Is a 'Katrina-Like' Space Storm Brewing? 356
pilsner.urquell writes "A newly released NASA report warns that the world has forgotten the power of the sun, creating a technological society susceptible like never before to large infrastructure damage from solar storms.
According to the report, the world has grown so dependent on modern technologies without respect of what the sun can and has done, that it's risking major communications, finance, transportation, government and even emergency services disruptions."
I know the solution (Score:5, Funny)
Endangered Species Act... (Score:2)
Make the check out to me.
Manbearpig has a different idea [youtube.com].
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I know the solution (Score:5, Interesting)
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I've lived rough -- no electric, no running water, if I wanted heat I had to chop wood, if I wanted dinner I had to hie myself to the river and catch it. The problem is that now we have too many people for the land to support in that way. I'd be fine, but what the majority would do ... probably riot.
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An AC remarks, "Why =wouldn't= you want heat and dinner?"
Well, I suppose if I'd previously frozen or starved, I'd have no further interest in either subject ;)
Re:I know the solution (Score:5, Funny)
WRT to item C on your list: birth control pills. It would be a completely different world without that medical wonder. Suddenly having hundreds of millions more fertile women in this world would cause lots o' problems.
Re:I know the solution (Score:4, Insightful)
WRT to item C on your list: birth control pills. It would be a completely different world without that medical wonder. Suddenly having hundreds of millions more fertile women in this world would cause lots o' problems.
Hardly. The vast, vast majority of women on this planet (measured in billions) do not use any form of birth control. A few percentage points' worth more would make zero difference.
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How many people here truly think that if there were an anomaly that they would be able to survive...
I live in the woods anyway, huge garden, plenty of animals to slaughter for tasty bbq and we have a very high water-table with multiple ponds around. Not the cleanest but I'd figure out a way to survive.
Oh, please don't turn this into a zombie apocalypse survivalist fantasy! Yes, yes, your supply of canned goods and guns are going to ensure your survival, while all of us are going to die miserably. Whatever helps you sleep at night!
finance (Score:5, Funny)
who needs the sun for that?
Re:finance (Score:4, Interesting)
Too much optimization (Score:2)
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Can you think of any intersections between A) groups who might be in a position to guide modern society that way, B) groups who might want society to end up that way, and C) groups who are positioning themselves to thrive in the aftermath?
If you were given the opportunity to shape society to prevent such a thing, how would you live? How would you govern yourself if you were trying to systematically disenfranchise people
Another fine mess... (Score:2, Insightful)
We're all going to DIIIIIIIIEEEEEE!
Re:Another fine mess... (Score:5, Funny)
Rather dramatic (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Rather dramatic (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Rather dramatic (Score:5, Informative)
It wouldn't. The damage isn't from the particle cloud itself, it's from the ripples it sets up in the Earth's magnetosphere. This makes the magnetic field move relative to any conductors (like power lines and circuit traces) in it. That causes an electric current to be induced in the conductor. The atmosphere doesn't affect the magnetic field at all, so it won't provide any protection from the disturbance.
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Sure but the power station would never make back even a tiny fraction of it's construction costs.
It's like building a power plant to harvest the power of lightening strikes.
Re:Rather dramatic (Score:5, Interesting)
Lessen? Yes. Could it still be catastrophic? Yes.
First, every satellite would be "down". That means no GPS. No communication satellites. No weather satellites.
Second, a violent storm can overload the power grid. Which means days without electricity - assuming important components aren't overloaded and destroyed.
Third, cell phones, radios and other wireless devices could go down. Your home network will probably be fine. But forget using your 3G phone for anything. Your cordless phone will probably be OK to call emergency services but they won't be able to get them on the radio to tell them where to go.
So, as long as you don't depend on modern technology, you should be fine.
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Third, cell phones, radios and other wireless devices could go down. Your home network will probably be fine. But forget using your 3G phone for anything. Your cordless phone will probably be OK to call emergency services but they won't be able to get them on the radio to tell them where to go.
No, landline phones have really long wires, so they'd have the same problems as the power grid. Wireless would probably actually be OK until the batteries ran down, I think modern schemes are fairly noise resistant.
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Re:Rather dramatic (Score:4, Insightful)
Third, cell phones, radios and other wireless devices could go down. Your home network will probably be fine. But forget using your 3G phone for anything. Your cordless phone will probably be OK to call emergency services but they won't be able to get them on the radio to tell them where to go.
It won't affect terrestrial radio, only satellite communications. If you can call 911 then they have power, if they have power their radios will work. Cell phones won't work well if at all, you'll likely not have any long distance phone service at all.
It won't bring us back to the stone age, only back to about 1960. It will be an inconvinience, not the end of the world.
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Re:Rather dramatic (Score:5, Interesting)
Think the report is kidding around? Go lookup what happened in Quebec on March 13th, 1989. The whole power system was knocked out in seconds. Then go read about the kind of storm they're worried about - the solar storm of 1859.
It actually caused telegraph wires to short out across Europe and the Americas - some even caught on fire. If that happened now, it would cause global power outages, fried computer equipment (including the ones that control your fancy electronic car), and everything except for milsats in orbit could be knocked out.
So will people be directly killed? No. But when the fly-by-wire planes fall out of the sky, your new car won't work, your cell phones are dead, power is dead, the internet is down, and landlines fried - I bet it won't take long for a lot of people to die anyway.
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your cell phones are dead, power is dead, the internet is down, and landlines fried - I bet it won't take long for a lot of people to die anyway.
The survivors will envy the dead.
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Modern power lines aren't protected at all. They are naked steel cables. Of course that also means that they are unlikely to be damaged unless actually heated red-hot, but the transformers ? Each and every one of them will get the equivalent of a lightning strike simultaneously.
Oh, and of course a solar storm might continue for a while, making the magnetic field go back and forth, so make that multiple li
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Modern power lines aren't protected at all. They are naked steel cables. Of course that also means that they are unlikely to be damaged unless actually heated red-hot, but the transformers ? Each and every one of them will get the equivalent of a lightning strike simultaneously.
Transformers and substations have a considerable number of lightning and overvoltage countermeasures. Circuit breakers, arc chutes, etc. Maybe all transformers on the planet will go boom anyway, but there is significant protection available now to the electricity infrastructure against a once in a millenia solar storm.
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your new car won't work
Makes me glad I have an old and almost gratuitously non-electronic car. I might switch back to the diesel version I had before - I've driven that with no working electrics of any kind. Probably not a great idea, not having brake lights, but needs must.
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It actually caused telegraph wires to short out across Europe and the Americas - some even caught on fire. If that happened now, it would cause global power outages, fried computer equipment (including the ones that control your fancy electronic car), and everything except for milsats in orbit could be knocked out.
Power outages, yes.
Fried computers, only if they're plugged in. And even that's questionable, since I'm pretty sure there are surge protectors now that are good enough to protect things from lightning strikes on the power lines.
Things in orbit, might actually include military stuff (unless they use vacuum tubes or something). The problem here isn't the magnetic fields, it's the charged particles. A transistor can only take so many hits from charged particles before it breaks (depends on how big it is),so th
Re:Rather dramatic (Score:4, Informative)
Please check the NOAA solar storm warning levels. They explain how far back to the stone age we will go when a big (X level solar flare) is going to hit the Earth.
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/NOAAscales/index.html#GeomagneticStorms [noaa.gov]
On the communications. It is not just satellite communications that will get disrupted. But also HF, UHF and other type of communication. Your GSM (2G or 3G really doesn't matter) might work, but then it might not work. It is any body's guess.
People might be out of power for days or weeks in the worst case.
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since I'm pretty sure there are surge protectors now that are good enough to protect things from lightning strikes on the power lines.
any company that claims this is bold face lying.
NOTHING can protect your computer from a direct lightning strike.
Hell your computer is dead if it's unplugged and sitting on the floor if a big strike nails the ground 200 feet away the EM pulse will pop most of the circuitry. I ahve seen laptops with burned traces on the motherboard that sat on a couch and the lightning struck
Re:Rather dramatic (Score:4, Informative)
Once a surge protector trips, its off until its manually reset.
Not necessarily. Many simple surge protectors just use a couple of varistors and gas discharge tubes connected between the wires. These devices have a variable resistance that is extremely high during normal operation but decreases sharply above a certain threshold voltage, and thus provide a short-circuit path for excess current to take. After the voltage returns to the rated level, the resistance again becomes extremely high, cutting off the short-circuit.
You are probably confusing surge protectors with circuit breakers. The latter are far too slow to protect sensitive electronics from damage from a voltage surge.
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I bet it won't take long for a lot of people to die anyway.
I suppose you replaced "everyone" with "a lot of people" to take into account vampires.
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Inductance is proportional to the length of the wire in the magnetic field.
Telegraph wires had problems in the 1800's because those big long wires can produce some impressive voltage surges. Mod
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Really? We're about to implement a system where we put more people than ever in the air, thanks to GPS systems and shorter distances between aircraft. When the grid and GPS go down at once, I'm sure they'll all get down safely.
As for the rest - you been to Vegas lately? Millions of people just waiting for a power outage or a water shortage to wipe them off the map. We've been stuffing millions of people into tiny areas across the globe over the past century, that are not friendly to human habitation - let a
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Only thing to do (Score:5, Funny)
I guess there's only one thing to do - Destroy the sun!
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Hmm, I wonder how that could be done..... I mean shooting nukes at the sun is like tossing matches into an erupting volcano, so we will require something new. Oh where is the Sun Crusher when you need one?
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Now, where to find the blanket??
Maybe one of these Giant Space Blankets [wikipedia.org]
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For more giant space blanets exhibit A:
Giant Space Blankets [wikipedia.org]
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You've got it backwards, but your heart was in the right place. Due to the fact that the sun is MUCH larger than this 12,000km shield, the shadow will actually get smaller as it gets closer to the sun.
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Sorry, dude, you're almost 30 years too late.
When I was WUSTL.edu in 1981, the no-nukes movement was in full swing. Their slogan was "Any Amount of Radiation is Dangerous".
So a bunch of friends and I started a movement called "Stamp Out The Sun", to point out how silly that slogan was.
And now for something completely different (Score:5, Funny)
A study funded by NASA has flagged up yet another terrible hazard for those no longer able to get excited about nuclear war, global pandemics, terrorism, climate change, economic meltdown and asteroid strike.
I for one welcome our weekly disaster overlords.
confirmed (Score:3, Funny)
Cold War & EMP (Score:3, Interesting)
It seems that with the end of the cold war, and the fact that an EMP can occur naturally, has been forgotten.
Greg P
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It's sufficient to just call it an electromagnetic pulse. But, to be pedantic, your choices for terms are "electromagnetic field" and "electromotive force"; the term "EMF" generally refers to the latter.
There's no Canada like French Canada (Score:5, Informative)
Quebec [solarstorms.org] knows what they're talking about.
Re:There's no Canada like French Canada (Score:5, Funny)
Dude, I live in Québec and I've never had any such prob{#`AX%$G{%5&`+'2h${`%&NO CARRIER
the term "katrina-like" makes me angry... (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:the term "katrina-like" makes me angry... (Score:4, Insightful)
For the most part, there was no way to save most of the victims of the tsunami.
Many of the victims of Katrina could well have been saved had their been ample planning and communication in regards to a disaster that they knew was coming sometime.
Most of the deaths of Katrina were caused by failure to plan, failure to listen, or failure to implement disaster plans.
I can see where the author is coming from.
Re:the term "katrina-like" makes me angry... (Score:5, Funny)
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Why is the term inapropriate here? Just like Katrina, the authors are describing a serious, but forseeable weather event, that could be almost completely mitigated with better planning.
Plus Katrina was one of the bigger hurricanes you could expect to see, while the event they describe is one of the bigger CME's you could expect to see... seems like a good analogy all around (except one effects a small area and dunks a small city, and the other the entire world and will destroy civilization as we know it).
Re:the term "katrina-like" makes me angry... (Score:5, Funny)
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It says nothing about he relative energy.
As it turns out, I am prepared for my bathtub swirl.
Bread (Score:3, Interesting)
Given that (a) the average journey for food items from production to plate is supposedly over 1000 miles in my country, (b) I live in area with few farms, and (c) Space Katrina is going to knock out transportation and probably the electical grid (I have an electric stove and oven), I have to wonder: Can the smoker I got for Christmas be used to bake bread? And what other essentials should I stock up on?
Re:Bread (Score:5, Funny)
I think the standard protocol for these sorts of things is to sell everything you own, stockpile as many guns as possible, and move into a cabin somewhere deep in the mountains. Disconnect from all power sources, and discontinue use of any electronic devices. Grow or hunt all your own food, and try to avoid contact with the outside world as much as possible. Also, if you could learn to enjoy drinking your own urine, that would be a big help.
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Drinking your own urine doesn't actually help you all that much. Since the saline concentration of your pee matches pretty well what's already in your blood, all you're doing is retaining the same salt that your body is trying to get rid of.
Recently, urine drinkage was disadvised by survival experts.
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Yes, it can. [about.com]
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Can the smoker I got for Christmas be used to bake bread?
Well, yes it can. You can bake bread in just about anything that you can keep sufficiently hot for sufficiently long. But I'm curious why you believe flour would be more easily obtainable than other foodstuffs? I know that in my area, there are a few farms that I believe have wheat in their crop rotation. I have no idea where the closest mill is, but any non-electrical mills are likely to be historical sites that are probably non-functional.
And then there's the big question: between you and all of your
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I live in Florida. We've had several storms hit us that would knock out power for people for months at a time. I lived in Fort Lauderdale a couple years back and we had a category 3 take out all but 1 traffic light in the entire county.
I'd say the state is probably one of the better prepared one for disasters. When the cat 3 took out Fort Lauderdale, the local Publix was open the next day selling groceries.
For myself, I very much make sure to keep around enough food and water for myself for at least a week.
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They did it for east berlin, they'll do it for us.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Please....stop! You're making my sides hurt!
The "Katrina-like" reference in the summary wasn't to the size of the storm, but rather to the effectiveness of government assistance afterward. If anything is to be learned from Katrina (other than don't build below-sealevel cities on the sea shore) it is no matter what the gov't tells you, you need to be prepared to take care of yourself and possibly some neighbors for at least a couple
Mr. Faraday reporting (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Mr. Faraday reporting (Score:5, Funny)
Hey you, how did you get out?! Get back in your cage!!!
Parrots a Sci American article a couple years ago? (Score:2)
If I remember they said there was a storm in the mid-19th century that interfered with _telegraph_ traffic. Which is to say, think about what it would do to microprocessors.
Re:Parrots a Sci American article a couple years a (Score:2)
Because home computers create a lot of EMI, they're enclosed in metal boxes. Those same metal boxes help protect them from EMP strikes. The vulnerable components are those connected to the world outside the box: keyboard ports, monitor ports, printer ports, external USB, firewire, SCSI, modem, etc.. The parts likely to blow are those interface components, not the microprocessor, which is protected for a variety of reasons including its price. However, if the interface parts are gone, the computer is useless
Katrina (Score:3, Funny)
Man, New Orleans can't catch a freaking break!
Arthur C Clarke anyone? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Are they safe from solar storms? Yes. If a solar storm strong enough to fry your CDs hits, your main concerns will be finding oxygen to breathe, keeping your DNA in one piece, and should you tell your doctor about the annoying way you glow in the dark.
Note, however, that CDs naturally degrade over a period of from 3-20 years depending on the brand. So there's a good chance they won't survive until the next solar maximum anyway. But don't blame the sun.
I hope it happens. (Score:3, Insightful)
Private and semi-private energy companies, like all lnstitutions promoted by competition to cut costs, suffer the malady of products and infrastructure "built by the lowest bidder".
Because of the nature of pure capitalism and even mixed economies, it is against the interests of any individual actor to create a more robust electronic infrastructure.
This is a role for the dreaded "R" word..ok i'll say it.. RRRegulation.
This is why i hope a solar storm like the one this article fear-mongers about happens.
When it does, various electronic infrastructure companies (power, telecom, etc) will happily welcome a law which sets a minimum level of EMP hardening and other standards.
It's important to note that, despite raising their costs a bit, it won't matter to them so long as their competition suffers the same way.
The cost will likely be passed on to the consumer, but "main street" will also be happy to pay an extra 3 bucks on a few bills knowing region-wide blackouts of power, phone, and internet will no longer be common, especially with a catastrophic failure fresh in their minds.
Kanye West says: (Score:4, Funny)
"George Bush doesn't care about BlackBerries."
Re:Kanye West says: (Score:4, Insightful)
Kanye West was wrong. George Bush cares about Oprah Winfrey, Bill Cosby, Condoleesa Rice, Barack Obama, and their ilk. It's poor people George Bush don't like, and their skin color is unimportant.
Racism is a tool of the rich, meant to take your eye of the real problem, classism, and meant to keep poor and middle class whites and blacks at each others' throats so they won't see the REAL enemy, the rich bastards who are keeping the poor and middle class of all races down.
Bernie Madoff stole fifty billion dollars and got out on ten million bail, if I get caught stealing fifty thousand dollars will I get out on ten dollars bail? And why am I the only one asking that question?
My bogus hypothesis (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:My bogus hypothesis (Score:5, Interesting)
Communication? (Score:2)
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> Most of the long distance shit uses fiberoptics...
Aren't the repeaters powered by wire run in the cable? If so, and if the runs are long enough, the magnetic storms will zap them.
> ...and a lot of the short distance stuff is underground...
Makes no difference. The problem is currents induced in long cables when the Earth's magnetic field wiggles around as it interacts with solar storms.
Answer the summary (Score:3, Insightful)
In answer to the ridiculous summary:
No, a "Katrina-like" space storm is not brewing, because for a storm to remotely resemble an Atlantic Hurricane, it would need to occur inside of a frikkin' atmosphere.
Bad journalism should be painful to the perpetrator.
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I know. I just get angry at politically-charged metaphors being used in the wrong place.
There have been plenty of destructive weather events and Katrina is the most famous recent one. But Katrina has all kinds of extra political baggage.
Is this space storm going to be inadequately recovered from? Is it going to signal the downfall of a corrupt administration? Will it disproportionately affect poor minorities?
It's pretty lazy writing to go for the closest shocking phrase available and it distracts from t
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Never under estimate the power of a gun (Score:3, Funny)
That's why I keep a loaded AK by my home servers and my passport is right beside my 45.
I can imagine the uproar... (Score:3, Funny)
Is a 'Katrina-Like' Space Storm Brewing? (Score:3)
I know, I know...troll / flaimbait but not funny. *sigh*
Destroy the sun (Score:4, Insightful)
We must destroy the sun immediately to avoid these disasters (it will also correct global warming).
The Amish manage to live without electricity, perhaps we should learn how to live without it ourselves for a few weeks. That skill might come in useful in the future.
Hurricane Katrina/Ike (Score:4, Informative)
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Screw cyberpunk, we're switching to steampunk!
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You could always go Amish.
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With any luck a major space storm will wipe out any and all technology on earth. Maybe this would be the kick in the pants our species needs.
Well, aren't you just a ray of sunshine on this cloudy Monday topic...
Better hope you're not wearing your bluetooth-enabled, wifi-hooked, Pacemaker-3000 by the time your epiphany rings true...
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On holiday (Score:2)
Unfortunately Kodos and Kang were unavailable for comment.
Re:Just a thought (Score:5, Insightful)
Right. If people had lower taxes, the first thing they'd think of to spend the money on would be EMP-resistant electronics.
They would forgo extra vacations, faster cars, Jacuzzis, expensive Champagne and plastic surgery, so that they could upgrade to a rad-hardened TV set. They would show off their Faraday-enclosed gear at parties to impress their friends.
I'm 100% confident that's what everyone would do, and solar storms would be no longer be a risk to anyone.