[News] Will a 'huge space storm' cause devastation this year?

[PokéZoom]

This news is almost 3 years old, but I'm going to make a thread anyway since it is 2013 now.

National power grids could overheat and air travel severely disrupted while electronic items, navigation devices and major satellites could stop working after the Sun reaches its maximum power in a few years.

Senior space agency scientists believe the Earth will be hit with unprecedented levels of magnetic energy from solar flares after the Sun wakes “from a deep slumber” sometime around 2013, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.

In a new warning, Nasa said the super storm would hit like “a bolt of lightning” and could cause catastrophic consequences for the world’s health, emergency services and national security unless precautions are taken.

Scientists believe it could damage everything from emergency services’ systems, hospital equipment, banking systems and air traffic control devices, through to “everyday” items such as home computers, iPods and Sat Navs.

Due to humans’ heavy reliance on electronic devices, which are sensitive to magnetic energy, the storm could leave a multi-billion pound damage bill and “potentially devastating” problems for governments.

Source: The Telegraph

What do you think of this? What will you do if NASA are correct?

Personally, all I have to say is that it's pretty scary...

[Razor Leaf]

Has there been any development on this in the last three years to the point where they feel a genuine warning is necessary? I've not seen any and really if this is meant to be as catastrophic as they say it is, I imagine we'd have been warned by now. So yeppp unless there's been further support in the past three years, I'm not worried at all.

[Blade_of_darkness]

While this sounds like something that's actually plausible, I'm still not worried about it. The way I see it, this article is three years old, plenty of time for these people to prepare for it, & by the time it does come, it won't do much of anything, provided that they've done everything they can to insure that.

& besides, like Razor Leaf said, if this is something that's going to have a huge impact, we'd most likely would have heard about this a long time ago. We didn't, so it's likely that it won't come to demolish us once the time does come by.

[Went]

First of all, the solar cycle goes on for 11 years. In other words, "the Sun reached its maximum power" last time in 2002. I sure remember all those satellites and TV's and phones and all sorts of stuff exploding back then. It was a shame, as we had just barely recovered from the great 1991 solar flare that destructed everything that had survived the 1980 one. If you do the math, by the way, you'll notice that the previous one was in 1969, when a huge technological thing went to space or something with people inside for the first time, and it wasn't damaged at all.

But, being serious, the Telegraph were just being scaremonging morons, to the point I could believe this piece of cr- "news" had come from the Daily Mail instead. Because I can disclose that the Nasa has NOT predicted any sort of catastrophical event nor serious damage to anything, not even mild inconveniencies.

And I did not need secret sources or anything to learn that- I just had to check the Nasa website.

Originally Posted by Nasa

16: Do scientists expect a huge solar storm in 2013?

The sun goes through cycles of high and low activity that repeat approximately every 11 years. Solar minimum refers to the several Earth years when the number of sunspots is lowest; solar maximum occurs in the years when sunspots are most numerous. During solar maximum, activity on the sun and the possibility of space weather effects on our terrestrial environment is higher. The next solar maximum is expected in the 2013-2014 time frame. No current observations or data show any impending catastrophic solar event. In fact, scientists believe the intensity of the upcoming coming solar maximum will be similar to the previous maximum in 2002.

We have never been so well prepared for the onset of the next solar cycle. NASA maintains a fleet of Heliophysics spacecraft to monitor the sun, geospace, and the space environment between the sun and the Earth.

NASA cooperates with other U.S. agencies to enable new knowledge in studying the sun and its processes. To facilitate and enable this cooperation, NASA’s Heliophysics Division makes its vast research data sets and models publicly available online to industry, academia, and other civil and military space weather interests. Also provided are publicly available sites for citizen science and space situational awareness through various cell phone and e-tablet applications.

Here, you can read it as well: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/su...index.html#q15

So don't be afraid, your iPhone is perfectly safe.

[PokéZoom]

Yeah, I hadn't heard anything anything about it since 2010 until I was reminded today.

[Scarf]

Went summed everything up nicely, but it is still true that the sun can potentially interfere with our satellites, harm astronauts, and, if a lot of factors all come together, damage power grids, but that's because of solar flares specifically, not wherever the sun is in its 11 year cycle. It doesn't happen that often.

[Blade_of_darkness]

Originally Posted by Scarf

Went summed everything up nicely, but it is still true that the sun can potentially interfere with our satellites, harm astronauts, and, if a lot of factors all come together, damage power grids, but that's because of solar flares specifically, not wherever the sun is in its 11 year cycle. It doesn't happen that often.

He did indeed, as he provided more than enough proof to give us peace of mind with regards to those solar flares.

[PokéZoom]

Originally Posted by Blade_of_darkness

So, my advice to you, PokeZoom? Check the dates of any news clippings that you're going to use as a source, & make sure that the clipping comes from a news source that is actually reputable. Otherwise, people aren't going to take you seriously.

Actually, I did:

Originally Posted by PokéZoom, first post

This news is almost 3 years old

I originally didn't post it as news cause it's not exactly news anymore - that bit got added by a mod cause I wasn't sure what to prefix it as, seeing as it's not exactly news ... Also, The Telegraph is usually reliable.

[Went]

Originally Posted by Blade_of_darkness

He did indeed, as he provided more than enough proof to give us peace of mind with regards to those solar flares.

So, my advice to you, PokeZoom? Check the dates of any news clippings that you're going to use as a source, & make sure that the clipping comes from a news source that is actually reputable. Otherwise, people aren't going to take you seriously.

/Thread

The worst thing is, the Telegraph IS supposed to be a reputable news source, which makes all this "omgapocalypse!!11!" nonsense that much harder to understand. I'd have understood it if the source had been the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, The Sun or other similar pieces of printed toiler paper, but... the Telegraph? Come on, guys. *shakes head*

Three years ago or now, a paper like the Telegraph should have never published nonsense like this.

[Pave Low]

I am not worried about this at all, nor do I think that such an event will occur. I haven't heard of anymore news surrounding this matter since The Telegraph had issued the warning, so the speculation of it happening must have disambiguated. There would probably be news pages covered in articles of this event if there was a big chance of it happening anyway, since it would wipe out the electronics on Earth.

[Suicune™]

I remember reading about this back then, it's because it's in solar maximum but apparently it's on a century low.

""It's likely to be the lowest solar maximum, as measured by sunspot 'number,' in more than a century,"" So it looks like we've got nothing to worry about according to this article.

[CobaltChrome]

Apparently, we're living in a really dangerous time, because solar flares are getting stronger, Yellowstone super volcano is in the red zone and stuff's getting real

[Blade_of_darkness]

Originally Posted by Went

The worst thing is, the Telegraph IS supposed to be a reputable news source, which makes all this "omgapocalypse!!11!" nonsense that much harder to understand. I'd have understood it if the source had been the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, The Sun or other similar pieces of printed toiler paper, but... the Telegraph? Come on, guys. *shakes head*

Three years ago or now, a paper like the Telegraph should have never published nonsense like this.

My sentiments exactly. Even the people in the bigger news companies are growing more & more paranoid by the day. I'm really not sure why people always believe in this. They all just need to read the cold hard facts from NASA first before jumping to conclusions on a whim.

[Livewire]

A real solar storm could be disastrous to the modern internet-connected world. Good thing is that the 'Solar maximum' as it's called won't create the kind of electromagnetic punch needed to damage the atmosphere like that.

[Landorus]

This solar maximum is predicted to be the weakest one in the past few decades.

We'll be fine.

[François]

Well if this happens before X&Y come out I am going to be so bummed.

[twocows]

I think Betteridge's law of headlines applies here. If there was any real concern, we'd be hearing about it in stories that aren't three years old.

[TRIFORCE89]

Last I was aware, NASA was saying we're in a relatively inactive solar cycle. We're scheduled for some more intense solar storms (had one in 2012 too I think?), but I'm not concerned. I think people just want... something to latch onto. The next doomsday, Y2K, 2012, whatever.

If anything, it's possibly a good motivator to upgrade some of our infrastructure