Blast

The Blast was an event in the early 21st century, which indirectly led to the independence of Hope City and its sovereignty over lands previously claimed by another nation (never specified in canon). The circumstances of the blast are described in more detail in the short story The Old City, which may be published in one of the upcoming Stories From Hope City collections, or here on this wiki if people prefer.

The Blast was some kind of nuclear detonation; though it is still a matter of debate whether it was an accident, a strike by a foreign power, or a terrorist attack. What is known is that the inner city was demolished, and the surrounding area contaminated by nuclear and chemical fallout which could not be removed using the technology common in the early twenty-first century. Therefore the state authorities invested a massive proportion of their budget into evacuating everyone from the affected area, and researching new techniques to keep the contamination from spreading. It was a mammoth task; and keeping radioactive dust from drifting into neighbouring countries continued to be a huge burden on the national economy.

Several years after the blast, Mayor Clarke travelled into the city with a custom-made aircraft, and declared herself a provisional government, announcing her intention to secede from the country which the old city was a part of. She presented a proposal to the government stating that she had a financial trust which could take responsibility for containing the contamination from the blast, in exchange for legal autonomy. After 18 months or debate, and the proof that she genuinely had invented a more efficient method for cleaning up the fallout, Clarke named the site Hope City, and it was recognised by the United Nations as an independent nation.