June 11, 2005: Dropping the Bomb - Dale Brown | Cross-Pacific Sailing Adventure - Susan Meckley
Podcast: The Art Bell ArchivePublished On: Wed Nov 26 2025
Description: Art Bell interviews 72-year-old Susan Meckley, who successfully completed a solo 34-day sailing voyage from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, to Hilo, Hawaii, in a 32-foot sailboat with only a 40-watt ham radio for communication. Susan describes sleeping in 25-minute intervals, navigating 20-foot swells, and the mid-ocean depression that nearly broke her resolve. She announces plans to continue westward to the Marshall Islands, Samoa, and possibly Thailand, searching for a permanent home.The program then features bestselling military thriller author and former B-52 navigator Dale Brown, who provides a firsthand account of pulling nuclear alert during the Cold War. Brown describes the experience of copying an actual combat execution message, putting on a lead eye patch designed to save one eye from nuclear flash, and the psychological weight of preparing to fight World War III with dial-a-boom weapons selectable from 150 kilotons to 1.1 megatons.Brown argues that even an all-out nuclear exchange would not end the world, and controversially contends that most American presidents would choose not to retaliate after a nuclear first strike. He identifies Iran as a greater nuclear threat than North Korea, asserting that Iran likely purchased actual nuclear weapons from Russia following the Soviet collapse.
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