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Scientists warn solar flares could disrupt power grid
NASA's depiction of a sun storm
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by Alisa Roth
Space weather scientists meet in Washington, D.C. tomorrow to discuss the potential problems of solar flares, eruptions on the sun's surface that can cause massive disruptions in the electrical power grid.
Solar flares send off little bursts of radiation that travel down to the Earth, and can impact communications systems, GPS systems, satellites, power grids, aviation interests and polar regions, according to Bill Murtagh, who works at the Space Weather Prediction Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
And he says get ready for more: Solar activity comes in cycles, and the next one starts in 2013. "It could be ugly: a storm could disrupt credit card and ATM transactions. Cell phone networks could go." According to Murtagh, the entire power grid could get zapped, which could cause trillions of dollars of damage.
W Kent Tobiska runs a company that does space weather forecasting. He says we can predict sun storms better, but it may not help. "Frankly right now, there is probably not an immediate solution, but certainly a necessity to plan for contingencies in case those kinds of things happen.
Scientists say there have been big sun storms before, but we've never been this dependent on the technology they can disrupt.
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@ stephanie allen: "Who can we send our concerns to? God. Just pray."
you bible thumping robots make me sick. just shut it and keep your retarded opinions to yourselves. an electric outage would cripple the world, but we would over come. it would be like going back a couple hundred years, but we'd be better prepared for it now than we were back then. solar panels and bio technology would enable us to still use electricity till the grids were repaired. at least the strong will survive, hopefully those "praying" for salvation will meet their maker sooner than later and give the rest of us some peace and quiet.
Why can't anyone talk about solar flares and not think of the end of the world. Not having electricity does not mean Armeggendon, and the Mayans have zero to do with anything about the 11-year cyclical nature of the sun. There is potential for disruption, so we should be prepared and not assume because people are talking about the probability of an event that it means they believe in a prophesized event.
What people might want to know is how to prepare for something like this and how it was fortold. Thousands of years ago it was written as to what would take place in the later years. The Earth is in fact growning with labor pains, the prophetic word of the Bible tells us this including a period of spiritual darkness, roaring seas, and heavenly bodies being shaken. These are Biblical Prophecies unfolding in our present time. So far the Bible is 100% accurate when telling man kind what will be expected to come. These are the signs of the times of the end as we know it. So my questions is how do you prepare the people for something no one can stop? This might be something to share with the public as well. However I believe this generation is just like it was in Noahs time. People didn't know there was a flood coming before he and his family got on the boat. Matt 24:37
God Bless you all!
In prayer with love and peace.
Wow. Scary. Even if people thought they could prepare for something as massive as the sun acting up, they're wrong. People can't even keep their own oceans from being destroyed by their own errors in the oil industry. How do they expect to deal with something on a level like this? Maybe we'll all end up without technology for a while. It could do us some good. except everyone would freak out instead of making the best of it. God forbid we go without cell phones for a month. Unless the world is planning on ending, I think we could better ourselves from this.
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