The only reason that the EMP became a recent topic is because some of us read "Lights Out" by Halfast. I think that because it's a high potential impact and it struck me as interesting it seemed to be a topic worth a thread or two. I even started one because I was curious about the effects. Some on the forum have provided useful, positive information and I thank them for it.

Others have provided funny commentary along with their input and I truly enjoy that. BTW - Iron Raven, I picked up "Zombie Survival Manual" from the public library Saturday and I spent most of Sunday laughing and rolling on the floor. Definitely recommend it.

If someone doesn't like the EMP topic, or any other threads, I suggest that they just ignore them and move to a different thread that holds your own interest. There's no need to jump on a thread to criticize those just seeking information and skills. Isn't that our greatest asset during an emergency?

Yep, it's not the little things that concern me about an EMP, it is the wholesale loss of electicity in just about any form once the batteries are gone. Alternators and generators will be rendered inoperative, so will anything with a piezo device in it. Relatively speaking, though, I am not too concerned these days about the chance of an EMP being lit off.

As for terrorists, it would be of far greater impact for them to detonate a dirty nuke in a metro area than to try and generate an EMP. Most tactical nukes, such as what they would likely get their hands on, won't be able to generate an EMP big enough to effect an entire region, let alone the whole country. Now if they could set off a bomb in the right location to allow the cloud to drift over a large enough area, that would fubar us pretty bad I think.

I fully expect that the next solar cycle peak will impact us quite severely. The sun is already overheating the solar system now, and the amount of radiation it is kicking out should reach some of the highest levels ever recorded. It would not surprise me at all if we take a direct hit from a major flare in the next decade and lose a lot of the birds we've put up, such as our GPS, our weather sats, our broadband telecoms. We could see the first 150+ Mhz persistent skip zone in recorded history.

And you thought your cellphone coverage was bad now!

A nuke at extreme altitude of a small personal plane would do almost as much damage to any of the cities noted above but would have the additional effect of the EMP for a localized area, that would cause a ripple effect along (at least the US power grid) causing a huge death toll across the affected area.

Yes, you get EMP, but at that level, everything you surged is either squashed flat by the pressure wave or melted/ignited by the thermal pulse. If I'm on fire then put out by a wall of air moving at mach, I'm not so worried about my car not starting as I am about being a lightly smoking, radioactive pile smear of grease.

Part of the reason why I'm sometimes a little bit joking about EMP is because let's face it, it mean you've lost power at the same time your car has died. For the first day or two, basic preps will be fine so long as no riots break out and any disruption of services in a urbanized area brings that risk, so those of us who would dig in rather than bug out in the face of hurricane or after an earthquake already know this drill.

After that, the reality will sink in and honestly unless you are in a position to influence the behaviors of large numbers of people, then you're just going to have to roll with it. If it is very wide spread, you aren't getting external support and resupply, so you are suddenly going to have to worry about something worse than having to replace my computer- the 90% of people who are hungry and unprepared.

Also, while everyone talks about EMP, they ignore than in most scenarios, EMP is part of decapitation before a strike with either conventional or nuclear explosives. The former is called "war", the latter has problems a lot bigger than my electronic banking records are gone, both of those being things that the average citizen is not really able to do much about that other than to hope that our elected representatives and their career advisors (a) aren't fallout and (b) don't choke.

If you loose your harddrive, anything you didn't back up is gone- if it is important, put it on hardcopy, if it's kinda important but not critical, put it on CDs and DVDs. That's just computercraft. Have a backup plan for mobility, getting water, keeping food, staying warm, and making light. And be ready for normally average-to-smart people in a large group to do something amazingly stupid. How does EMP honestly differ from any other major problem such as a hurricane, earthquake, epidemic or an expeditionary and colonial fleet from a non-Terrestrial nation, other than outside support might not be there ever if the effects are widespread, rather than in a few days to a week? How do you plan for that, other than to gather the tools you think you'll need and be ready to adapt?

You know,there comes a point in the ETS game where the law of diminishing returns kicks in and says "folks things have gotten just bad enough now that surviving it may not be that desirable". Up to a point, I will tolerate a fair amount of abuse, stress and having to do without all the niceties. When the line gets crossed, well, you gotta think what is life gonna be like coming out the other side of the big nasty.

So for surviving the mild to moderate catastrophes, I reckon it is worth the time, effort and money I have put out and will continue to do so, especially if it means getting through it all stands a good chance of elevating my relative position. But if the heat gets turned up too high, even the chicken can't dance that fast, know what I mean Vern?

So while the idea of surviving an EMP strike is plausible, is it really gonna be worth it, considering all the other implications such an event would likely entail?

One thing I don't understand: You build a Faraday cage for your equipment, you get a solar flare that fries everything electronic/electrical for at least 500-1000 miles around you (possibly best-case scenario for EMPs).

So, what good is having your electronics saved, when all the access lines (etc) are dead around you? Am I understanding the scenario correctly? I do understand about having all your info on CDs, for when power eventually comes back (a year or more later), which makes sense. But having the only working computer in a an otherwise 250,000 sq mile dead zone would be some kind of advantage?

Sue

Yep! You'll have bought yours when they were cheap.

April 27, 2007 3:14 PM PDT
Solar storm warning: You have a year to prepare
Posted by Harry Fuller
The federal government now predicts a new cycle of solar storms will start in March 2008. Those storms are expected to peak around the end of 2011. That's the conclusion of some scientists at NOAA.
Solar storms lead to violent eruptions on the sun's surface. There'll be solar flares and explosions sending highly charged matter toward Earth's atmosphere. This jolts Earth's geomagnetic field and ionosphere. That can lead to disruption of electric grids and communications systems.
Sunspot predictions for this coming storm cycle run from 90 to 140. There were different prediction models among the scientists and that led to disagreement over how strong the next solar storm cycle might be. Stick around, we'll find out.

from nasa nws release

You park your Honda generator inside the cage, and can still fire it up after the SHTF. Of course, you'd better have a real good supply of gas or diesel on hand...