I have been paying a lot of attention over all of my web presence on this site blogging and clogging up the networks about solar flares and the like..
Last night (did not see them) and tonight, there is a chance that northern lights will be as low as my state of Pennsylvania.. that’s a big deal. Far down here. It was a major solar flare and storm that obviously caused such an event.
Such an event could be a catastrophe..
The timing from the Obama Administration couldn’t be more impeccable.
A solar flare awareness is evident.. hopefully cool non-flared heads will prevail and this nation will advance beyond 20th century technology and insulate our grid. It would be a stunning achievement for the President–call it a new Dwight Eisenhower interstate system.. it could create jobs and maintain future economy might and security.
A failure?
That could be awful.
As FOX news reports, about the White House plan and obvious dangers:
“The efforts undertaken to achieve the objectives of this strategy will establish a national approach to the security and resilience in the face of our improved understanding of the seriousness of the space-weather risk, and the steps we must take to prepare for it,” Suzanne Spaulding, undersecretary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s National Protection and Programs Directorate, said Thursday during an event hosted by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) that discussed the new documents.
That risk is indeed serious, many experts say. High-energy solar flares aimed at Earth can affect the operation of orbiting satellites, and the most powerful emissions can even pose a risk to astronauts aboard the International Space Station.
Of even larger concern are coronal mass ejections (CMEs), huge eruptions that send clouds of solar plasma streaking through space at millions of miles per hour. CMEs that hit Earth can spawn intense geomagnetic storms, with the potential to disrupt power grids, satellite navigation and radio communications temporarily.
In March 1989, for example, a strong CME caused a blackout that left 6 million people in the Canadian province of Quebec without power for 9 hours, OSTP Director John Holdren said during Thursday’s event, which was webcast live.
The news just so happens to coincide with a major solar storm.
All of earth should take notice.
