§ LORD BROCKWAYasked Her Majesty's Government:
What progress has been made in the designation by British scientists of a computer for use in seismic stations to enable the identification of underground nuclear weapon tests.
§ THE MINISTER OF STATE, FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (BARONESS TWEEDSMUIR OF BELHELVIE)As part of our programme of seismic research bearing on the verification of a comprehensive test ban treaty, United Kingdom scientists have designed equipment to help with data processing at the individual stations of a world wide network of seismic arrays. This equipment, known as a Seismic Array Station Processor (S.A.S.P.), consists of a small digital computer. It is now under construction and should be operational by the end of 1973. Though the deployment of S.A.S.P. would help the establishment of an effective seismic network, such a network cannot precisely identify all nuclear tests. There would remain a number of events each year which either could not be detected at teleseismic distances or, if detected, could not be proved with certainty to be earthquakes or nuclear tests.