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this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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Showerthoughts
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The thing is, we don't know how viable this is in the long term.
For all we know, every 200 years the Earth is hit by a major EMP sunspot event that will fry our cellpones, cell towers, and satellites.
This isn't just speculative. In 1859 a major solar storm took down most of the electronic communication of that time. Back then, that meant telegraph communication. The first major telegraph message had been sent only 15 years before, so world-wide communications didn't suffer too much.
If we had a major storm now, the winners would be those countries and institutions that still retained paper-based communications and information management systems. The losers would be everyone dependent on electronics communications.
That is not true. Paper-based information storage is significantly more unreliable and volatile than electronic storage. Geomagnetic storms of such intensity as the Carrington Event would certainly cause power outages and other inconvenience, sure, but modern integrated circuits based on field-effect transistors would likely be entirely unaffected, and most integrated circuitry is hardened anyway and especially high-density VLSI devices like flagship smartphones that use 5nm manufacturing processes are protected against so many special cases and quantum phenomena like electromigration that a geomagnetic storm would appear to be a very minor problem. Solid-state storage drives are also very reliable in extreme scenarios and most would likely retain their data in the case of a major solar flare. And much data is still saved on optical storage media like DVD, and these are absolutely immune to geomagnetic storms and EMPs. The only thing we really should worry about is our power grid, but we won't lose any significant quantity of data and definitely not such that is integral to the functioning of our technology and society. And Faraday's cage still exists, so a lot of militaries and institutions will probably have made arrangements that make sure their devices are not compromised.
You are correct that there are many devices and plenty of examples of infrastructure that is hardened against such things- but it's just plain wrong to assume it wont be a major problem- Multiple studies have found the damage caused by a solar storm equivalent to the 1859 example would cause trillions of dollars of damage and a lot infrastructure would be down across most of the 1st world for at least months if not years.
It would probably also trigger a lot of violent outbursts from populations around the world, probably a lot of mostly peaceful and fiery looting, riots etc.
Source on the first world countries being down for years?
https://youtu.be/oHHSSJDJ4oo?t=343 This is the video I was remembering, it has sources in the description if you want further reading- and it says 4-10 years, which is insane to think about.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/oHHSSJDJ4oo?t=343
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
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I didn't understand a lot of those terms so you're probably smart enough for me to trust you, thanks for helping assuage my fears
Make sure you put your phones into the microwave when a solar storm comes
What setting?
The strongest one
Melt > Butter > 1 Stick
I mean, if all the infrastructure is fried, your phone surviving wont do much besides allow you to have a disconnected phone until the battery dies.
I'm the beginning yes, but when everything does start going back online, you'll be able to while everyone else is overpaying for the limited supply. Billions will be wanting smart devices just to call other people and the supply will be extremely limited for a while.
The ideal good to have in their are a phone or two, loaded up external hard drives, solar charging batteries, and maybe a laptop. Enough to get by until everything is relatively more normal.
Yeah… man, that would be a clusterfuck. Or I should say, WILL be, when it inevitably happens.
Probably the least of my worries for when that happens but uhh… anyone know if optical media are capable of surviving a Carrington event? Sure as shit hard drives won’t. I’d like to keep some data..
Maybe I'm misremembering it but I don't think personal devices would be much affected. Apart from potentially damaging satellites, AFAIK the biggest danger is induction of big currents in powerlines and telecommunications lines and it could fry the components connected directly to them if they're not sufficiently protected from power surges (substations, network elements etc.). Any damage to data storage devices, computer chips and such would only be secondary, if the surge propagates all the way to the computer or server, which I find quite unlikely on a larger scale with all the surge protections we have. But someone correct me if I'm wrong.
I sure hope so. Perhaps my home data centre is safe.
Although I guess it depends on the intensity of the storm doesn’t it?
I've heard some major techies will keep a spare unplugged microwave in their room with spare hdds inside incase a solar store comes. The same Faraday cage that stops waves from harming us should hopefully keep them safe if/when a Carrington event happens again.
Damn, I don’t have a spare microwave lying around..