclear war.