“How would an EMP be much worse than being hit by lighting?
I’m sure power plants and transmission lines are hit, somewhere in the world, daily.
I believe they are designed to withstand that just fine.”
EMP isn’t just like a lightening strike. EMP has 3 separate components: E1, E2 and E3. E2 is very similar to lightening, and no one is much concerned with it. E1 is far more rapid, and will by-pass most surge protectors (and virtually all of those sold in electronics stores to protect your computers, TVs, etc.). It will fry sensitive electronics. E3 is a slow-moving wave that affects long cables and the transformers attached to them. E3 is most similar to a geomagnetic storm. http://emppreparedness.com/Problem/EMPBackground.html
E1 will not just fry your iPhone and computer, it’ll also fry all of the circuits used to produce medicines, petrochemicals (i.e. gas and diesel) and lots of food. Cars may or may not be affected, same for aircraft in flight (no one really knows for sure - but I’d rather not be at 30,000 feet when one of these hits). Even with the rest of the grid functioning, without all of the microprocessers that make modern life possible, we’re sunk. With E3, your iPhone, etc. will work - but there’ll be no cell phone network, no GPS and no power, so they’ll be useless. Worse, the transformers will be rendered inoperable, meaning that we won’t have any electricity - for months on end, at least. This is not about being sweaty during the summer - it is about no fuel, no medicines (including vaccines and insulin), no refrigeration, no transport or processing of food, no telephones - nothing modern. We’re simply not prepared for life in the 1800s, which is about where we’d be transported in a matter of seconds. We haven’t the tools or skills to support 300 million people without modern petrochemicals, computers and communications, so literally tens of millions will die of starvation, disease, cold or heat and rioting. The EMP commission itself estimated that 90% of us could die within 1 year.
You have doubts about the panic that would ensue? Take a look at what happens when a hurricane strikes - stores empty out, and at the first sign of police not being present, cities are looted and burned.