Solar flare

Solar flare almost destroyed Earth 2 years ago.

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Two years ago the life seems to be fine for everyone who had gone to their work and daily business, however we were unaware that our planet almost plunged into global catastrophe.
NASA had recently revealed that on July 23, 2012, Earth had a near miss with a solar flare, or coronal mass ejection (CME), from the most powerful storm on the sun in over 150 years, but nobody decided to mention it.
Err, what? Well, that’s a sobering bit of news.
“If it had hit, we would still be picking up the pieces,” says Daniel Baker of the University of Colorado.
We managed to just avoid the event through lucky timing as the sun’s aim narrowly turned away from Earth. Had it occurred a week earlier, when it was pointing at us, the result could have been frighteningly different.
“I have come away from our recent studies more convinced than ever that Earth and its inhabitants were incredibly fortunate that the 2012 eruption happened when it did,” says Baker. “If the eruption had occurred only one week earlier, Earth would have been in the line of fire.”
An eruption was captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory in the 304 Angstrom wavelength, which is typically colored in red. (Photo: NASA)
The power of this ejection would have raced across space to knock us back to the Dark Ages. It’s believed a direct CME hit would have the potential to wipe out communication networks, GPS and electrical grids to cause widespread blackout. The article goes on to say it would disable “everything that plugs into a wall socket. Most people wouldn’t even be able to flush their toilet because urban water supplies largely rely on electric pumps.”
Just 10 minutes without electricity, Internet or communication across the globe is a scary thought, and the effects of this event could last years. It would be chaos and disaster on an epic scale.
“According to a study by the National Academy of Sciences, the total economic impact could exceed $2 trillion or 20 times greater than the costs of a Hurricane Katrina. Multi-ton transformers damaged by such a storm might take years to repair.”
So can we breathe a worldwide sigh of relief? Well, not quite. Physicist Pete Riley, who published a paper titled
“On the probability of occurrence of extreme space weather events,” has calculated the odds of a solar storm strong enough to disrupt our lives in the next 10 years is 12 percent.
“Initially, I was quite surprised that the odds were so high, but the statistics appear to be correct,” says Riley. “It is a sobering figure.”

Huge Solar Eruption November 20th.

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On Nov. 20, 2012, at 7:09 a.m. EST, the sun erupted with a coronal mass ejection or CME. Not to be confused with a solar flare, a CME is a solar phenomenon that can send solar particles into space and can reach Earth one to three days later. When Earth-directed, CMEs can affect electronic systems in satellites and on Earth.

 

NASA’s Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) captured this image of a coronal mass ejection on Nov. 20, 2012 at 8:54 a.m. EST, about two hours after it left the sun.

Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), show that the Nov. 20 CME left the sun at speeds of 450 miles per second, which is a slow to average speed for CMEs. CMEs can cause a space weather phenomenon called a geomagnetic storm, which occurs when CMEs successfully connect up with the outside of the Earth’s magnetic envelope, the magnetosphere, for an extended period of time. In the past, CMEs of this speed have not usually caused substantial geomagnetic storms. They have caused auroras near the poles but are unlikely to cause disruptions to electrical systems on Earth or interfere with GPS or satellite-based communications systems.

NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (http://swpc.noaa.gov) is the United States government’s official source for space weather forecasts.

 

On December 11 (tentative), SWPC will introduce two new forecast products titled the 3-Day Forecast and the Forecast Discussion.  These new products will: be available twice a day at 0030 and 1230 UTC; provide space weather information in two separate formats, abbreviated and detailed; and use NOAA Space Weather Scale information.  Examples of these new products are available to familiarize our users at http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/info/3-Day.pdf(the concise, 1-page summary) and http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/info/Discussion.pdf(the in-depth space weather analysis for the technical user).  These two products will supplement the existing product suite and no current products will be discontinued.

Source: http://beforeitsnews.com

Why Nasa Experts Think The September 2012 Solar Storm Could Reduce America to a Developing Country.

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Scientists now believe, the solar flare could change everything for our civilization as we know it today.Predictions are being made to the effect that a major solar storm is set to strike America and some parts of the world on September 21 2012.

NASA has warned that a virulent Solar storm is likely to hit America by September 2012  and the resultant damage could be so catastrophic that America and some of the well known Super power nations could instantly become developing countries. Information relayed down to earth from the Voyager 1 and 2 has now convinced NASA officials and  Scientists that a solar storm leading to the Carrington effect is inevitable and could strike our world in  on 21st September 2012 because as of now, the entire solar system is moving into the  Inter-stellar energy clouds which are so turbulent that they have started exciting/charging the sun and the atmosphere of our planet. As this charging goes on, the sun will become more active with greater energy output into our atmosphere leading to more serious Solar storms resulting into the Carrington effect.

The world was last hit by the most serious solar storm in 1859, an event still remembered as the Carrington event after a British amateur astronomer Richard Carrington who first explained to the world the cause of the event. The 1859 solar storm was an 8 day severe space weather that caused serious damage across the affected parts of the world. Scientists still say, the Carrington event of 1859 was by far the most powerful solar outburst the world has ever seen, this makes the anticipated 2012 solar storm very worrying to the scientists.

The solar storm could change everything for our civilization as we know it today and the following are some of the scientific analysis scientists give to present just how deadly this predicted solar storm really;

The Power Grid system

Because of the Power grid interdependence with systems that support lives, namely, water and sewage treatment, super market delivery infrastructure, power station controls, financial markets, hospital theaters, a severe solar storm would immediately melt and knock out 300 key transformers in US within 90 seconds, cutting off power to more than 130,000,000 people. From this first 90 second of the solar storm, the super-power status of America will have been dealt a terminal blow. This is very interesting because, usually with other forms of natural disasters, the less developed economies are most vulnerable, but with a Carrington event, the highly sophisticated economies based on grid systems will simply face instant collapse leading to thousands of deaths.

Drinking Water

Firstly, there will immediately be no drinking water for millions of people because the pumps will have gone silent. Anybody living in a high rise terrain will not benefit from the water flow through gravity, so water will simply be cut off with the black outs. For the rest on low lying ground, water may still come to the taps for a day or so but the taps would thereafter, go dry. Here in my country, we would rush to the available ponds without compromising our 3rd world status-imagining an American rushing to the Mississippi to draw drinking water for drinking and cooking would definitely make them a developing country.

Powered Transport

The electrically powered  transport systems will immediately grind to a halt-people will find themselves unable to use underground and over ground trains, the super markets will immediately have empty shelves, the ATM machines will no longer spit out money, cellphones will go silent and probably drums and bells will be used to send out communications. The delivery trucks may keep running until their tanks dry out, from that time on, there will be no electricity to pump fuel from the underground tanks at the gas stations.

Health care System

In Hospitals, backup generators would be made to run at certain key areas of the hospitals for about 3 days,  but as soon  as the fuel runs out, CT Scans cease to exist, x-rays become a crisis, surgery becomes a big risk and all in all, the modern health care system as we know it in America and other developed  countries will simply vanish and America will begin to look like some 3rd World.

Death due to lack of drugs

A solar storm would not spare Nuclear stations as well. Most Nuclear stations are programmed to Shut down in the event of grid power irregularities and are not reprogrammed to start running until the power grid problem has been rectified. Remember, September will be nearly the onset of winter, so with no power for heating, cooling systems, many people, especially the elderly will begin to die in droves. Loss  of power at the major pharmaceutical plans would mean, people who are suffering from chronic ailments like diabetes, asthma or HIV would all perish because the pharmaceuticals are not able to produces the life saving drugs.

Source: http://scienceray.com