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Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

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311–320 of 418 posts

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#311

Are these type of events problematic for putting nuclear weapons in space or is it just fine and you could never get accidental detonations or even just large amounts of uranium burning up in the atmosphere because military satellites are shielded so well!?

In a word, no. There is no risk of an "accidental detonation" caused by a magnetic storm, and there wouldn't be one even if you put the warhead upstream the bow shock directly in the path of the CME.

On the other hand, if a LEO satellite's electronics get fried, sooner or later it will burn up in the atmosphere since it cannot maneuver anymore, and if it carries a load of weapons-grade uranium it's going to be a somewhat unpleasant event, as you imagine.

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#312
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anyone else was looking for the source of this, it's here: https://emergencyprocedures.pjm.com/ep/pages/dashboard.jsf

That server is down. I hope we didn’t break it by too many requests.

I don't think it's just "us". A lot of people are seeking answers right now

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#313
post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of tired of hearing this. Citing one initiative from 50 years ago is the definition of cherry picking, I'm sorry. The trend is that humans are incapable of long term global initiatives. I'm sure some game theory guy could prove it.

Strong disagree. When there is sufficient political will complex policies can and will be enacted. What is missing in climate action is not some psychological deficiency of our species, it’s lack of strong enough political consensus. ”We can’t do this” is both inaccurate and harmfull. I believe ”We are not currently fixing this” and ”there is a need for stronger political alignment” are the more accurate descriptions…

> it’s lack of strong enough political consensus

But this _is_ the psychological deficiency of our species.

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#314

Google News: You will see the northern lights tonight! HN: CME imminent, We're all gonna die!

Not really. In my experience HN is (and I guess many groups are) surprisingly cognitively biased against considering the risk, mostly the vibe is denialism. However, that seems to be way less true today than it has been in the past. This is great! When I'm seeing people seriously face the idea of preparing, or the consequences and risk, I feel safer because I know that there are going to be a lot of other people who want to take responsibility.

But the denialism makes sense if you don't want "existential angst" or "ontological shock" to inject into your worldview, and just want to get on with the day to day. It entirely makes sense because of how scary it is to consider given the total dependence of almost everybody on the systems that would be wiped out by a global outage.

If you intend to survive such without solely relying on luck you need to take a different approach, tho. That's okay, not everyone needs to have the same mindset, especially in "peace time". And most people will catch up pretty quickly in "war time", although for some the delay will be fatal, unavoidably.

The denialism and minimization is quite endearing (in a totally non patronizing way) such as:

- "usually no ill effects reported even from pretty strong ones"

- "resources are limited. You cannot prepare for all the threats in the world."

- "we can just fix the risk by putting counter satellites at L1 or L2 lagrange points"

Although the mood today is waay more curious and studious. Actually it's a very good response today I think, a lot of people are discussing things seriously and posting articles about the risks of a major storm.

I think 7 X-class flares in a row (space of 48 hours right?) shows just how little we really know or understand, or can scientifically predict (tho others may have better luck using different methods haha! :)) about the sun. :)

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#315
post #230
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anyone else was looking for the source of this, it's here: https://emergencyprocedures.pjm.com/ep/pages/dashboard.jsf

This chart of the real-time K-index is pretty interesting: https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/planetary-k-index#:~:text... . I found this after looking up what "A GMD warning of K7 or greater" means.

Thanks for that link!!! I didn't know there was a dedicated page for the K index :) haha

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#316

Is there any danger of people flying in planes during this time? Will there be any radiation exposure?

I read some time ago that normal routes are fine but if possible people should avoid polar routes. Then again I think airlines nowadays track these exposures and adjust routes.

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#317
post #297
post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, there's usually no ill effects reported even from pretty strong ones, but lights in Stockholm, Sweden (which is itself pretty far south for an aurora in the first place) were reported to flicker earlier this evening. That's pretty remarkable.

Not just Stockholm. They also flickered where I live, some two hours away from Stockholm,

There is a whole Reddit thread about this, many people noticed some flickering at 9PM.

https://old.reddit.com/r/sweden/comments/1cozkpa/blinkade_di...

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#318
post #217
post #11

Implications! - Power systems: Possible widespread voltage control problems and some protective systems will mistakenly trip out key assets from the grid. - Spacecraft operations: May experience surface charging and tracking problems, corrections may be needed for orientation problems. - Other systems: Induced pipeline currents affect preventive measures, HF radio propagation sporadic, satellite navigation degraded f…

Yeah, there's usually no ill effects reported even from pretty strong ones, but lights in Stockholm, Sweden (which is itself pretty far south for an aurora in the first place) were reported to flicker earlier this evening. That's pretty remarkable.

It's funny. Had one halogen lamp flicker around 9pm but even though I knew about the eminent events, my first thoughts were 'power failure or lamp at end of life?'

Re: Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, two more earth-directed CMEs

#320
post #227

"The Threat of a Solar Superstorm Is Growing—And We’re Not Ready" https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-threat-of-a-s... Discussed in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40196820

Humanity is good in sweeping problems under the rug and not preparing to various threats.

Are we not prepared though? Given other posts in this thread it seems to me that the effects are all calculated, expected and accounted for.

I mean if it's strong enough to fry off-grid electronics then it's a different matter entirely, but consumer electronics has some protections against that, right?

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