Posted on 11/25/2012 10:18:27 PM PST by cruise_missile
If Earth is struck by a large solar flare, some in the scientific community believe:
The planet will be hit with a widespread loss of power. Air travel would be grounded. Nuclear plants would be crippled and without sufficient back-up power, dozens could meltdown. Satellites would be disabled, causing a serious loss of communication in all areas (military and civilian). Food and medicine would be in short supply, setting up the potential for food riots within days of an outage.
The same scientists who believe that a large solar strike could lead to a very rapid societal breakdown say that steps to avoid the problem are available and at a relatively low cost to all of us. What is a “relatively low cost?” They estimate the amount of money needed to insulate the power grid (and ourselves) from trouble to be less than one dollar per American. But Congress said “no” to their proposal.
Is there really cause for concern?
Over the next fourteen months Earth will be on high alert for a huge burst of electromagnetic energy from the sun. This powerful pulse is known as a “Solar Maximum” – an event that could cause catastrophic damage to power grids and communications systems. The peak time for the next big flare is sometime between now and the end of 2013. This possibility has scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on alert. Tom Bogdan, the director of NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center, is monitoring the situation as closely as possible.
The more important part to your chart, imho, is that the decreasing sunspots also are indicators of a cooling period for the earth.
HOWEVER - the number of sunspots doesn’t affect the STRENGTH of a CME (coronal mass ejection) from what I understand - but it does increase the likely-hood of a big one, and also increases the chance that it might be headed in our direction. I believe earlier this year their was a very large flare - but headed away from us.
The following is a short article about this year’s past solar flares. It must have been the late October one that I had hoped to see the Northern Lights, but no such luck so close to the city.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/10/23/sun-unleashes-seventh-x-class-flare-of-2012
Sun Unleashes Seventh X-Class Flare of 2012
The sun is nearing its most active period, according to NASA scientists.
“As the story goes Bill Gates is to be one of them.”
Bill Gates has his home (well, main home I suppose) on the shores of Lake Washington near Seattle. Much of it IS built into the hillside. To be more heating efficient, lower profile, etc. so they said. I suppose he may have been thinking of a CME as well.
However, they now think that a large rupture of the Seattle Fault that runs underneath Lake Washington could cause a tsunami in the lake (and Puget Sound). The runnup of water in the lake would inundate Gate’s home as it is fairly low on the hillside.
Well, like Grandma said - “When its your time to go - its your time to go.”
The current prediction model for Solar Cycle 24 gives a smoothed sunspot number maximum of about 90 at its peak in May of 2013. This current prediction makes this the smallest sunspot cycle in about 100 years.
The resulting low numbers of sunspots do not necessarily mean weaker solar flares, just less of them probably occurring. There is always a chance of an Earth directed X class flare disrupting the power grid and causing damage to communications satellites, but less of a chance of one during a weak solar maximum like this one is shaping up to be.
I heard on Coast to Coast that it would only cost us 5 billion dollars to harden our electrical grid in the right places and to have a store of essential transformers that used to be made in USA but are now made in China etc. A grid meltdown will blow many transformers that take a while to build especially when the electric is out and the whole world is clamoring for them. So having a reserve of these would help get the grid back up lot sooner.
This would also be very helpful if we are hit with an EMP attack. Seeing how the USG pisses away billions each day it it treasonous not to have a store of these transformers.
Good points, and yes we were missed by one very large CME earlier this year. As to when our luck will run out is anyone’s guess. It is not if but when.
Eventually we will get hit with a large X-class flare and resulting Coronal Mass Ejection. We should be preparing for it, on a national level, to protect the power grid, but we are not. We are also just as vulnerable to an EMP attack which worries me more.
bttt
http://www.ips.gov.au/Educational/1/3/12
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/sun_darkness.html
Very real, this book woke me up (and scared me) a couple of years ago.
One Second After
In other words, heavily Democratic precincts would be devastated. That’s just awful.
Wouldn't buried lines be protected from any kind of solar flare? All the lines in my neighborhood are buried.
Does the sun always have that large cool dark area on the top?
I read it too. Very sobering book. I never realized what the consequences would be if the power grid went down for the long term. I can’t say we’re ready if it happened, but we can get by for awhile. We’ve prepared for short-term emergencies, but after that....
Neighborhood distribution lines are not long enough to be affected (much). The large, high-voltage transformers (greater than 110,000 volts) at either end of long grid runs will be the victims of solar flares. When they melt down, the extensive areas served by them with go without power until they are replaced. There are spares but not enough. It will take at least 6 months to get new 500kV/230kV transformers from China as they are not made here anymore. In the meantime, the spares, if needed, will be allocated to "priority" areas, such as DC, NY, LA, and so on. Everyone else will do without until the new units arrive and are installed.
I read it too. Very sobering book. I never realized what the consequences would be if the power grid went down for the long term. I can’t say we’re ready if it happened, but we can get by for awhile. We’ve prepared for short-term emergencies, but after that....
God only knows what the sun will do, and he is not talking.
That being said, I was monitoring the sun from age 14, back in the late 50s.
As a ham radio operator, interested in working DX (foreign countries), we lived and died by the 11 year sunspot cycle.
The late 50s was probably the greatest sunspot period in my
50+ years of activity.
I remember days/nights when the 15 meter band was open to contacts most anywhere in the world, and at the same time.
I also remember many periods of low sunspot activity when I would be hard pressed just to work anything outside of the states.
We should all keep in mind that we live or die by what the sun does.
Just one burp can be catastrophic for life on Earth.
Only in the broadest sense is this true. History is full of retrograde movements, some of them quite abrupt. Die-offs of half of populations in a decade or less have happened over and over. Sometimes entire tribes and peoples just plain go extinct. (Seen any Mohicans lately?)
We may be winding up for a big one. To beat my tired drum again, just for one example, if anything causes the EBT system to go down hard, our cities will explode in under a week.
Just a blast from the sun could send us over that ledge.
Exactly. There was a huge event a week or two ago but it was facing away from earth.
I can just imagine the effects of a massive debit card failure all at once.
First off they won’t trust the news saying its temporary, maybe it will stay quiet for 24 hours but after that I truly think it will be riots over food, shoes, cellphones.
Now if I was head of a community I would announce that we have a facility chock full of emergency “free stuff” such as new Ipads, cellphones, designer shoes. Basically bling, but here is the kicker, its advertise to be exactly what it is, emergency free stuff for those that live off of trash.
And then when they swoop down on the warehouse and get inside we gas them unconscious and ship them out of town.
The riots won’t always be just food, its about getting something the poor doesnt have, something that better off folks have, the status symbol crap thats been pushed by the MSM.
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