Massive Solar Flare To Paralyze Earth In 2013

By on September 23, 2010 in News 12

So was Lawrence Joseph right when he warned of a potentially catastrophic solar flare in the disinformation film 2012: Science or Superstition? This story from the Daily Mail lends his theory some credence, albeit a year later than he predicted:

A massive solar flare could cause global chaos in 2013, causing blackouts and wrecking satellite communications, a conference heard yesterday.

On August 1st, almost the entire Earth-facing side of the sun erupted in a tumult of activity. There was a C3-class solar flare, a solar tsunami, multiple filaments of magnetism lifting off the stellar surface, large-scale shaking of the solar corona, radio bursts, a coronal mass ejection and more. These images taken by the STEREO Ahead satellite from 3:47 to 15:47 UT on August 2nd show the movement of the CME cloud, on the right of the disc, as it expands toward Earth. Credit: NASA/STEREO

On August 1, 2010, almost the entire Earth-facing side of the sun erupted in a tumult of activity. There was a C3-class solar flare, a solar tsunami, multiple filaments of magnetism lifting off the stellar surface, large-scale shaking of the solar corona, radio bursts, a coronal mass ejection and more. These images taken by the STEREO Ahead satellite from 3:47 to 15:47 UT on August 2nd show the movement of the CME cloud, on the right of the disc, as it expands toward Earth. Credit: NASA/STEREO

Nasa has warned that a peak in the sun’s magnetic energy cycle and the number of sun spots or flares around 2013 could generate huge radiation levels.

The resulting solar storm could cause a geomagnetic storm on Earth, knocking out electricity grids around the world for hours, days, or even months, bringing much of normal life grinding to a halt.

Defence Secretary Liam Fox, who delivered the keynote address at an international conference on the vulnerability of electricity grids around the world, warned that modern societies’ dependence on technology leaves them vulnerable to such events.

The Sun follows an 11-year cycle of high and low periods of solar activity. It is now leaving a notably quiet phase and scientists expect to see a sharp increase in the number of solar flares as well as unprecedented levels of magnetic energy.

The rings of fire, which have the power of 100 hydrogen bombs, could cause twenty times more economic damage than Hurricane Katrina.

Experts met in Washington DC in June to discuss how to protect Earth from the ferocious flares, which are expected sometime around 2013…

[continues in the Daily Mail]

, , , , , , ,

  • Andrew

    Maybe we’ll have some nice aurorae.

    • justagirl

      optimism at its finest.

  • Andrew

    Maybe we’ll have some nice aurorae.

  • justagirl

    optimism at its finest.

  • Haystack

    The world must unite to confront this deadly threat to my Internet access.

  • Haystack

    The world must unite to confront this deadly threat to my Internet access.

  • A Bad Joke

    Funny, considering solar activity is unpredictable even in the best conditions. In reality? It could strike tomorrow, or next week, or in decades.

    • Vox Penii

      >A massive solar flare could cause global chaos in 2013, causing blackouts and wrecking satellite communications, a conference heard yesterday.

      Judas Priest, I get tired of linking to this speech … but as long as people keep speculating I’ll do my best to do my duty.

      Michael Crichton, “Why Speculate?” a speech to the International Leadership Forum, La Jolla, California
      April 26, 2002

      Abstract: In recent years, media has increasingly turned away from reporting what has happened to focus on speculation about what may happen in the future. Paying attention to modern media is thus a waste of time.

      …

      My topic for today is the prevalence of speculation in media. What does it
      mean? Why has it become so ubiquitous? Should we do something about it?
      If so, what should we do? And why? Should we care at all? Isn’t speculation
      valuable? Isn’t it natural?

      I will join this speculative bandwagon and speculate about why there is so
      much speculation. In keeping with the trend, I will try express my views
      without any factual support, simply providing you with a series of bald
      assertions.

      This is not my natural style, and it’s going to be a challenge for me, but I will
      do my best. I have written out my talk which is already a contradiction of
      principle. To keep within the spirit of our time, it should really be off the top
      of my head.

      Before we begin, I’d like to clarify a definition. By media I mean movies
      television internet books newspapers and magazines. That’s a broad
      definition but in keeping with the general trend of speculation, let’s not make
      too many fine distinctions.

      First we might begin by asking, to what degree has the media turned to pure
      speculation? Someone could do a study of this and present facts, but nobody
      has. I certainly won’t. There’s no reason to bother.

      Today, everybody knows that “Hardball,” “The O’Relly Factor,” and similar
      shows are nothing but a steady stream of guesses about the future. The
      Sunday morning talk shows are pure speculation. They have to be. Everybody knows there’s no news on Sunday.

      But speculation is every bit as rampant in the so-called serious media, such
      as newspapers. For example, consider the New York Times for March 6,
      2002, the day I was asked to give this talk. The column one story that day
      concerns George Bush’s tariffs on imported steel. We read:

      Mr. Bush’s action “is likely to send the price of steel up sharply, perhaps as
      much as ten percent..” American consumers “will ultimately bear” higher
      prices. America’s allies “would almost certainly challenge” the decision. Their
      legal case “could take years to litigate in Geneva, is likely to hinge” on thus
      and such.

      In addition, there is a further vague and overarching speculation. The Allies’
      challenge would be “setting the stage for a major trade fight with many of
      the same countries Mr. Bush is trying to hold together in the fractious
      coalition against terrorism.” In other words, the story speculates that tariffs
      may rebound against the fight against terrorism.

      You may read this story and think, what’s the big deal? Isn’t it reasonable to
      talk about effects of current events in this way? I answer, absolutely not.
      Such speculation is a complete waste of time. It’s useless. It’s bullshit on the
      front page of the Times.

      The reason why it is useless, of course, is that nobody knows what the future
      holds.

      Do we all agree that nobody knows what the future holds? Or do I have to
      prove it to you? I ask this because there are some well-studied media effects
      which suggest that a simple appearance in media provides credibility. There
      was a well-known series of excellent studies by Stanford researchers that
      have shown, for example, that children take media literally. If you show
      them a bag of popcorn on a television set and ask them what will happen if
      you turn the TV upside down, the children say the popcorn will fall out of the
      bag. This effect would be amusing if it were confined to children. The studies
      show that no one is exempt. All human beings are subject to this media
      effect, including those of us who think we are self-aware and hip and
      knowledgeable.

      Media carries with it a credibility that is totally undeserved. You have all
      experienced this, in what I call the Murray Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. (I call
      it by this name because I once discussed it with Murray Gell-Mann, and by
      dropping a famous name I imply greater importance to myself, and to the
      effect, than it would otherwise have.)

      Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect works as follows. You open the
      newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case,
      physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist
      has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the
      article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward-reversing cause
      and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.

      In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in
      a story-and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read
      with renewed interest as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more
      accurate about far-off Palestine than it was about the story you just read.
      You turn the page, and forget what you know.

      That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. I’d point out it does not operate in
      other arenas of life. In ordinary life, if somebody consistently exaggerates or
      lies to you, you soon discount everything they say. In court, there is the
      legal doctrine of falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus, which means untruthful in
      one part, untruthful in all.

      But when it comes to the media, we believe against evidence that it is
      probably worth our time to read other parts of the paper. When, in fact, it
      almost certainly isn’t. The only possible explanation for our behavior is
      amnesia.

      So one problem with speculation is that it piggybacks on the Gell-Mann effect
      of unwarranted credibility, making speculation look more useful than it is.
      Another issue springs from the sheer volume of speculation. Ubiquity may
      come to imply a value to the activity being so assiduously carried out. But in
      fact, no matter how many people are speculating, no matter how familiar
      their faces, how good their makeup and how well they are lit, no matter how
      many weeks they appear before us in person or in columns, it still remains
      true that none of them knows what the future holds.

      …

      read the remainder of the speech here:

      http://web.archive.org/web/20070629011206/www.michaelcrichton.com/speech-whyspeculate.html

  • A Bad Joke

    Funny, considering solar activity is unpredictable even in the best conditions. In reality? It could strike tomorrow, or next week, or in decades.

  • Ironaddict06

    No the solar activity the article is talking about is not unpredictable. The article should have made the issue clearer. By solar activity, they mean the sunspot activity will reach its peak in 2012-2013. It an eleven year cycle. If there was ever a prediction to come true-December 2012 would be the one to bet money on. People are caught up on the year. It doesn’t matter what year people call it-on that day and moving forward is what’s important. Here are some thing that are for sure going to happen.
    1. Dec. 21-2012-First day of winter
    2. Peak of solar(SUNSPOT)activity
    3. The sky changes from the from the constellation Pisces to Aquarius.
    4. Galactic Alignment-which happens once every roughly 26,000 years.
    I’m not claiming the end of the world is coming, only pointing out that some very interesting things are set to occur late 2012 into 2013.
    Also 2012 just happens to be an important year for political elections.

  • Ironaddict06

    No the solar activity the article is talking about is not unpredictable. The article should have made the issue clearer. By solar activity, they mean the sunspot activity will reach its peak in 2012-2013. It an eleven year cycle. If there was ever a prediction to come true-December 2012 would be the one to bet money on. People are caught up on the year. It doesn’t matter what year people call it-on that day and moving forward is what’s important. Here are some thing that are for sure going to happen.
    1. Dec. 21-2012-First day of winter
    2. Peak of solar(SUNSPOT)activity
    3. The sky changes from the from the constellation Pisces to Aquarius.
    4. Galactic Alignment-which happens once every roughly 26,000 years.
    I’m not claiming the end of the world is coming, only pointing out that some very interesting things are set to occur late 2012 into 2013.
    Also 2012 just happens to be an important year for political elections.

  • Vox Penii

    >A massive solar flare could cause global chaos in 2013, causing blackouts and wrecking satellite communications, a conference heard yesterday.

    Judas Priest, I get tired of linking to this speech … but as long as people keep speculating I’ll do my best to do my duty.

    Michael Crichton, “Why Speculate?” a speech to the International Leadership Forum, La Jolla, California
    April 26, 2002

    Abstract: In recent years, media has increasingly turned away from reporting what has happened to focus on speculation about what may happen in the future. Paying attention to modern media is thus a waste of time.

    …

    My topic for today is the prevalence of speculation in media. What does it
    mean? Why has it become so ubiquitous? Should we do something about it?
    If so, what should we do? And why? Should we care at all? Isn’t speculation
    valuable? Isn’t it natural?

    I will join this speculative bandwagon and speculate about why there is so
    much speculation. In keeping with the trend, I will try express my views
    without any factual support, simply providing you with a series of bald
    assertions.

    This is not my natural style, and it’s going to be a challenge for me, but I will
    do my best. I have written out my talk which is already a contradiction of
    principle. To keep within the spirit of our time, it should really be off the top
    of my head.

    Before we begin, I’d like to clarify a definition. By media I mean movies
    television internet books newspapers and magazines. That’s a broad
    definition but in keeping with the general trend of speculation, let’s not make
    too many fine distinctions.

    First we might begin by asking, to what degree has the media turned to pure
    speculation? Someone could do a study of this and present facts, but nobody
    has. I certainly won’t. There’s no reason to bother.

    Today, everybody knows that “Hardball,” “The O’Relly Factor,” and similar
    shows are nothing but a steady stream of guesses about the future. The
    Sunday morning talk shows are pure speculation. They have to be. Everybody knows there’s no news on Sunday.

    But speculation is every bit as rampant in the so-called serious media, such
    as newspapers. For example, consider the New York Times for March 6,
    2002, the day I was asked to give this talk. The column one story that day
    concerns George Bush’s tariffs on imported steel. We read:

    Mr. Bush’s action “is likely to send the price of steel up sharply, perhaps as
    much as ten percent..” American consumers “will ultimately bear” higher
    prices. America’s allies “would almost certainly challenge” the decision. Their
    legal case “could take years to litigate in Geneva, is likely to hinge” on thus
    and such.

    In addition, there is a further vague and overarching speculation. The Allies’
    challenge would be “setting the stage for a major trade fight with many of
    the same countries Mr. Bush is trying to hold together in the fractious
    coalition against terrorism.” In other words, the story speculates that tariffs
    may rebound against the fight against terrorism.

    You may read this story and think, what’s the big deal? Isn’t it reasonable to
    talk about effects of current events in this way? I answer, absolutely not.
    Such speculation is a complete waste of time. It’s useless. It’s bullshit on the
    front page of the Times.

    The reason why it is useless, of course, is that nobody knows what the future
    holds.

    Do we all agree that nobody knows what the future holds? Or do I have to
    prove it to you? I ask this because there are some well-studied media effects
    which suggest that a simple appearance in media provides credibility. There
    was a well-known series of excellent studies by Stanford researchers that
    have shown, for example, that children take media literally. If you show
    them a bag of popcorn on a television set and ask them what will happen if
    you turn the TV upside down, the children say the popcorn will fall out of the
    bag. This effect would be amusing if it were confined to children. The studies
    show that no one is exempt. All human beings are subject to this media
    effect, including those of us who think we are self-aware and hip and
    knowledgeable.

    Media carries with it a credibility that is totally undeserved. You have all
    experienced this, in what I call the Murray Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. (I call
    it by this name because I once discussed it with Murray Gell-Mann, and by
    dropping a famous name I imply greater importance to myself, and to the
    effect, than it would otherwise have.)

    Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect works as follows. You open the
    newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case,
    physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist
    has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the
    article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward-reversing cause
    and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.

    In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in
    a story-and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read
    with renewed interest as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more
    accurate about far-off Palestine than it was about the story you just read.
    You turn the page, and forget what you know.

    That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. I’d point out it does not operate in
    other arenas of life. In ordinary life, if somebody consistently exaggerates or
    lies to you, you soon discount everything they say. In court, there is the
    legal doctrine of falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus, which means untruthful in
    one part, untruthful in all.

    But when it comes to the media, we believe against evidence that it is
    probably worth our time to read other parts of the paper. When, in fact, it
    almost certainly isn’t. The only possible explanation for our behavior is
    amnesia.

    So one problem with speculation is that it piggybacks on the Gell-Mann effect
    of unwarranted credibility, making speculation look more useful than it is.
    Another issue springs from the sheer volume of speculation. Ubiquity may
    come to imply a value to the activity being so assiduously carried out. But in
    fact, no matter how many people are speculating, no matter how familiar
    their faces, how good their makeup and how well they are lit, no matter how
    many weeks they appear before us in person or in columns, it still remains
    true that none of them knows what the future holds.

    …

    read the remainder of the speech here:

    http://web.archive.org/web/20070629011206/www.michaelcrichton.com/speech-whyspeculate.html