SCP-1143 — SCP-1143 | Cost Breakdown

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SCP-1143 Safe ~ medium confidence

SCP-1143

Expected annual

$2.8M

One-time setup

$3.3M

Annual recurring

$2.8M

Personnel

Estimated initial capital outlay of approximately $3.31M driven by remote range purchase/setup, blast containment, instrumentation, and contingency reserves; ongoing annual operating costs are approximately $2.44M/yr driven primarily by staff wages, research programs, and emergency readiness.

🏗️ One-Time Capital Costs Total: $3.3M

Arff Truck Purchase $950K

[#13] Option to purchase in-house ARFF vehicle (capital cost included as one-time if chosen).

Facilities $662K

[#2, #5, #6, #8] Locker/vault modification, remote test-range purchase & setup, engineered blast containment (berms/trenches/nets), and purchase/setup of remote operations trailer; includes installation/integration and site prep.

Equipment $501K

[#1, #3, #7, #9, #16, #4] Fitted tamper-evident carrying case, climate/electrostatic sensor hardware, remote high-speed cameras & sensors, drones/robotic platforms fleet, initial blast-rated PPE kits, and optional dedicated vehicle purchase for secure transport.

Contingency Reserve Property $500K

[#18] Property damage reserve / indemnity contingency (initial allocation as suggested).

Initial Research And Lab Setup $470K

[#22, #23, #24, #25] Initial data analysis/storage systems, initial personnel training and protocol development, initial research tranche to characterize human-variable dependence, and initial neutralization/disposition project tranche.

Redundancy Reserve $200K

[#26] Redundancy / disaster recovery reserve for replacement of destroyed high-cost gear.

Legal Initial Permits $25K

[#21] Initial legal/regulatory & permit costs (one-time filings or payments).

🔄 Annual Recurring Costs Total: $2.8M/yr

Staff Wages $1.1M/yr

[#10, #11, #12, #13, #14] Fully-loaded salaries/benefits for dedicated staff: Level-3 researcher(s), testing technicians, safety officer(s), security guards, emergency (ARFF) crew, and in-house medical techs (if maintained).

Research And Monitoring $330K/yr

[#3, #22, #24, #25] Ongoing monitoring fees, data storage/compute & secure archiving, recurring research budget to characterize human-variable dependence, and ongoing neutralization/disposition research.

Recurring Research Budget $300K/yr

[#24] Multi-year recurring R&D program to characterize human-variable dependence and mitigation engineering.

Arff Crew Salaries $200K/yr

[#13] In-house ARFF crew salaries (alternative to contracting; included here as recurring if maintained).

In House Medical Staff Salary $200K/yr

[#14] In-house medical techs/trauma team salaries (alternative to per-test contracting; included if maintained).

Eod Retainer $150K/yr

[#15] Option to retain full-time/retainer explosive specialists (recurring if chosen).

Opportunity Cost Admin Overhead $125K/yr

[#27] Administrative overhead and opportunity cost for management, coordination, and diverted staff productivity.

Neutralization Recurring $100K/yr

[#25] Recurring budget for continued neutralization/disposition research if project continues after initial tranche.

Cover Story And Legal $60K/yr

[#20, #21] Legal retainer and budget for cover-story / amnestics & public relations; per-incident amnestics are budgeted separately per-incident (baseline assumes none).

Property Damage Replenishment $50K/yr

[#18] Annual replenishment allocation for property-damage contingency reserve.

Facilities Maintenance $30K/yr

[#5] Annual lease/maintenance/grounds/upkeep for remote test range and perimeter infrastructure (or equivalent maintenance if purchased).

Redundancy Replenishment $20K/yr

[#26] Annual replenishment of redundancy/disaster recovery reserves used to replace lost gear.

Supplies And Consumables $18K/yr

[#17, #16, #9] Consumables and per-test expendables (fuel, drone batteries, targets), plus annual PPE replacement/inspection and drone battery/consumable replenishment. (Assumes ~2 tests/yr baseline.)

Instrumentation Maintenance $15K/yr

[#7] Maintenance, shielding repairs, and data-storage upkeep for high-speed cameras, sensors, and backups.

Data Storage Compute $15K/yr

[#22] Ongoing secure storage, backups, and compute for high-speed footage and sensor data.

Eod Consulting Per Session $12K/yr

[#15] Per-session EOD / explosive safety consulting for tests (assumes ~2 sessions/yr at mid-range).

Emergency Response Per Test Contract $11K/yr

[#13] Contracted per-test standby (assumes baseline ~2 tests/yr at mid-range per-test cost).

Blast Infrastructure Repairs $10K/yr

[#6] Occasional repairs/maintenance for berms, nets, trenches following tests/inspections.

Control Trailer Utilities $10K/yr

[#8] Utilities, comms costs, and site services for remote operations trailer/mobile ops.

Debris Cleanup Per Test $10K/yr

[#19] Debris removal and environmental remediation per-test (assumes ~2 tests/yr at modest scale).

Training Refreshers $10K/yr

[#23] Ongoing training refreshers, emergency drills, and psychological screening refreshes.

Drones Maintenance $6K/yr

[#9] Maintenance, spares, and battery replacement for drone/robot fleet.

Ppe Replacement $5K/yr

[#16] Annual replacement/inspection costs for blast-rated PPE and specialist protective equipment.

Logistics And Transport $4K/yr

[#4] Secure transport per-transfer costs averaged for baseline (~2 transfers/yr). Vehicle ownership capex accounted for in one-time costs if purchased.

Medical Standby Per Test $2K/yr

[#14] Contracted on-site paramedic/trauma standby per-test (baseline assumed tests).

Monitoring Service Fee $200/yr

[#3] Small recurring monitoring/service fee for environmental & access logging sensors.

Amnestics Per Incident $0/yr

[#20] Per-visible-incident amnestics/cover-up costs; baseline assumes no visible incidents (set to 0 for baseline).

⚡ Cost Scenarios

📊 Baseline (baseline) $2.8M/yr

92.9% probability / year

Normal year with no major incidents: routine testing (≈2 small tests/yr), ongoing research, and full staffing.

scheduled small-scale tests routine maintenance ongoing research activities

🚨 Minor Incident $2.5M/yr

5.0% probability / year +$-241800 vs baseline

A test becomes visible to civilians or minor uncontrolled damage occurs requiring public remediation and amnestics/legal work.

visible explosion to civilians small-scale collateral property damage media/legal inquiries

🚨 Major Incident $3.9M/yr

2.0% probability / year +$1.2M vs baseline

A large-scale test or accidental escalation destroys on-site infrastructure and causes significant off-site damage requiring major remediation/replacement.

vehicle/building-level explosion loss of instrumentation and containment infrastructure substantial civilian/property claims

🚨 Catastrophic Event $10.4M/yr

0.1% probability / year +$7.7M vs baseline

Rare catastrophic detonation comparable to Incident 1143-A resulting in total loss of test site, massive remediation, and large-scale cover-up operations.

uncontrolled 10+ megaton-scale detonation complete site destruction mass-casualty / large-scale public exposure requiring major cover-up

👥 Personnel 14 total

Role	Count	Notes
Level-3 Researcher	1	[#10] Dedicated Level-3 researcher to authorize tests; fully-loaded salary included in staff_wages.
Technician (testing team)	3	[#11] Technicians to run tests, maintain gear, and operate sensors; aggregated salary included in staff_wages.
Safety Officer	1	[#11] Dedicated safety officer for testing operations; salary included in staff_wages.
Security Officer / MTF Agent	4	[#12] On-site security for storage and perimeter; number reflects shift coverage and is included in staff_wages.
Engineer / ARFF Crew	3	[#13] ARFF / emergency response crew (if maintained in-house); salaries included in staff_wages.
Medical Officer / Paramedic	2	[#14] In-house medical techs/paramedics (alternative to per-test contracting); salaries included in staff_wages.

📋 Confidence Notes

Many cost items are well-scoped (equipment, sensors, staff wages), but large uncertainty stems from operational choices (contract vs in-house ARFF/medical/EOD), test cadence, and low-probability high-impact events (historical 20-megaton class detonation). Ranges in analyst notes produce medium confidence in these aggregated estimates.

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