What Would Happen if a Massive Solar Storm Hit the Earth?

Gizmodo ^ | 8/20/15 | Maddie Stone

[Kartographer]

It’s hard to overstate just how much this would uproot our lives. The lights would of course go out, as would the internet, and any device that draws current from the wall. In places with electronically-controlled municipal water supplies — like most modern cities — toilets and sewage treatment systems would stop working. Heating and air conditioning would fail. Perishable food and medication would be lost. ATMs would be useless. Gas pumps would go offline. And so forth.

GPS technology would also be knocked out. Said Grunman, “The GPS system depends on the very precise timing of a course of signals between two points, like a spacecraft and your phone. If you dump a bunch of energetic particles into the atmosphere, that effects your GPS. Which is sobering when you consider the replacement of old aircraft landing technology with GPS.”

[Mad Dawgg]

"Ok, this would work how, if the internet is down?"

It is one of those questions best left unasked...

(This may or may not be true but I hear Jim Thompson supposedly got his hands on some of that secret alien tech from the Roswell Crash and gave it to the FRmods... Shhh don't tell anyone)

(Put me on it.)

Your wish is my command...

"So let it be written. So let it be done."

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[Mad Dawgg]

Please Help us NicholObi-Wan you are our only hope...

[Hot Tabasco]

a book by my friend Bill Forstchen,

Wow, you know Bill???? I'm impressed!

So where do you know Bill from and how are his kids doing?

[COBOL2Java]

A small number of politicians have done some public hand wringing about it, but so far nothing has been done.

Au contraire! The IRS has reams and reams of detailed COOP plans for collecting taxes in the event of several kinds of disasters.

[LS]

Bill and I go back some time: I put him in our movie “Rockin’ the Wall.” He has used our book for years.

[Hot Tabasco]

I put him in our movie “Rockin’ the Wall.”

Was that a home movie? I never heard of it.........

[LS]

On PBS: www.rockinthewallstudios.com for trailer. Available on iTunes or Amazon

[Hot Tabasco]

Rockin’ the Wall

Just curious, were you the writer, the director, the producer or the guy who financed the home movie?

[Hot Tabasco]

Bill Forstchen

Oops, forgot to ask, how did Bill fit into your movie? Did he star in it, did he help write it ?

[LS]

Did you watch the trailer?

[Hot Tabasco]

Did you watch the trailer?

I tried several times but it kept freezing up..........Links and videos are a major problem with my computer

[grey_whiskers]

I know that the EMP introduce Compton scattering in the upper atmosphere; that there are induced, *very* short-lived currents induced in almost any length of conducting materials — short enough that the typical surge protectors don’t work; and that diesel engines would still start: ergo locomotives could still move and mayhap provide power until they ran out of fuel. What are the chief differences between the EMP and Carrington?

[Hawthorn]

>> A very good look at this is a book by my friend Bill Forstchen, called “One Second After,” about an EMP blast. It was #1 on the NYTimes for a while. Terrifying. <<

Double amen to that. Can’t be stressed too much.

On the other hand, if you read some of the EMP-related threads on FR over the past couple of years, you’ll “learn” that all discussion of EMP is simply part of a big plot to generate more government expenditure, sorta like glow-bull warming. That kind of attitude is deeply distressing, to say the least.

Anyway, I think the danger from a solar storm is only half of the story. The Iranians almost certainly will be able to generate multiple EMP’s over the USA within a few years, by launching relatively small nukes on Scud missiles from unobtrusive cargo ships a few hundred miles offshore in the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf. The upshot could be that 90% of the US population might starve to death. So, the Iranian dream of “death to America” would literally come to pass.

There are lots of mitigating steps we could take to head off the twin existential threats of solar EMP and Iranian-made EMP. And the costs would seem to be fairly modest. But almost nobody in the ruling class pays attention. Why can’t we take this stuff seriously? Beats me.

[LS]

Bill went on a jihad so to speak, talking to DoD people, Intel people about hardening.

[Hawthorn]

>> Bill went on a jihad so to speak, talking to DoD people, Intel people about hardening <<

Good for him. But as far as I can tell, the only “prominent” folks in Wash DC to take the matter the least bit seriously have been Newt Gingrich, Jim Woolsey, Frank Gaffney and former Congressman Roscoe Bartlett. It’s really hard for me to fathom why the issue has gained no significant traction, when our whole way of life may be at stake.

Defense against this looming apocalypse ought to be something that men as diverse as Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz could easily agree upon. It really has no deep partisan overtones. Maybe it’s just not glamorous enough for our celebrity-worshipping culture. If that’s the case, I truly fear for my country, even for the whole of western civilization.

[DuncanWaring]

Which is sobering when you consider the replacement of old aircraft landing technology with GPS.”

The modern aircraft I'm familiar with are distinctly non-dependent on GPS; they have plenty of alternate means of navigation.

[Squantos]

How about you take me off your ping list professor....

[RFEngineer]

” What are the chief differences between the EMP and Carrington?”

EMP is typically what is referred to as the effect from a high altitude nuclear detonation.

A “Carrington Event” is a solar storm that causes a geomagnetic disturbance.

EMP top frequency is about 1000MHz, a Solar EMP/Geomagnetic Storm has a top frequency content of a few HERTZ.

A geomagnetic storm causes Geomagnetically Induced Currents - which when imposed on long-distance transmission lines can cause uncontrolled DC currents to superimpose onto the AC transmission line currents which is the mechanism for transformer damage.

[Kartographer]

You have already been removed.

[Kartographer]

What I wonder is how man fires would break out. During the Carrington Event a number of Telegrapher offices caught fire. Now every house and building is wired to the grid.