Doomsday Clock

Nuclear specialists have chosen to keep the hands of the Doomsday Clock unchanged at 90 seconds before midnight, a symbolic representation of the hypothetical point of global destruction. This precarious position, mirroring last year's setting, underscores the world's vulnerability to imminent catastrophe, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Top scientists and security experts moved the "Doomsday Clock" forward on Jan. 24 to just 90 seconds to midnight, signaling an increased risk to humanity's survival from the nuclear shadow over the Ukraine conflict and the growing climate crisis.

The new timing of the clock set by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is closer to midnight than ever before.

After a year marked by the COVID-19 pandemic and continued fears over nuclear risks and climate change, the symbolic Doomsday Clock remains stuck at the same time as last year.

"The hands of the Doomsday Clock remain at 100 seconds to midnight, as close to midnight as ever," Rachel Bronson, president of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS), said on Wednesday (27 January).

"Without a proper sense of urgency, we will be eventually defeated, dominated and very likely destroyed," wrote former Gen. Michael Flynn, President Donald Trump's national security adviser, in his recent book. "They are dead set on taking us over and drinking our blood."

Comments by US President Donald Trump on nuclear weapons and climate change have helped make the world less safe, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists warned on Thursday, moving its symbolic “Doomsday Clock” 30 seconds closer to midnight.