Posted on 05/09/2014 6:15:29 AM PDT by Cringing Negativism Network
Experts on Capitol Hill Thursday warned that an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack aimed at the nation’s electrical grid could leave the majority of Americans dead.
(Excerpt) Read more at freebeacon.com ...
They need to be more concerned about whats going to happen if and when CWII kicks off. Internal forces will put the grid down. IMO its more likely the grid will be hacked and brought down or some ticked off Americans. EMP is only one of the ways the grid goes down. Getting an alternative source of electrical power for your home is a really good idea.
>> a Faraday cage yes, but grounding doesn’t do squat <<
I ground all of my Faraday cages!
(All of those grounds are connected to one another via no. 6 AWG cable, plus being connected to the main electric service ground, per the NEC. And for good measure, all of the above are connected to a separate 8-foot copper grounding rod that’s as close as possible to the Faradays.)
Is this not the original plot line for the Dark Angel series with Jessica Alba? An EMP sets everyone back to the pre-transistor technology.
EMP will generate a charge in all the conductors and fry anything needing a pure crystal semi-conductor, but the lines will still be there. How soon would we be able to remake breakers and switches pre-semiconductor? We would be out for a bit, and mass chaos will ensue, but we will recover.
Start putting fiber optic in your home. Glass fiber is immune to EMP because it does not depend on an ordered crystal structure, and you only need to Faraday cage the transmitters.
A 737 at max altitude ? It would do practically nothing to no one. At about 40,000 feet, or about 8 miles up, even a 1 megaton bomb wouldn’t touch Earth with its fireball, which is about 1.5 miles radius. There would be some wind from the blast but not much else.
“All I am saying is, if this problem is what it seems (not that this is certain, but it seems to be potentially big) America is being completely irresponsible not paying attention to such a very large issue.”
Same thing has been said of the Ozone Hole, Global Warming, etc. Junk ‘science’ lead by people that are not scientists spread by the Internet.
I don’t know.
The issues you mention seem like leftist rallying points.
I’m not sure this is a leftist rallying point.
This seems like a very large (potential) issue which we need to pay a large amount of attention to.
Or not. But it seems like to me.
:)
Sure thing.
You don’t spend large amount of anything on potential. You spend it on probable.
EMP has far less science behind it that most other fads people demand everyone else follow.
“I ground all of my Faraday cages!”
Tough to use an earth ground in a car or plane. Faraday cages do not need one.
However I think the possibility of a solar flare large enough to cause grid outages or even an EMP attack to have a more likely possibility of happening than trouble from the Ozone Hole, Global Warming, Over Population, junk science scams you list.
Since you seem to have a firm grasp of the details, I value your opinion. Do you really rate them all the same?
I agree with the poster in 30.
However I also tend to being concerned with this issue. So I also tend to remain concerned with this.
It appears to me, the military is prepared for EMP, but the civilian population is not.
Then why has it been something the military spends money on and has for many decades, both in enhancing EMP weapons, and in hardening against EMPs?
>> Tough to use an earth ground in a car or plane. Faraday cages do not need one. <<
OK, I’ll disconnect all of my grounds this afternoon or tonight!
They have? Got proof?
I thought you were military, you never noticed that some of your equipment was hardened against EMP, such as my PRC70 in the 1980s, or the PRC 77, and vehicles, aircraft and all kinds of gear?
Here is a piece of a Boeing 2008 news release.
“Major survivability discriminators for the Boeing KC-767 included:
More robust surface-to-air missile defense systems
Cockpit displays that improve situational awareness to enable flight crews to better see and assess the threat environment
Better Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) hardening — the KC-767 is better able to operate in an EMP environment compared with the KC-30
Automatic route planning/rerouting and steering cues to the flight crew to avoid threats once they are detected
Better armor-protection features for the flight crew and critical aircraft systems
Better fuel-tank-explosion protection features.”
http://boeing.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=20295&item=179
>> You don’t spend large amount of anything on potential. You spend it on probable. <<
That’s a misleading statement. You want to look not only at the probability of an event, but also at its potential effects. If you can quantity the effects, say as in a cost estimate, then you should multiply this estimated cost by the estimated probability. That multiplication gives an “expected cost” — and the relative expected costs of different potential disasters are what should determine your rankings of the various expenditures for mitigation.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.