Nuclear fallout could have swept through UK if Putin launched tactical strike on Ukraine

Vladimir Putin's plan to batter Ukraine with a nuke could have seen sweeping through Europe and blasting the UK.

Back in October 2022, was so close to pushing the red button that former Prime Minister spent her final days in office analysing data and creating plans for radiation cases.

intelligence agencies had alerted Number 10 that the Kremlin was moments away from triggering a nuclear attack on .

Disaster planners in Whitehall believed that weather conditions at the time could see radioactive materials from any blast zone in Ukraine, travelling the 1,700 miles across Europe and causing a surge in British radiation patients.

The tactical nuclear weapon is less well-known than its strategic counterpart. Strategic nukes are the version that can cause unimaginable horrors and reduce entire nations to piles of smouldering rubble in a matter of minutes. The tactical versions carry similarly awful consequences for those in the blast radius, but this radius is considerably smaller, with it designed to only impact a small geographical location.

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While they are designed to minimise the risk of radioactive fallout, experts feared that certain weather conditions could carry the particles from the blast site all the way to the UK.

Truss was informed of the risk by US security officials citing "exquisite" intelligence, which said there was a 50 per cent chance of a tactical nuke being deployed on the battlefield in Ukraine, or a larger bomb being tested over the Black Sea.

Out of the Blue, a recent biography of the former PM - who was only in office for 45 days - revealed just how close the came to a chilling nuclear escalation. Ms Truss spent "numerous hours studying satellite weather data" as there were fears that certain weather patterns could lead to fallout dropping on the UK, reports The claims were backed up by Watergate journalist Bob Woodward, who wrote in his new book, War, that the White House thought there was a 50 per cent chance of using a battlefield weapon. This was based on "exquisite" human intelligence received in the autumn of 2022.

What the public saw in October that year was then UK Defence Secretary heading to Washington to meet with US officials to discuss the crisis. It was the same month that President said there was a "direct threat" of Russia using nukes, which was the first utterance of that severity since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.

Donald Trump's election last week has once again raised fears over the fate of Ukraine, with UK ministers scrambling to dampen concerns. Defence Secretary John Healey said the President - elect would be supporting Ukraine for "as long as it takes to prevail", with Prime Minister echoing the claims, saying Number 10 would "support President Zelensky for as long as it takes".

There were also reports that Trump had spoken to Putin - warning the tyrant he should not escalate the conflict any further, claims a Kremlin spokesman batted away as "pure fiction".