[HN Gopher] Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, Two more eart...
___________________________________________________________________
Coronal mass ejection impact imminent, Two more earth-directed CMEs
Author : gnabgib
Score : 161 points
Date : 2024-05-10 17:50 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.spaceweatherlive.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.spaceweatherlive.com)
| prerok wrote:
| The sky is falling!
|
| Seriously, though, I am not knowledgeable enough about these CMEs
| and how they compare to the past ones. Are there any good
| historical analyses?
| SkyPuncher wrote:
| My understanding is bigger than normal, but a lot smaller than
| storms that have caused grid issues.
| gashad wrote:
| Not saying anything about the current storm, but a storm as
| strong as the Carrington Event[1] would make modern day life on
| Earth pretty unpleasant. Some of the potential impacts are
| documented in Severe Space Weather Events: Understanding
| Societal and Economic Impacts [2]
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event [2]
| https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/12507/severe-space...
| candiddevmike wrote:
| This is the first G4 watch since 2005:
| https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/severe-geomagnetic-storm-stil...
| downvotetruth wrote:
| intended url? https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/severe-
| geomagnetic-storming-l...
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Can you really call yourself a prepper if you don't have a
| faraday cage with a spare laptop inside?
|
| (The intersection of doomerism and tech is amusingly cyberpunk
| sometimes.)
|
| Actually, what's the most useful way you'd prepare for a
| worldwide grid outage? This isn't that, but sometimes I wonder if
| a future CME might be as catastrophic as some say.
| Muromec wrote:
| > Actually, what's the most useful way you'd prepare for a
| worldwide grid outage?
|
| Be on a government payroll and have the skills necessary to
| repair the damage.
| belter wrote:
| Or load on ammunition, and be ready for your neighbor to go
| cannibalistic within 3 months...
| remlov wrote:
| Try days, not months. Especially in densely populated
| areas.
| mberning wrote:
| The government has done studies showing that the vast
| majority of the population would be dead not long after a
| sustained nationwide power outage. All it takes is people
| missing a few meals before the fun starts.
| N0b8ez wrote:
| Do you have a link to the study?
| mberning wrote:
| I had to dig around but I think this the one I remember.
| There are two other reports linked in the comments.
|
| https://old.reddit.com/r/preppers/comments/11tblpp/found_
| it_...
| N0b8ez wrote:
| Thanks! This is the doc I found the "90 percent of our
| population is dead" quote from, which is asserted
| indirectly:
|
| https://irp.fas.org/congress/2008_hr/emp.pdf
|
| It's referring to a fictional story in that quote, but
| the scientist says that 90% is accurate for the real
| world if that scenario were to happen. Pretty chilling.
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| You do realize humanity has had countless famines before
| right? I grant you, a few of them brought out a
| regrettable side of humanity but by and large people come
| together during times of hardship, they don't tear each
| other apart. I feel like only those who've never felt
| hunger could contemplate such a savage reaction.
| belter wrote:
| And I hope you realize China had multiple famines with
| cannibalistic events as recent as 1959:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| I hope you realize that about a million people died
| during the Irish great famine with almost no events of
| cannibalism. Suggesting that it's a normal occurrence
| during famine is _very_ insulting to the character of
| those that survived those famines while still upholding
| basic human decency.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| I hope you realize that these events are notable because
| they are unusual and not because they are the rule.
| N0b8ez wrote:
| It's an understatement to say that only "a few" famines
| have brought out a regrettable side of humanity. The
| situation is very similar to a war. Remember that the
| rate of violent death was much higher before agriculture
| and farming were invented. A breakdown of infrastructure
| would bring us closer to our natural condition from those
| times. Accepting that doesn't require anyone to be a
| misanthropist or a cynic about human value.
| holoduke wrote:
| Days. After the soviet union fell in Armenia there was no
| supply of food the first days. Also no gasoline nothing.
| The first day people were normal. Second day people started
| stealing. Third day all birds and rats were shot for food.
| Luckely soon food became a normal thing again. But chaos is
| quickly there. I believe even quicker in rich western
| countries. Most men and women cant survive on their own for
| a week.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| You can survive with no food for a week. And you can use
| water from toilet tank for this week.
| gosub100 wrote:
| Part of what makes me take prepping seriously is that the
| majority of payments are electronic now and there is no
| failover as far as I'm aware. In ~2015 I saw a power outage
| briefly take down the payment processsor at a grocery store.
| despite having cash I could not check out.
|
| If something like that happens but sustained long enough to
| cause a mob to loot the store (which the media would of
| course amplify), it wouldn't be long before there was
| widespread panic.
|
| It's not the CME itself that terrifies me, but the knock-on
| effects.
| javajosh wrote:
| It's really too bad we didn't have a major CME in the 90's.
| That was the perfect time for a good lesson in redundancy
| and why you can't and shouldn't jettison "the old ways" so
| quickly. Perhaps its not too late now, but the pain will be
| considerably higher. Earth lucked out in so many ways, but
| a CME spanking in the 1990's is asking for too much I
| guess.
| lxgr wrote:
| That's just the anthropic principle for you: If we'd have
| been any less lucky, we wouldn't be here to write about
| it :)
| gosub100 wrote:
| I would like to think that the servers that run ACH
| networks, IBM mainframes that actually store your account
| balance, etc are shielded from CME and even an EMP.
|
| But the vulnerable side then becomes the power grid and
| Internet backbone. Part of a resilient disaster plan
| would be to allow ACH and other payment traffic to take
| priority if we were relegated to a low bandwidth
| connection. If we cannot transfer money, we will
| collapse, plain as that, once panic over food security
| sets in.
|
| An EE friend said that we do not have enough transformers
| to replace if a critical number of them fried. Substation
| level components could be a huge bottleneck if we had
| another Carrington event.
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| That was one of the big problems in Puerto Rico in 2017 -
| all the credit/debit card systems were out and almost
| nobody had money.
| dan_can_code wrote:
| I would also like to know any practical answers to your
| question. My assumption is that there would be widespread
| panic, and I'm not sure how I would go about dealing with that
| other than waiting it out.
| morkalork wrote:
| According to pop culture, a closet full of old sports equipment
| will be indispensable. Goalie masks etc.
| bigDinosaur wrote:
| Ignoring unrealistic preparations for most of us (such as
| bunkers and whatever else), an adequate supply of food and
| water to handle disruptions to logistics for a realistic amount
| of time must surely be the lowest hanging fruit (e.g. a
| month?). This is fairly trivial if you aim for things like rice
| and pasta, and if the grid goes down for longer than a month a
| lot of us are dying regardless of how we prepare.
| calvinmorrison wrote:
| If you are in the US, the best preparation you can have is to
| be able to relocate during an emergency. Do not get stuck in
| Katrina so to speak. Having transport to other parts of the
| country is the best bet.
| steve1977 wrote:
| Not sure if and how modern cars with all their electronics
| might be affected. Also maybe have some paper maps and a
| compass somewhere (and know how to use them!) and don't
| purely rely on GPS.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| The water seems like the hard part. Are there any tricks for
| cheap, safe hydration for a family?
|
| I guess we could just start building walls of unopened water
| bottles in our basement...
|
| (In my teens I saw a family friend had a bag full of food
| supplies. I asked someone if that was a prep bag, and they
| said yes. I thought they were a bit weird. Now I've come full
| circle browsing Amazon for cheap doomsday food.)
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > Are there any tricks for cheap, safe hydration for a
| family?
|
| Live near a lake, stream, etc. and enough firewood to boil
| water.
| harry_ord wrote:
| High water tinned foods will help a lot.
| encoderer wrote:
| Have the local water delivery company drop off 5 jugs a
| year
| briffle wrote:
| Walmart sells 5 gallon water totes for $15. that is
| essentially 5 days for one person. We have a few on hand
| (family of 4 plus dog) and every six months or so, I empty
| them, clean them, and re-fill them. Also, there are gravity
| filters that work great if you have things like creeks near
| you.. Berkey Filters are pretty good for filtering out
| contaminants, as well as 2-bag gravity filters that are
| really popular with backpackers because you can fill the
| dirty bag up, hang from a tree, and do other things while
| the clean bag fills.. (not an endorsement, but their
| pictures show nicely how they work)
| https://www.platy.com/filtration/gravityworks-water-
| filter-s...
| bbarnett wrote:
| If there is no AC, and you are exerting yourself a lot
| (no car or transportation is down, more work to prepare
| food, even having to take a dump outside), 5 gallons is
| barely enough for one person to drink per day. You'll be
| sweating a lot more in those conditions.
|
| Another example is food in winter months. During a
| disaster, even with winter gear, your houee may not be
| heated. If it is -20C inside, your body will need more
| calories.
|
| If you're having to go outside to cook, to expel waste,
| and maybe even to go find snow to melt for water, you're
| going to need 3x your caloric intake.
|
| You have to plan for worst case usage per day, not best.
| danw1979 wrote:
| If you drink ~19 litres (5 US gallons?) of water every
| day you will not survive long. That's about an order of
| magnitude more than is recommended under normal non-
| strenuous conditions.
| groby_b wrote:
| > 5 gallons is barely enough for one person to drink per
| day.
|
| OK, no. If you're running a marathon, in hot weather,
| you're at _maybe_ a liter per hour. Unless you plan to
| run 20h marathons and the sun never sets, 5 gallon is
| well beyond drinking needs.
|
| And unless you're able to exert yourself at that level
| _at all_ , this isn't the "worst case", this is pure
| fantasy.
|
| And if you're preparing for -20C in your house, I
| recommend investing in insulation, not more calories
| stored away. (I also question 3x, the figures I've seen
| point to 2x, with exertion somewhat counteracting cold)
| vbezhenar wrote:
| I drink may be two liters of water per day. Unless Google
| lies to me, 5 gallons is almost 20 liters which would be
| enough for 3 weeks for me with rationing.
| mmh0000 wrote:
| I've got one of these in my garage. It provides a lot of
| piece of mind knowing water is solved for. I not a
| "prepper" by any means, but, realistically I need water
| every day or I will die. Spending a few hundred to ensure
| I don't die from dehydration during a natural disaster
| seems worth it.
|
| https://www.surewatertanks.com/collections/products/produ
| cts...
| dole wrote:
| I'll second Berkey Filters. While a full Berkey setup may
| seem expensive, the filters themselves and not the
| housing is the important part.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| You can also use the filters with alternative housings
| that are far cheaper if aesthetics aren't a concern. I've
| seen people use food safe 5 gallon buckets for example.
| It's much cheaper and works just as well in emergency
| situations. You do need to be careful about light
| penetration of the translucent bucket wall.
|
| Another cool thing is that you can make (in a pinch, I
| wouldn't recommend this over berkey filters) filters from
| the same type of bulkheads berkey uses attached to home-
| made ceramic filters. They work remarkably well in
| emergencies and are trivial to make if you've got clay
| and a hot fire. There's definitely trial and error
| involved for getting perfect seals, and some advanced
| DIYers I've seen used glazing to create a more easily
| sealed rim which can have a plastic tube jammed into it
| for a friction fit, which then attaches to the inner part
| of the bulkhead.
|
| Totally unnecessary if civilization is working but
| awesome if things go sideways and you're out of filters.
| There might be better methods too, I haven't looked into
| it for years.
| tithe wrote:
| One option is to do what quick-service restaurants (e.g.,
| Subway) do for chips, cookies, drinks, etc.: keep a hefty
| supply of product on hand, but consume it first-in-first-
| out (FIFO, like a queue). During times of stability (when
| supplies are available), add new supplies to the "back"
| while you consume from the "front".
| pennomi wrote:
| Backpacking water filters aren't all that expensive and
| work fine with most water sources. Wouldn't produce enough
| to shower in but certainly enough that you could survive in
| a disaster.
| Marsymars wrote:
| I've got an assortment of backpacking/camping water
| filters, but don't live especially near a water source,
| so my days would revolve around walks to the nearest
| creek. (2 km away) A cargo bike would help a lot there.
|
| If the municipal water is still functional but non-
| potable, a LifeStraw Max gets you effectively unlimited
| water on-demand for most sources of contamination.
| rolph wrote:
| distillation allows separation of water from not water.
|
| mud or damp vegetation can be a water source.
| jandrese wrote:
| You could collect rainwater, but realistically water
| outages are usually not "the taps are dry", but rather
| "the water treatment plant failed so we can't guarantee
| the water is safe to drink."
| ninininino wrote:
| I would probably want a Gravi-stil as relying on filter
| mediums has a built-in expiration date (or # of gallons).
| Marsymars wrote:
| Sure, but even with my regular water usage, the LifeStraw
| Max filters would last me over a year, and it works via
| water pressure. There isn't really any disaster scenario
| where I'm remaining in my home and need to purify water
| via burning wood.
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| I wouldn't think backpacking water filters would help
| much in for getting water from rivers / ponds in an
| urban/suburban environment? They'd take care of
| particulate matter and microbes but I doubt they'd do
| much for chemical contaminants.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| Also, most filters can filter bacteria and cysts, but
| can't filter out viruses. Many say viruses are not an
| issue in the backcountry (but I still use purifying
| tablets), but if you're taking water from a suburban
| stream during a disaster, I'd definitely want to make
| sure I'm not ingesting whatever viruses the guy upstream
| deposited when he used the stream as a toilet.
| cynicalsecurity wrote:
| Dig a well.
| salad-tycoon wrote:
| You have to have the right kind of ground to drill with
| this. I think lots of gravel and rocks won't work well.
| Never used it myself but was considering it in the past.
|
| https://www.drillawell.com/complete-kit
| rolph wrote:
| storing large quantities of water is not trivial
| maintenence.
|
| its better to be able to sanitize required quantities on
| demand.
| swader999 wrote:
| A bag of pool shock and how to use it safely to treat water
| is fairly easy and cheap.
| sa46 wrote:
| I used to be a logistics officer for an Infantry battalion.
|
| Most of the comments down thread underestimate water
| consumption. Depending on the climate, you'll want the
| following daily quantities [1]:
|
| - 2-3 gallons for drinking
|
| - 1.5 gallons for hygiene (can skip for a while)
|
| - 0.5 gallons for food prep
|
| The planning factor for military operations was 8 gallons
| per person per day. Water is heavy--8 pounds per gallon--
| and acquiring, storing, and moving it is a large effort.
|
| [1] https://cascom.army.mil/g_staff/g3/TTD/Products/QM-How-
| to-Ha...
| close04 wrote:
| > 8 gallons per person per day. Water is heavy--8 pounds
| per gallon
|
| The average person needs far less than 65lbs (30kg) of
| water per day, which is a third of the average male
| weight in the US.
|
| By medical standards humans need more like 8lbs (under
| 4l) per day for men and 6lbs (under 3l) for women. Less
| if your rationing and not exerting yourself.
| fl0ki wrote:
| > 8 pounds per gallon
|
| It never occurred to me that people needed this spelled
| out, but I guess it's simpler in most of the world where
| 1L = 1kg.
| ghostly_s wrote:
| I don't think you can blame inch-pounds for this one-
| even though we rationally know it is heavier than most
| materials we don't "think of" water as heavy because
| modern society gives us the luxury of seldom having to
| handle more than a thirty minute or so supply of it at
| once.
| fl0ki wrote:
| I wasn't actually commenting on the "heavy" part but the
| "8 pounds per gallon" part. I can do these conversions on
| demand but, besides never being the native way I think
| personally, there are simply more numeric conversions you
| have to do when you use this system whether or not it's
| native to you.
| DemocracyFTW2 wrote:
| then again, anyone with a garden or balcony that has to
| be watered with a watering can can [sic] attest to how
| heavy a little bit of water is. If you have a small 100m2
| garden and it rains a modest 1mm (per m2 that is) that's
| 1L/m2 equivalent to 1kg/m2 or 100kg total mass of water.
| When it has rained 1mm people call it "three drops of
| rain" and they will have to water their plants anyway.
| That's already 10 cans @ 10L each to lug around.
|
| The other kind of people who know about the weight of
| waters are people with campers / trailers and people with
| fish tanks in their apartments. The maximum allowable
| size for a fish tank in the middle of the room is not
| _that_ much.
| ajross wrote:
| > The water seems like the hard part. Are there any tricks
| for cheap, safe hydration for a family?
|
| You already have the equipment for that. Your existing hot
| water heater stores enough drinking water for a month at
| least, probably more if you ration carefully.
| mgkimsal wrote:
| we got the smaller 42 gallon one, and.. with two people
| and a pet... it might last a couple weeks tops, I'd
| think, if we rationed (~2-3 gallons per day?)
| ajross wrote:
| I don't think I've ever drunk two gallons in a day in my
| whole life. Sedentary survival needs in reasonable
| climates are maybe a third of that.
| travisb wrote:
| The cheapest way is to find some cheap, food-safe
| container(s). Put it into your basement and change out the
| water every 3-6 months.
|
| 55 gallon rain barrels can often be found subsidized and
| therefore cheap.
|
| Keep a bunch of camping iodine drops around and you are
| set.
| ramses0 wrote:
| The genius move I heard of was to throw a few 5-gal jugs of
| water up in your attic (!!!). It's relatively shelf-stable,
| standardized size, and "in case of emergency" you can even
| use it as a gravity-flowed spout to fill smaller containers
| below.
|
| I've taken to trying to have a minimal set of 4 one liter
| steel water bottles hung in the closet (grab + go) all the
| time. So convenient to be able to "just grab some water" on
| the way out the door, and is the start of a solid emergency
| prep station.
| blincoln wrote:
| If one is going to do that, I'd strongly recommend
| putting them in some kind of basin that can hold the
| water if it escapes from the jugs, or sturdier
| containers, or both.
|
| At least in the US, water jugs are generally very flimsy.
| An attic is likely to have wide temperature variations
| throughout the year, and leaky water jugs up there could
| cause some expensive damage.
| nytesky wrote:
| Yeah we had plastic jugs in our cool basement leak all
| over the concrete floor -- I can't imagine the disaster
| that would be to have plastic jugs in my 140F attic with
| resultant leaking down from the ceiling
| scheme271 wrote:
| If it's kept in plastic containers, it's probably only
| good for a year or so before enough stuff leaches into
| the water that it'll last off and funky. The time period
| decreases significantly if your attic gets hot (like a
| lot of them do).
| halgir wrote:
| I want my regular drinking water to be as free of
| microplastics as possible, but is contamination from
| plastic containers dangerous enough to be of any concern
| during an emergency situation?
| tlavoie wrote:
| I've got a 1000 litre / 250-ish US gallon rainwater
| collection tank. While I wouldn't want to start there for
| drinking water, it would do for quite a while if I boil it.
|
| We do get power failures, so it's mostly been for some
| garden watering, and being able to flush our toilets during
| an outage. We're on a well, and the pump needs 220v. I
| suppose I could get a better generator too, ours only does
| 120v.
| briffle wrote:
| In Oregon, after some severe forest fires, ice storms that
| shut down whole towns, and the possibility of a Cascadia
| Subduction Zone event (ie, ~9.0 earthquake) They recommend
| keeping supplies for 2 weeks to allow time for local areas to
| get regular supplies of food, water, etc.
| https://www.oregon.gov/oem/hazardsprep/pages/2-weeks-
| ready.a...
| withinboredom wrote:
| The problem with that advice is that anyone who could bring
| you supplies is also suffering from the same problems you
| are.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Nothing is perfect,but 2 weeks is better than 0 weeks,
| and enough for a wide array of circumstances
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| Homes being prepared also dramatically reduces the need
| for distributed aid to these people. That could mean that
| labour to restore minimal infrastructure is more
| available. Feeding people in situations like that takes
| immense effort.
| fragmede wrote:
| For a world affecting CME, it might take a month but a
| 9.0 magnitude earthquake is not going to destroy the
| entire world, so you don't need a years worth of food
| before help arrives. we're talking about a little extra
| bit of water and food, not an underground bunker. Help
| from outside the affected area will be coming.
| wongarsu wrote:
| Also a small camping stove with a couple of gas cartridges to
| ensure you can cook your rice and pasta.
| Marsymars wrote:
| Or with an adapter hose you can connect a standard propane
| tank. If you get the right connector bits, you can use
| propane with either a dual-burner Coleman-like stove, or
| with a minimal Jetboil-like backpacking stove.
| Syzygies wrote:
| With a different adapter one can refill camping canisters
| from a standard propane tank. One "usually" gets away
| with refilling empty canisters, but these aren't legal
| for transport in an automobile. Presumably with reason,
| as in the odds aren't as good as skydiving. I recommend
| the DOT approved:
|
| Flame King Refillable 1LB Empty Propane Cylinder Tank
|
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00MM3GCVO/
|
| It offers some nuanced controls e.g. to avoid
| overfilling.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I'm really curious where that presumption comes from.
| There are tens of thousands of things that are prohibited
| due to saftyism.
|
| If you understand pressure Regulators and can hook up a
| BBQ, [is it really] more risky than skydiving
|
| Edit: Switched a safety assertion to a question
| travisb wrote:
| I'm not entirely clear on what your question is, but
| reused single-use propane canisters are lesser for three
| reasons.
|
| 1. The propane they are manufactured with is carefully
| dried, but propane out of bulk tanks is not. The single
| use tanks have thinner walls with less corrosion
| protection because the high-end propane doesn't need it.
|
| 2. The safety over-pressure valve on those tanks has
| similar design constraints and may corrode shut with un-
| dried propane. Sometimes people damage those valves while
| refilling.
|
| 3. It's easy to overfill those little tanks such that
| high temperatures can cause over-pressure problems. Due
| to (1) and (2) the built-in safety measures for
| refillable tanks cannot be assumed.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I was questioning the idea that having a refilled tank in
| your car is more dangerous than skydiving. I think it is
| fair to presume it has some non-zero risk.
|
| I was questioning if that risk is meaningful, or if it is
| like a prop 65 warning on every building you enter, and
| most products you purchase.
|
| Googling around I was able to find 1 death associated
| with refilling a DOT-39 container [1], which is scary
| shit. However, it seems to be caused by a poor coupling,
| refilling inside, with an ignition source. This could
| have happened with any container including a certified
| refillable one.
|
| https://lni.wa.gov/safety-health/safety-
| research/files/2016/...
| Marsymars wrote:
| Yeah I looked into those, but in practice it seemed
| easier to just get a 5lb propane tank for camping that I
| get refilled at the same place I fill my 20lb tanks.
| (Plus I'm not clear about the legality of the Flame King
| ones in Canada, with the result that there aren't any
| reputable sellers.)
|
| If I really need to go light I'm carrying isobutane
| canisters or using an alcohol stove.
| tlavoie wrote:
| Keep some oats, you can eat them raw.
| komali2 wrote:
| Also trash bags to shit in. Put it in your toilet, close the
| lid on it, boom you can shit in the comfort of your bathroom
| in a relatively sanitary way.
| windexh8er wrote:
| I guess that's one upside of living off of city water /
| sanitation. In my circumstance I wouldn't have a change of
| living due to well water pump being easily run from solar
| collected electricity. It would only have to run the pump a
| few times a day to keep the well bladder tank primed. Same
| thing for the mound system as the pump only needs to run a
| few times a day during normal operations. This could just
| be run once at the end of the day to bring the final
| holding tank down to a normal level.
| unclebucknasty wrote:
| > _the grid goes down for longer than a month a lot of us are
| dying regardless of how we prepare._
|
| This. When trying to make provisions for even modest
| disruptions, you quickly realize how herculean a task it is
| to be _truly_ prepared. Unless you 're already a self-
| sustaining farmer with a well/water source and other
| resources or (ideally) billionare-bunker capable, you can see
| how prepper-ism becomes a lifestyle beyond prepping for a
| relatively short period.
|
| Making a choice between living life as it currently is and
| being prepared to survive indefinitely is a hard fork in the
| road.
| kyleblarson wrote:
| I have a 50kw generac tied into my house with a 1000 gallon
| propane tank.
| voisin wrote:
| What will you do once the propane runs out? Solar (and
| battery) is the way to go.
| csteubs wrote:
| Not OP, but I use solar and H8-size AGM batteries as
| primary with a backup diesel generator that I've converted
| to run on wood gas (and occasionally coal gas). Added a
| triple stage water filter to the gasifier last year to keep
| the tar and creosote down. The generator is an old clunker
| but it's easy to disassemble, which made it an ideal
| candidate for tinkering and the eventual retrofit.
| hersko wrote:
| Please tell me you have a youtube channel or blog on that
| thing.
| Marsymars wrote:
| Not very useful for much of the year at high latitudes
| though. If you're off-grid, you basically need wood to heat
| your home, and if you clear the snow off your panels you
| can get enough juice to keep your phones charged.
| wcoenen wrote:
| I don't understand what 50 kW could possibly be needed for.
|
| Part of the electricity bill here in Flanders is based on
| monthly power peak. I charge an EV at home, and by setting up
| the charging station to take into account consumption data
| from the meter, I have no problem staying below 7 kW. Okay,
| that's averaged over 15 minute time slots, but even the
| connection for my house is only rated 13.8 kW!
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| Startup spikes; AIUI anything with a motor will initially
| sink way more power than you expect it to use, then settle
| to a more reasonable level. So you need to overspec a
| generator to handle that without a brownout.
|
| I think that's it, anyways; this is not my strong suit.
| quickthrowman wrote:
| > Okay, that's averaged over 15 minute time slots, but even
| the connection for my house is only rated 13.8 kW!
|
| In the US we have single-phase (split-phase) 120/240v 200A
| service drops for houses, 48kW. Houses over 3,000 square
| feet with electric heating, electric ovens, electric water
| heaters, and electric air conditioning can push 150A peak
| demand, and a 200A service drop is not much more expensive
| for the utility than a 100A service drop. Most houses in my
| state have gas water heaters and furnaces so 200A is
| overkill for most people in my state.
|
| A 7kW 240V single-phase load draws (7000/240) 29.1A
|
| IIRC most of Europe gets 230V or 400V three-phase power for
| houses, so here's both calculations.
|
| A 7kW 230V three-phase load draws (7000/(230*1.732) 17.57A
|
| A 7kW 400V three-phase load draws (7000/(400*1.732) 10.1A
|
| The reasoning behind a 50kW for a house in the US is
| (probably a 48kW) generator is you can fully back up your
| 200A service (240V times 200A = 48kW) and not split out the
| generator loads into a subpanel.
|
| Older houses in the US might have a 100A service, I've even
| seen 60A house services.
|
| P.S. 1.732 is sqrt(3)
| travisb wrote:
| Not needing a sub-panel is almost certainly the reason.
|
| The North American residential electrical code limits how
| many circuits you can put onto a generator based on the
| circuit capacity, not the expected use. You aren't
| allowed to pinky swear that you won't run your electric
| oven and dry laundry at the same time. It doesn't matter
| that your generator will just trip its breaker or die.
|
| So if you want to have most of your house on a
| permanently wired standby generator you need to wildly
| oversize that generator such that it can entirely replace
| utility power.
| kyleblarson wrote:
| I have 2 wells, irrigation, a big shop and a smallish
| house. I live on the eastern crest of the North Cascades
| mountains in Washington State US and it can be -30c in the
| winter and 40c in the summer. Heat pump system with wood
| backup for the house and woodstove in the shop. When
| looking at the costs to put in the genset the difference to
| go big was de minimus.
| ortusdux wrote:
| One less obvious CME prep suggestion that I have heard is to
| prepare for extensive forest fires.
|
| https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18291443/
| lxgr wrote:
| Interesting, what's the proposed mechanism for CMEs causing
| fires? I unfortunately can't access the paper text.
| tejtm wrote:
| Current is _generated_ in static lengths of wire. At any
| point the voltage exceeds the design, it arcs. Current
| passing through imperfect conductors are heating elements.
|
| Both sparks from shorts and excess heating of conductors
| are possible ignition points.
|
| n.b. I have not look at the paper.
| daemonologist wrote:
| The paper's a bit hard to read but I don't think it
| suggests a mechanism, or that the correlation between CMEs
| and forest fires is statistically significant for that
| matter. If you email me (address in profile) I can send you
| a copy.
|
| It does seem plausible that you could get fires as a result
| of electrical sparks off of long conductors (transmission
| and communication wires, pipelines, fences), such as with
| the Carrington event (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagn
| etically_induced_curren...).
| colechristensen wrote:
| * Have a well stocked pantry. Costco business centers sell
| large bags of rice, beans, etc. very cheap. It just doesn't
| hurt to have some of these things on hand and use them.
|
| * Have solar installed on your home. Have some spare
| disconnected inverters, maybe even a couple of uninstalled
| panels.
|
| * Grow some of your own food in a garden.
|
| * Have good relationships with some of your neighbors.
|
| * Know how to do stuff yourself, have some tools and building
| materials in your garage
|
| * Have a bicycle
|
| * Have a method to purify water
|
| None of these things are bad ideas anyway. Just don't be
| absolutely reliant on just-in-time purchasing of life
| necessities and know enough to be able to figure stuff out on
| your own. More or less just go on an overnight backpacking trip
| once in a while without buying prepackaged everything and
| you'll be pretty good.
| V__ wrote:
| In a lot of places you can get permission to have your own
| water well. You may not even need to filter it.
| fl0ki wrote:
| > * Grow some of your own food in a garden.
|
| This will get you a handful extra meals, assuming the ideal
| case where everything was fully grown, harvested, and
| preserved before the incident. It's one thing to have a
| village harvest & jam cycle for the seasons, it's another to
| need to be prepared for the situation to change overnight,
| all alone and with only a home garden to work with.
|
| You're better off using the money, time, energy, etc. to buy
| provisions that are immediately and near-permanently useful
| without the variability, climate sensitivity, and labor
| intensity of gardening.
| colechristensen wrote:
| You would be surprised how much you can grow in a small
| space. But also small additions of fresh fruits,
| vegetables, herbs, and greens to your long term stores of
| rice, beans, and preserved foods can go a long way towards
| making those foods more pleasant and making up for some of
| the nutrients which are either not present or destroyed by
| preservation processes. In situations of major food
| shortages even a little bit goes a very long way.
|
| And also, gardening is a high quality activity for you and
| your family at any time. It feels good eating a little bit
| of what you've grown, and there are lots of things that are
| either not possible or rather expensive to buy but simple
| to grow.
| steve1977 wrote:
| Have some water, food which doesn't require cooking, and a
| weapon.
| voisin wrote:
| Best way to prep is strong community connections around you.
| Community is resiliency.
| ryandrake wrote:
| LOL we saw how that played out with COVID. 1/2 your
| "community" is going to deny the disaster and deliberately
| worsen it. 1/2 (with some overlap) is going to go from
| grocery store to grocery store buying all the necessities to
| resell them later.
|
| EDIT: Wow, I know HN wears rose-colored glasses when looking
| at the past, but come on, people. We didn't hallucinate the
| antimaskers, antivaxxers, and thousands of protestors
| deliberately ignoring stay-at-home. I worked with a health
| official who had her home picketed because she dared to
| involve herself in health policy. It's only been a few years
| and y'all are in denial already.
| digging wrote:
| That was actually more of a demonstration of the utter
| _lack_ of community in our society, among other things.
| tetris11 wrote:
| that's the parents point though
| anigbrowl wrote:
| That's the point. In many respects, community life is
| just a polite facade.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I think both sides of this thread agree that most of us
| (in the US at least) don't have a robust community in the
| "community resilience" sense.
|
| The only disagreement I think is in the definition of
| community. We could either say that community is just,
| like, our extended circle of acquaintances; we've all got
| one and it isn't very robust against disasters. Or we
| could say that a resilient community is some deeper thing
| on which people can lean in a disaster, but which needs
| to be carefully tended to, and most of us lack.
|
| The latter is, I think, what the original poster meant.
| ryandrake wrote:
| Yes, that was what I was going for. If you consider your
| community to be _only_ the likeminded, cooperative people
| you know and associate with and rely on for help, then of
| course "your community" is great. I was talking about
| the greater community: the full population of your town,
| neighborhood and/or surrounding neighborhoods, and I'd
| estimate (depending on where in the country) a good 50%
| showed their counterproductive, selfish, belligerent side
| during COVID. Since we collectively haven't learned
| anything from our mistakes, I would expect the same
| behavior during the next disaster.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I think it is not just a matter of what you consider your
| community. The comment was suggesting building that
| community of reliable and likeminded people. It takes
| work, it is part of the "prep." I certainly haven't done
| it. But of course the suggestion must be to build the
| good type of community.
| digging wrote:
| I see. I thought you were refuting the advice that having
| community is a major factor in resiliency - you were
| actually saying, "lol good luck having community in the
| modern world." Which... yeah : /
| komali2 wrote:
| I didn't have either of those issues in my community, I'm
| sorry yours had those issues. In ours we formed bubbles,
| shared food, cooked meals together, and played an
| absolutely stunning volume of retro multiplayer games.
| Covid was awful but I think I'll always fondly remember
| some of those nights.
| adamomada wrote:
| In a real disaster, there won't be any buying or selling
| 7952 wrote:
| Maybe that is what you get when you replace social
| obligation with money and apps. That kind of existence was
| common in America and increased during covid. And it is a
| terrible model for situations where people actually need
| each other in a reciprocal way.
| DanHulton wrote:
| I don't know about you, but my community came together in
| those moments. When TP was hard to buy, we shared among
| ourselves. When members in our community discovered they
| had issues that prevented them from taking the vaccine
| safely, we went back to masking when meeting to keep them
| safe. And so on and so on.
|
| I think maybe you're thinking of a different definition of
| "community connections" than the parent poster. It's not
| _literally everyone around you,_ but the people around you
| that you trust and support and who will support you. Get as
| many of those as you can, as high quality as you can.
|
| It's beneficial even if the world _doesn't_ go to shit,
| too! =)
| xucian wrote:
| this
| Johnny555 wrote:
| I lived in a small condo complex during the early pandemic
| (~30 units, around 100 people total including kids) and
| COVID brought everyone together -- people sharing
| food/supplies (even elusive toilet paper), offering to make
| grocery runs for those that can't go themselves, one lady
| sewed enough homemade masks for everyone using her
| curtains.
|
| I'd rarely met the neighbors before then, but COVID really
| brought everyone together.
|
| Though I lived in a pretty liberal and well educated area,
| not many anti-vaxxers around where I lived.
| steve1977 wrote:
| Just be aware that what looks like a strong community can
| quickly turn into something else once the sh* hits the fan...
| komali2 wrote:
| Practice makes perfect. Highly recommend finding your local
| food not bombs cohort or visiting one in a nearby city and
| then starting your own back home.
|
| Community resiliency is a natural instinct it seems.
| Rebecca solnit's "paradise built in hell" is a fascinating
| read on the subject.
| internetwanker wrote:
| Now I've volunteered with a local FNB group so I'm not
| trying to be mean but...
|
| What would a group that gets cheap and or throwaway
| groceries and feeds homeless do in a Fit-Hits-The-Shan or
| End-of-World scenario?
|
| You'd have to hope some heavily agricultural minded types
| would be friendly to you and your labor potential.
| skyfaller wrote:
| The "end of the world" could be a local phenomenon. I
| like my headcanon that in Mad Max it's just Australia
| that's fucked, the rest of the world is fine.
|
| If there are functional societies elsewhere in the world,
| then help in the form of food could be on its way. The
| question is, will it be distributed efficiently to the
| people who need it? Something like Food Not Bombs could
| respond quite effectively to such a situation.
| encoderer wrote:
| With limited resources you have to choose: are you trying to
| prepare to keep life ~normal for a brief period waiting on a
| recovery or rescue, or are you trying to prepare for survival
| in a drastically less resourced world.
|
| These are very different things.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Just reminding that you don't need a Faraday cage to protect
| against giant coronal mass ejections. You just need to unplug
| from the grid.
|
| Even the grid is probably fine if it's unplugged from
| transmission.
| swader999 wrote:
| You don't need a Faraday cage for CME, just EMP.
| zikduruqe wrote:
| > Actually, what's the most useful way you'd prepare for a
| worldwide grid outage?
|
| Read One Second After by William R. Forstchen. It's probably
| the most accurate description of what may happen.
|
| https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4922079-one-second-after
| BenjiWiebe wrote:
| I really like that book but it is still highly unrealistic,
| since the grid going out != every small electronic circuit
| being fried. I'm not really clear on the issues with EMPs vs
| CMEs, but CMEs at least aren't going to induce dangerous
| voltages on a 5 foot long conductor routed inside a piece of
| metal (car). For sure not inside a cell phone or wristwatch.
|
| It's more about tripping out the grid, or sensitive
| inadequately-protected grid-connected electronics. Even then,
| the short will likely happen in the input stage of the power
| conversion, where repairs with salvage parts are not
| infeasible.
| swader999 wrote:
| World wide grid outage prep? Assuming transformers out
| continent wide? That's very bad imo. One of the hardest to
| prepare for. Cities will be impossible.
|
| A year of food stored and a really good place to hide from the
| hordes that want it. Very difficult imo.
| lxgr wrote:
| A continent-wide transformer blowout would pretty much be the
| end of modern civilization, as far as I've read. The capacity
| of both spares and teams capable of swapping them is orders
| of magnitude too low to do it in time to prevent large-scale
| collapse of interlinked systems.
| hinkley wrote:
| restarting a dead grid is the blackest of magic.
| gosub100 wrote:
| Not joking, I have LTO tapes in an ammo can.
| nati0n wrote:
| What on earth is on them?
| javajosh wrote:
| _> Can you really call yourself a prepper if you don't have a
| faraday cage with a spare laptop inside?_
|
| What do you call someone who puts their tablet and phone in the
| microwave? Preppy?
| sandworm101 wrote:
| >> most useful way you'd prepare for a worldwide grid outage?
|
| Put gas in your car. Impacts are likely to be regional, one
| town might loose power and another not. Be ready to move if
| needed.
| lxgr wrote:
| What use is a spare laptop in a faraday cage if I can't brag
| about having one on this site?
| holoduke wrote:
| Clothing, weapons, some tools, some survivial books. And
| muscles and brains. And last but not least. Gold and silver.
| Because that will become the only money.
| yks wrote:
| Last part is a trope but human societies around the world use
| different things as money, including counterfeit notes in
| Somali http://jpkoning.blogspot.com/2013/03/orphaned-
| currency-odd-c...
|
| In fact I doubt gold/silver becomes money because it's
| generally too rare and inconvenient (hard to cut the gold bar
| without tools even if you have one). Realistically people
| will just keep using cash.
| nonameiguess wrote:
| I'm curious what a realistic estimate of service loss even is.
| We had pretty close to this happen three years ago in Texas and
| only had about two hours of electricity a day for two weeks.
| That was more than enough to make it barely a disaster, even
| though we lost all vehicular services and could not shop or
| receive deliveries for that entire time. We still had water
| service, which does not seem to universally rely upon long-
| range electrical grids being consistently up.
|
| Simply surviving something like this, provided you can rely on
| the grid coming back eventually, is mostly just hunkering down.
| The water requirements here are referring to what is needed to
| sustain activity. I was also a logistics officer for a combined
| arms battalion and the water needs of an infantryman fighting a
| war are quite a bit greater than a family hunkering down in
| their house. Drink whatever non-perishable liquid you have,
| slowly, and it will take at least a week before you dehydrate.
| If you're not already anorexic or some kind of extreme
| endurance athlete, it's going to take most people at least a
| month to starve. You won't have a pleasant existence, but as
| long as you stay in place and don't try to do anything, you can
| easily stay alive without much.
|
| If you're talking true Walking Dead level post-apocalypse
| LARPing civilization is gone and not coming back, stored
| supplies do nothing but delay the inevitable. You need to learn
| how to live off the land and probably fight for it. Look at
| people taking shits in the street that Hacker News hates so
| much and see what they do to survive without working utilities
| and access to grocery stores. Eat trash. Drink rainwater. Stay
| out of sight as much as possible and look insane and dangerous
| when you're not out of sight.
| karaterobot wrote:
| Shotgun and a big canvas bag.
| stuff4ben wrote:
| The K-index for this is an 8 which is one less than an extreme G5
| geomagnetic storm (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K-index). I
| haven't been able to find it, so I'm curious what the Carrington
| event K-index was?
| gnatman wrote:
| This paper estimates Kp = (8.4+-0.8). Because the scale is
| logarithmic, the difference between 8 and 9.2 is obviously
| quite extreme.
|
| https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/asna.2022007...
| tithe wrote:
| 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 for hours, low-frequency radio navigation disrupted, and
| aurora has been seen as low as Alabama and northern California
| (typically 45deg geomagnetic lat.).
|
| https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
| xtracto wrote:
| Uuuuh I have a flight today 8pm CT . What will this mean for
| airplanes?
| tithe wrote:
| Sorry, updating...
| eigenform wrote:
| SWPC says we haven't had a G4 storm since 2003 :o
| tithe wrote:
| I wonder how Starlink is going to fare...
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| Not very well. They will absolutely lose sats this weekend.
| Thrymr wrote:
| There was a G4 storm less than two months ago:
| https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/news/noaa-satellites-detect-seve...
| eigenform wrote:
| oop, i guess i confused g4 and g5
| Animats wrote:
| PJM (the US east coast power grid) has issued a warning:
| 104202 Warning Geomagnetic Disturbance Warning
| 05.10.2024 13:48 PJM-RTO A Geomagnetic
| Disturbance Warning has been issued for 13:48 on 05.10.2024
| through 21:00 on 05.10.2024. A GMD warning of K8 or greater is in
| effect for this period.
|
| Times are US EDT.
|
| This is a warning only. No actions are listed yet.
| phyalow wrote:
| If anyone else was looking for the source of this, it's here:
|
| https://emergencyprocedures.pjm.com/ep/pages/dashboard.jsf
| lgats wrote:
| Fascinating, if anyone has info on other grids that share
| these types of alerts, pease link!
| Brybry wrote:
| ercot (texas):
| https://www.ercot.com/services/comm/mkt_notices/notices
|
| miso (midcontinent): https://www.misoenergy.org/markets-
| and-operations/notificati...
|
| ieso (canada/ontario): https://www.ieso.ca/Sector-
| Participants/RSS-Feeds/Day-0-Advi...
| everybodyknows wrote:
| CAISO (California):
|
| https://www.caiso.com/informed/Pages/Notifications/Notice
| Arc...
|
| Nothing reported just yet ...
| andrewinardeer wrote:
| Ercot seems to put some geo restrictions on their page.
| I've been blocked from viewing. I'm in Australia. When I
| put on my US VPN, it works.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Related:
|
| _NOAA Forecasts Solar Storm (G4)_
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40315394
| banish-m4 wrote:
| A science presenter mentioned that the sunspots were supposed
| visible without magnification using eclipse glasses.
| wizardforhire wrote:
| Just confirmed
| Ductapemaster wrote:
| They are definitely visible! Got to see them this afternoon --
| very cool.
| wglb wrote:
| WWV 15 mhz is way down in Chicagoland at 19:03z. 10 mhz extremely
| faint.
| scentoni wrote:
| "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
| geye1234 wrote:
| Should I disconnect my computer from the grid at this point?
|
| (I'm using a UPS with built-in power surge protection but I'd
| rather not test it in prod.)
| verdverm wrote:
| Latest https://xkcd.com/2930/ (Google Solar Cycle)
| shoghicp wrote:
| Here in Stockholm, Sweden had some power flickering and UPS
| triggering at home and several friend's place a few minutes ago.
|
| Shame it's going to be always bright outside tonight :(
| impossiblefork wrote:
| I've seen the flickering as well, but surely it's not CME-
| related?
|
| After all, it's already evening.
| petters wrote:
| It takes a while for a solar storm to reach earth. It travels
| slower than light. But I don't know what caused the
| flickering in Stockholm.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| Ah, yes, I know this of course, and I somehow temporarily
| imagined some kind of madness where the earth's sunny side
| is permanently pointing towards the sun.
| all2 wrote:
| Relevant YouTube channel:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKGlGCIiyZE
|
| This guy has done solar weather reports every morning for years
| at this point.
| wglb wrote:
| My preference is for Dr Skov:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXia20jA4tI
| tvshtr wrote:
| I am ready
| throwitaway222 wrote:
| Google News: You will see the northern lights tonight!
|
| HN: CME imminent, We're all gonna die!
| blindriver wrote:
| Is there any danger of people flying in planes during this time?
| Will there be any radiation exposure?
| chdnr wrote:
| Boeing: "When you fly our planes, you agree that Coronal Mass
| Ejections may occur at any time and we are not liable for
| sudden door losses"
| xtracto wrote:
| Want to know this a well...
| gnatman wrote:
| There was a really good article in a February issue of the New
| Yorker about solar storms:
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/03/04/what-a-major-s...
| N0b8ez wrote:
| I wonder how much it would cost to harden the US power grid
| against another Carrington Event, such that "only" thousands of
| people would die, instead of millions.
| alejohausner wrote:
| In 1989, transmission lines in Quebec were affected by a
| geomagnetic storm, bringing down the whole grid in Quebec, and
| the US grid in the Northeast.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm
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