Congress warned North Korean EMP attack would kill '90% of all Americans'

The Washington Examiner ^ | Oct 12, 2017 | Paul Bedard

[bitt]

Congress was warned Thursday that North Korea is capable of attacking the U.S. today with a nuclear EMP bomb that could indefinitely shut down the electric power grid and kill 90 percent of "all Americans" within a year.

At a House hearing, experts said that North Korea could easily employ the "doomsday scenario" to turn parts of the U.S. to ashes.

In calling on the Pentagon and President Trump to move quickly to protect the grid, the experts testified that an explosion of a high-altitude nuclear bomb delivered by a missile or satellite "could be to shut down the U.S. electric power grid for an indefinite period, leading to the death within a year of up to 90 percent of all Americans."

[hillarys cankles]

You haven’t seen how people react to a couple of days on no power?

Or a verdict they don’t like?

Now imagine Zero police response in either of those situations. This country would devour itself.

[central_va]

A North Korean food processor.

[LambSlave]

If you knock down the grid and mass communication for a year, over nearly all of the U.S., then 90% casualties are likely.

You seriously underestimate your fellow Americans. Many of us have lived without power under brutal conditions for extended periods, and as a result are well prepared to do so indefinitely. Many of us have served in the military spending weeks, months or more deployed in the field under brutal conditions as well with no access to heat, power, or even a decent meal. It is not that hard, and it doesn't take long to simply adapt and be comfortable with it.

[marktwain]

I said that I think we are tougher than implied in the novels.

But generators need fuel and infrastructure to make and distribute it.

I think the whole grid would not go down and stay down. We are tougher. But if the whole grid went down and stayed down, a months supply of fuel will not make much difference for most people.

But, I like the way you are thinking about it. It would be much closer to that in reality. In reality, we would get local power generation up and running pretty quickly.

It does not take a lot to get a lot accomplished.

There is no big trick to producing food without electricity.

It is the transition that would kill. If the grid is out for a year, vast numbers would die.

The cities would be death traps.

[Republican Wildcat]

For a week? It could be a lot longer than that. Every electronic device could be destroyed even if power were restored.

EMPs can also occur naturally so there is no reason not to harden the infrastructure to be protected against such an occurrence.

[Leo Carpathian]

Unplug your apliances. Use generator for backup.

[Tilted Irish Kilt]

Prepper ping !

" In calling on the Pentagon and President Trump to move quickly to protect the grid,
the experts testified that an explosion of a high-altitude nuclear bomb delivered by a missile or satellite
"could be to shut down the U.S. electric power grid for an indefinite period,
leading to the death within a year of up to 90 percent of all Americans." The utility companies and the military can argue whose responsibility it is to shore up the grid and make it impervious to EMP/ solar flares
But I wouldn't want to wait for the government to make that determination - considering the current Congressional stalemate.

That says it all !
I have nothing more to add !

[Balding_Eagle]

All of the harvesting equipment is dependent on electronics, except for the very old stuff.

That said, this is all overblown

[marktwain]

You have to eat.

The food has to be available.

There has to be a way to distribute it.

Water has to be available.

Sewage has to be taken care of.

Without electricity or communications, those things become very iffy for very large percentages of the population.

I do not think it will happen. Parts of the grid would be brought up quickly.

The number 90% has a very unlikely premise attacked to it.

Lots of people are pretty tough.

My brother and I have played around with this premise extensively.

You pretty much need an all out nuclear war to achieve it, and then we have lots of other problems as well as the power grid and communications.

Food distribution is one of the biggest problems.

But finding a way to kill off a lot of Americans is really quite difficult. Finding a way to keep the power grid down for months, is difficult as well.

I think it very unlikely to happen.

Puerto Rico is a good example of having a *partial* destruction of the grid. They, overall, are doing pretty well.

[Leo Carpathian]

90 % my foot.

[indthkr]

EMP mitigation funding scare - bump for later...

[Tilted Irish Kilt]

Leo Carpathian :" 90 % my foot. "

Hey Leo, read Bill Fortschen's : "One Second After"
with a forward by Newt Gingrich
available at Amazon, your public library, or Kindle
and then get back to me.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

I believe that tax reform should include an individual deduction for hardening personal assets against EMP and full corporate and pass-through expensing for hardening business assets and infrastructure against EMP, including transmission lines, transformers, etc.

[Cvengr]

For a point charge influence upon another point in 3D space the ration would be by the inverted distance squared.

In the case of a single transmission line, say a lossy line receiving the EMP charge from a point charge, the ratio is relative to twice the inverted distance.

Basic field theory.

It gets more significant as the distance approaches the surface. Then half the total charge might be absorbed by the plane beneath it, while the other half might be greatly reflected within the atmosphere.

Next, the field absorption of a space point charge on a distributed mesh network (elec grid).

While many protective relays and fused cutouts could operate in cycles, the concern on the EMP would be to fry the components in less than a cycle.

Original studies by Morse & Feshbach studies in ‘Acoustics’ back in the 50/60s at MIT. Methods of Theoretical Physics

[familyop]

"We really do not know, with precision, what high level EMP strikes would do. What testing I know about, indicated that the destruction would be far from complete."

Extremely high frequencies are weakened within short distances by our atmosphere and extra atmospheric debris (maybe 10-20 miles or so). Those are the frequencies dangerous when moving through atmosphere to electronics with micro-components.

Long waves travel far through atmosphere while retaining plenty of power, though. Immediately after any warning if not before, unplug appliances with microelectronics (most recently built appliances) from the grid and especially from network cables and antennas. That's an effort to protect the appliances from the long wave line spikes.

Appliances directly under or laterally near EMP shots will need to be unplugged, wrapped with insulation material and in conductive cases (aluminum foil if nothing else). Avoid having any gaps in the outer, conductive case. A steel container that closes fairly tightly with overlapping joints should be great, but remember to wrap a non-conductive material around the backup appliance or component to be stored. This paragraph is full of overbuilding.

Most of the damage to electronics will be in large, builtup areas (cities, for example) hit by air bursts. Electronics at high elevations (e.g., over 8,000 feet elev.) a little farther from bursts (maybe around 25 miles or so) will also more likely be damaged (lack of atmosphere and debris).

Of course that won't protect all appliances everywhere, but it will protect most of them. As for power companies, at least some have begun to receive and store extra equipment (transformers, etc.). Others have been too concerned about raising rates to do so. Everyone should write to their power companies to advise the extra purchases despite the rate hikes. Maybe try proposing that rate increases be temporary but adequate for equipment purchases.

The enemy will try to destroy our military forces, military equipment and long airstrips (alternate landing areas for bombers and security aircraft). He'll also try to destroy our recruiting potential (population size).

Because the ugly truth is that war will go on and on after the nuclear exchange.

And again, if we don't have a cohesive NATO and don't build greater offensive and defensive nuclear forces than our enemies, nuclear war is inevitable. The nations that are up against us are expansionist by nature (fascism/communism). They think differently from us.

They exist for the purpose of perpetual expansion and must persist until they have complete control over all of the peoples of the planet. It's the only way that they can continue to control their own people.

[GnuThere]

Cheaper than a Vitamix - take some smelly ground water and grass clippings, voila! A green juice!

[bitt]

“Alas, Babylon”...

[SgtHooper]

Good! Start in DC.

[Tilted Irish Kilt]

Tolerance Sucks Rocks :" I believe that tax reform should include an individual deduction for hardening personal assets against EMP
and full corporate and pass-through expensing for hardening business assets and infrastructure against EMP, including transmission lines, transformers, etc."

Russia has full-underground resources for certain cities
Complete food, housing, medical supplies, water, sanitation and miscellaneous supplies for an entire city population.
My local "Civil Defense " structure has been turned into a municipal paper record storage dump 10 years ago,
as all civil defense materials have expired and been thrown out.
I know ,... because I checked it out.

[lizma2]

Heard this morning we dissolved our EMP commission yesterday. Not sure what’s going on.