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A Possible Solar Storm in 2012?


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#31 Luna

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Posted 03 August 2010 - 02:37 AM

I wonder what's the point of this kind of a title;

"Powerful Solar Storm Could Shut Down U.S. for Months"
http://www.foxnews.c...,478024,00.html

Could shut down.. U.S.? What about the rest of the world? Does it not exist O_o silly people.

#32 bobdrake12

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Posted 04 August 2010 - 12:47 AM

http://www.foxnews.c...als-sun-waking/

Solar Tsunami to Strike Earth (excerpt)

Published August 03, 2010
| FoxNews.com


Earth is bracing for a cosmic tsunami Tuesday night as tons of plasma from a massive solar flare head directly toward the planet.

The Sun's surface erupted early Sunday morning, shooting a wall of ionized atoms directly at Earth, scientists say. It is expected to create a geomagnetic storm and a spectacular light show -- and it could pose a threat to satellites in orbit, as well.

"This eruption is directed right at us and is expected to get here early in the day on Aug. 4," said Leon Golub of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. "It's the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time."

The solar eruption, called a coronal mass ejection, was spotted by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, which captures high-definition views of the sun at a variety of wavelengths. SDO was launched in February and peers deep into the layers of the sun, investigating the mysteries of its inner workings.

"We got a beautiful view of this eruption," Golub said. "And there might be more beautiful views to come if it triggers aurorae."



#33 Luna

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Posted 04 August 2010 - 02:14 AM

doesn't sound like anyone is worried...

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#34 Soma

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Posted 04 August 2010 - 08:41 PM

I wonder what's the point of this kind of a title;

"Powerful Solar Storm Could Shut Down U.S. for Months"
http://www.foxnews.c...,478024,00.html

Could shut down.. U.S.? What about the rest of the world? Does it not exist O_o silly people.


Run like hell from Fox news.

#35 niner

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Posted 04 August 2010 - 08:56 PM

The electric power industry employs engineers whose job it is to deal with stuff like this. Does anyone think they didn't get the memo about the expected increase in solar activity? And then there's this place called "The Pentagon", where high level staffers of an entity known as "the military" work. You know, the guys who spend trillions of dollars keeping us "safe". They have been known to engage in "contingency planning". Is the end of life as we know it from a very predictable occurrence the sort of contingency they might plan for? With all the brouhaha over EMP weapons and hardened electronics, wouldn't one think that maybe they had thought about this sort of thing, and maybe have a bit of shielding around critical electronics in, say, vehicles? Excuse my "sarcasm" and overuse of "quotes", but this thing is getting way too hyped by scaremongers.
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#36 PWAIN

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Posted 05 August 2010 - 01:01 AM

The electric power industry employs engineers whose job it is to deal with stuff like this. Does anyone think they didn't get the memo about the expected increase in solar activity? And then there's this place called "The Pentagon", where high level staffers of an entity known as "the military" work. You know, the guys who spend trillions of dollars keeping us "safe". They have been known to engage in "contingency planning". Is the end of life as we know it from a very predictable occurrence the sort of contingency they might plan for? With all the brouhaha over EMP weapons and hardened electronics, wouldn't one think that maybe they had thought about this sort of thing, and maybe have a bit of shielding around critical electronics in, say, vehicles? Excuse my "sarcasm" and overuse of "quotes", but this thing is getting way too hyped by scaremongers.


Break open any home electrical appliance and show me the proper shielding to protect against EMP or EMR. It is not there because it would add to the cost and no one wants to pay a premium. It is also very difficult to do on most equipment thanks to incoming leads.

It is truly naive on a massive scale to say "Oh, I'm not worried, our government will protect us" NO THEY WON'T!!! Name me the initiatives that the government has launched to protect against such an event? Governments strategy is to say "OOPS, ok well we quit now" because they know that it is a very hard problem and they don't want to have to deal with it.

There is no guarantee as to when it might happen so those in charge just hope that it is not during their term. If it happens in 30 years time, what will they care? It is not like government has never screwed up, it is just that the consequences have never been quite so serious. GFC anyone????

#37 niner

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Posted 05 August 2010 - 05:00 AM

Break open any home electrical appliance and show me the proper shielding to protect against EMP or EMR. It is not there because it would add to the cost and no one wants to pay a premium. It is also very difficult to do on most equipment thanks to incoming leads.

It is truly naive on a massive scale to say "Oh, I'm not worried, our government will protect us" NO THEY WON'T!!! Name me the initiatives that the government has launched to protect against such an event? Governments strategy is to say "OOPS, ok well we quit now" because they know that it is a very hard problem and they don't want to have to deal with it.

There is no guarantee as to when it might happen so those in charge just hope that it is not during their term. If it happens in 30 years time, what will they care? It is not like government has never screwed up, it is just that the consequences have never been quite so serious. GFC anyone????

Actually, because of the rapid rise of the initial pulse, EMP is a much tougher problem than geomagnetically induced currents, about which Wikipedia contains these snippets:

On 13 March 1989, a severe geomagnetic storm caused the collapse of the Hydro-Québec power grid in a matter of seconds as equipment protection relays tripped in a cascading sequence of events.[4] Six million people were left without power for nine hours, with significant economic loss. Since 1989, power companies in North America, the UK, Northern Europe, and elsewhere have invested in evaluating the GIC risk and in developing mitigation strategies.

Grid management is also aided by space weather forecasts of major geomagnetic storms. This allows for mitigation strategies to be implemented. Solar observations provide a one- to three-day warning of an Earthbound coronal mass ejection (CME), depending on CME speed. Following this, detection of the solar wind shock that precedes the CME in the solar wind, by spacecraft at the L1 Lagrangian point, gives a definite 20 to 60 minutes warning of a geomagnetic storm (again depending on local solar wind speed). The magnitude and arrival time of a CME after detection is unknown, although there is much research and model development within the space weather community.

This is a well-understood problem, a lot of people are already on top of it, and we have both long term and short term advance warning which will allow a wide range of mitigation methods to be employed. I'm not claiming that there won't be any disruption or cost, but I think it's ludicrous to believe that we will be returned to the stone age or will see a hundred trillion dollars worth of damage. If I'm not mistaken here, the main danger from space weather involves the induction of currents in very large networks of conductors, like electrical and pipeline grids. I don't think this will impact small electronic circuits such as computers, ipods, or cell phones. It is materially different from the EMP due to a high altitude nuclear detonation.

#38 Ghostrider

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Posted 09 August 2010 - 09:09 AM

I dunno about you guys, but there's a website which says that the world ends EXACTLY 30 years after the day I was born. Will the world end on my 30th birthday? I sure hope not! That would be worst birthday present ever.


http://www.december212012.com/

#39 bobdrake12

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Posted 21 August 2010 - 05:55 PM

The video below sheds some light on solar flares.

2012 Doomsday #1 - Solar Flares

Kicking off the 2012 series, here I examine what some doomsayers think about a solar flare apocalypse in 2012, then I examine what solar flares actually are and what science to date has revealed about them.




#40 PWAIN

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Posted 26 August 2010 - 02:31 AM

http://www.news.com....0-1225909999465

#41 Luna

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Posted 26 August 2010 - 05:36 PM

Can't we have a satellite with some magnetic shielding between us and the sun to reflect it back? or at least deflect it?

#42 PWAIN

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Posted 27 August 2010 - 12:32 AM

Can't we have a satellite with some magnetic shielding between us and the sun to reflect it back? or at least deflect it?


It would be too small and even if it could absorb or deflect the energy, it would get fried. They are talking about energy equivalent to dozens of nuclear explosions which could never be absorbed/deflected by any kind of satellite.

We do have a satellite out there which is used to send us a signal that we are about to get hit so that we can switch things off - things like satellites and power transformers. This satellite is well past it's use by date and not expected to be replaced any time soon. If it goes on the blink, then we are left completely blind.

It may not happen but I think it would be nice if we had at least a backup satellite out there and had better designed our protection/recovery systems. How long can you live without power - bear in mind it won't just be your home by everyday things like traffic lights, food processors, safety equipment, imminst etc.

#43 Luna

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Posted 03 September 2010 - 02:38 AM

http://www.nasa.gov/...tures/2012.html

scroll down to the end:

Q: Is there a danger from giant solar storms predicted for 2012?
A: Solar activity has a regular cycle, with peaks approximately every 11 years. Near these activity peaks, solar flares can cause some interruption of satellite communications, although engineers are learning how to build electronics that are protected against most solar storms. But there is no special risk associated with 2012. The next solar maximum will occur in the 2012-2014 time frame and is predicted to be an average solar cycle, no different than previous cycles throughout history.


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#44 bobdrake12

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Posted 05 September 2010 - 10:29 PM

Can't we have a satellite with some magnetic shielding between us and the sun to reflect it back? or at least deflect it?


Without going into specifics, there are ways to accomplish this goal, Luna. See excerpt of the article below or click on the link for more details:

http://en.wikipedia....ation_hardening

Radiation hardening is a method of designing and testing electronic components and systems to make them resistant to damage or malfunctions caused by ionizing radiation (particle radiation and high-energy electromagnetic radiation)[1], such as would be encountered in outer space, high-altitude flight, around nuclear reactors, or during nuclear accidents or nuclear warfare.

Most radiation-hardened chips are based on their commercial equivalents, with some manufacturing and design variations that reduce the susceptibility to interference from electromagnetic radiation. Due to the extensive development and testing required to produce a radiation-tolerant design of a microelectronic chip, radiation-hardened chips tend to lag behind the cutting-edge of developments.


Edited by bobdrake12, 05 September 2010 - 10:30 PM.





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