Carrington style event with a solar flare... preps?

[PreppingPingu]

Also what do we think the knock on effect would be... its all well and good saying the power will be back in 6 months but could society maintain itself for that long..

The book "One Second After" deals with this rather well. If you get a chance, read it. Its an easy read and not a huge book and it certainly make you think about how life would go on after a social/economic changing event such as that. In the UK I understand that our power system is more robust than our American and Canadian friends due to how our grid system is laid out or rather it is less susceptible to a total loss of power, though I may have got that wrong.

Many years ago I had to visit a "civil defence bunker" to fix some telephone equipment.

- interestingly in One Second After, they revive an old telephone system with an operator to manage it so they can talk to the next town.

[peejay]

An EMP type event is something that has weighed on my mind for a long while, it WILL happen again at some point, just a matter of whether it does so in our lifetime or way in the future.

The thing that strikes me though is that it's one thing having widespread electricity knocked out (say from a CME) but the bigger problem is that without that electricity you don't have the power to manufacture the replacement parts etc. so it'll likely go exponentially bad PDQ...

[Arwen Thebard]

One second after does its best to describe just how quickly things would go bad, but IMO the impacts would be even faster and more severe. I know very few people who would last 1 or 2 days without power before going into complete meltdown. A scary prospect indeed.

[SPJ]

I was listening to a Podcast last year. The Conversation was about the Sun and it going into Hibernation
and the effect it would have on the Earth over the next 50 years. The topic of a Carrington Event came up. The Guest, an Electronic Warfare Expert, said the number one question he was always asked, was how to build a Faraday Cage, this is what he suggested:

To make a Poor Mans Faraday Cage. You will need:

1 Metal Rubbish Bin. (They come in different sizes and are generally all Galvanised.)
2 A roll of this- https://www.screwfix.com/p/aluminium-fo ... -45m/50629

Take your bin and draw a marker line around the rim of the lid, onto the bin itself. Then remove the lid. Then with the tape, tape over the line, making sure the tape is equal on both sides of the line. This is to make that the Lid, fits tightly onto the bin. Also when you come to seal the bin it will bind with the pre placed tape. Also put some onto the lid as well for the same reason

You should then place the Roll of Tape into the Bin until it's needed. So you know where it is at all times.

In the event of an EMP, which I might add is more likely to come from the Sun, and which we would get about 12Hrs warning notice!

Place your valuables in the bin, then take the Foil tape and tape the lid around its rim, to the bin. Sealing it tight.

That's is your Poor mans Faraday Cage.

Now you should be able to do that, depending on the size of bin, for about £30 or less. Especially if you are just looking at putting phones and IPads into a small size bin. You could if you want, line the bin with rubber mats if you so which to. Just to give your valuables some extra protection.

[Arzosah]

If a bin is too big, or if you live in a flat, the other option is a breadbin, from places like Wilko: http://www.wilko.com/storage-jars+bread ... vt/0453051
They've changed the style since I bought mine, a side opening must be a little bit less secure, I'd have thought, but it might be an option.

[jansman]

If a bin is too big, or if you live in a flat, the other option is a breadbin, from places like Wilko: http://www.wilko.com/storage-jars+bread ... vt/0453051
They've changed the style since I bought mine, a side opening must be a little bit less secure, I'd have thought, but it might be an option.

That's rather a neat idea!

[ukpreppergrrl]

In the event of an EMP, which I might add is more likely to come from the Sun, and which we would get about 12Hrs warning notice!

Cool! So I possibly won't be sorting out my electronics when it strikes. Unless I miss the urgent memo about the imminent Coronal Mass Ejection....

Even if you protected electronics, such as phones ,tablets and even radios,it is probable that no one else has.Therefore there's no interaction with others,making your stuff useless

The assumption there is that the only reason I am protecting my electronics is so that I can communicate with others. Not so. I want to protect my Kindle and my music and my films and tv i.e. my entertainment! Yes I am that shallow! Also I doubt that no-one else on the face of the planet would have protected their communications equipment, either deliberately or accidentally. e.g. There is a building where I used to work that is clad in decorative metal sheeting. A side effect of this is that you can get no phone signal inside the building. Nada. Effectively the building is one big faraday cage. I rather like it. I'm fairly sure that any electrical items that happened to be in there (not connected to the mains) come the great EMP strike would be protected; certainly from a CME though maybe not a nuclear EMP. Items on the London Underground underground parts (particularly the Northern Line, which is the deepest line) at the time would probably be protected (the rails may act as antennas but things on the tube trains or the platforms are insulated from the rails). I think rather more electrical items will survive by accident than is necessarily thought. I'm not saying that the whole country won't go to pot, but not bothering to protect your own things simply because no-one else will be protecting theirs is a little shortsighted. Natch things like mobile phones rely on satellites in order to communicate and in a CME they will be the first things to stop working (but they will possibly be ok from a nuclear EMP depending on where it was detonated). But hey, that radio ham on his way to a convention with his portable rig in his backpack, standing on the platform at Hampstead Station...he will be a God when he emerges from under the ground. Assuming he doesn't have a heart attack climbing the 320 stairs on his way to freedom...

As for powering said items after The Great EMP Strike Of ???? - this is where batteries and solar panels come in. From what I have read there is nothing in a solar panel that will be affected by an EMP other than the diodes that stop electricity coming back into the panel from the batteries. Yes your charge controller will be fooked so you should have a spare one in your metal rubbish bin, but the panels themselves and the batteries will be fine I think. And if they're not, well I'll watch the pretty colours in the sky and know that at least I did my best.

*Usual caveat - I am no expert, I could be talking bo***cks, note the frequent use of "probably" and "think".

[SPJ]

An EMP from either a Nuclear or a actual EMP device would probably be a localised event. By that say, the effects would be within a 100 or 200 miles radius of an Detonation.

However, with a CME EMP from the Sun. If you take the UK as X marks the spot. An EMP directly hitting the UK, would effect the East Coast of the United States, all of Europe, Africa, Eastern Europe etc. In fact everywhere, where it is daylight would be effected. Every Transformer and Relay Station would be destroyed. Every Power Line, Telephone Cable would overload, spreading the damage directly into Houses, Factories. Your household Fuse Boxes would blow. Every Vehicle would be knocked out. I could go on. The damage would be Utterly Catastrophic.

Every 200 years or so, the Sun sends out a Grid Killing CME-EMP, that hits the Earth. The problem is we've never had an Electrical Grid before to kill.

[Wood cutter]

An EMP from either a Nuclear or a actual EMP device would probably be a localised event. By that say, the effects would be within a 100 or 200 miles radius of an Detonation.

However, with a CME EMP from the Sun. If you take the UK as X marks the spot. An EMP directly hitting the UK, would effect the East Coast of the United States, all of Europe, Africa, Eastern Europe etc. In fact everywhere, where it is daylight would be effected. Every Transformer and Relay Station would be destroyed. Every Power Line, Telephone Cable would overload, spreading the damage directly into Houses, Factories. Your household Fuse Boxes would blow. Every Vehicle would be knocked out. I could go on. The damage would be Utterly Catastrophic.

Every 200 years or so, the Sun sends out a Grid Killing CME-EMP, that hits the Earth. The problem is we've never had an Electrical Grid before to kill.

How do we know it's every 200 ish years? How long have these things been monitored for? Long enough for statistically significant results?

[ForgeCorvus]

An EMP from either a Nuclear or a actual EMP device would probably be a localised event. By that say, the effects would be within a 100 or 200 miles radius of an Detonation.

However, with a CME EMP from the Sun. If you take the UK as X marks the spot. An EMP directly hitting the UK, would effect the East Coast of the United States, all of Europe, Africa, Eastern Europe etc. In fact everywhere, where it is daylight would be effected. Every Transformer and Relay Station would be destroyed. Every Power Line, Telephone Cable would overload, spreading the damage directly into Houses, Factories. Your household Fuse Boxes would blow. Every Vehicle would be knocked out. I could go on. The damage would be Utterly Catastrophic.

Every 200 years or so, the Sun sends out a Grid Killing CME-EMP, that hits the Earth. The problem is we've never had an Electrical Grid before to kill.

How do we know it's every 200 ish years? How long have these things been monitored for? Long enough for statistically significant results?

But is it "Every 200 years or so" or "A once in 200 years Event" ?
The first means that it will happen and then you are free and clear for the next two centuries, the other that you have a 200-1 chance of it happening this year (and a 200-1 chance of it happening in any given year, which means you might have it several years in a row)

More info Here and Here