THE Doomsday Clock has been moved to two minutes to midnight, the closest to the apocalypse since 1953.

Mounting concerns about the possibility of a nuclear war along with US President Donald Trump's "unpredictability" have pushed the symbolic time piece to two minutes before midnight, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists said today.

2 The Doomsday Clock has moved to two minutes to midnight today Credit: EPA

The clock which serves as a metaphor for how close humanity is to destroying the planet was moved forward by 30 seconds, to as near as it has ever been to the hour of the apocalypse.

The last time the clock was at two minutes to midnight was in 1953 when the United States and Soviet Union were testing hydrogen bombs.

"In this year's discussions, nuclear issues took centre stage once again," said Rachel Bronson, president and CEO of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

She mentioned new testing by North Korea, an enhanced commitment to nuclear weapons in China, Pakistan and India, and "unpredictability" embodied by the US president in tweets and statements.

2 The last time the clock was at two minutes to midnight was in 1953 when the United States and Soviet Union were testing hydrogen bombs. Credit: Getty - Contributor

The Doomsday Clock was created in 1947 and its time has changed 20 times since then, ranging from two minutes to midnight in 1953 to 17 minutes before midnight in 1991.

Last year it moved from three minutes before midnight to two-and-a-half minutes.

Beatrice Fihn, Executive Director of International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), said we are currently heading to catastrophe.

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She said: “The actions and policies of the nuclear-armed states are winding the Doomsday Clock towards midnight.

"We have been lucky to avoid conflict through intentional or accidental means, but recent posturing and the false alarms in Hawaii and Japan show our luck is about to run out if we don’t move quickly.

"A security based on luck is reckless and foolish; it’s exactly what the nuclear states have now."

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