NASA: 2012 solar flares could DEVASTATE CITIES!

Get the numbers of dead Katrina victims right

Please cross check your numbers for the total dead from Katrina. Thousands died and many of those bodies were never found as they washed out into the Gulf of Mexico from that monster Hurricane.

Something to look forward to

All iDevice owners will be vaporized as they clutch them tightly to their bosoms :)

Bingo

So devistation reigns..and a new ice age will start a few years after.,...HMMMMMMMMM...then whe better get this old earth as warm as possible before that happens so the decreas in temps will not be as severe right? Get lots of carbon and greenhouse gasses in the air.It is our only help...The sky is falling, the sky is falling RUN RUN chicken little...Quote " The more intelligent and educated we become the more reason and common sense are pushed aside from oner enlarged egos"

Bingo

So devistation reigns..and a new ice age will start a few years after.,...HMMMMMMMMM...then whe better get this old earth as warm as possible before that happens so the decreas in temps will not be as severe right? Get lots of carbon and greenhouse gasses in the air.It is our only help...The sky is falling, the sky is falling RUN RUN chicken little...Quote " The more intelligent and educated we become the more reason and common sense are pushed aside from our enlarged egos"

OMFG what dose this mean? Thomas Aquinas says that “it is clear that blasphemy, which is a sin committed directly against God, is more grave than murder, which is a sin against one's neighbor. … it is called the most grievous sin, for as much as it makes every sin more grievous.”[11]

The author of this article is an idiot.

The mere thought of this is amusing, but the authors sincerity makes this one for The Onion. This shit is not in any way true. Devastate cities? Get F*cking real dude.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/Design/graphics/icons/comment/fail_32.png

"It may not be time to wrap all your electronics in tinfoil just yet."

Or maybe you should to keep them warm through the "mini Ice Age"!

They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist...................

There simply isn't enough energy in the sun to send a killer fireball 93 million miles to destroy Earth ... even at their worst, the sun's flares are not physically capable of destroying Earth.

Famous last words?

what about zombies though? the internet said there would be zombies reanimated by solar flares. NASA is being curiously silent on that front. obviously they don't want to cause a panic by telling people about the coming zombie apocalypse as predicted by the Mayan's calander, but I think by remaining silent on the subject they are just confirming that the zombie threat is real and they can't stop it.

OMG!!

Hide the electronics? Hell no! Dig out the old 10m SSB rig and enjoy!

(27MHz CB'ers too. Just, please, stay in your band. Thanks.)

Wait a minute..

"devastate modern civilisation" blah blah, "bringing down power grids" yawn and "frying satellites en masse" /shrug. "Food would rot, trains wouldn't move, traffic would be gridlocked", who cares? crisps don't go off for months, "phones and THE INTERNET WOULDN'T WORK".. O.M.F.G.

So what you're saying is this could be the End of the World of Warcraft (tm)? And I notice none of the important questions have been asked.. Is the downtime expected to be more than an hour? Will deleting my WTF folder and running a repair restore my WoW connection? Does WoW have it's own backup of the internet just in case of catastrophic, world-wide destruction? Given we are forecasting solar flares, a solar genny for my WoW laptop will be just the ticket right? Do the Red Cross have adequate supplies of spare laptop batteries for all major manufacturers?

That's why they killed the ibook, now everything is encased in aluminium shells which can be earthed, it's Steve Jobs' last vision, oh wow oh wow oh wow.

Is this a joke?

The author has clearly bought into the sensationalism (maybe to get more views) regarding solar flares and "DOOM." Even if every satellite gets knocked out of the sky and every chip gets fried on earth, it's not going to kill everyone in planes or ships. Every commercial Boeing aircraft has a full hydraulic backup for the control surfaces, so even in a complete electronics failure the pilot can still land safely. That's not to mention the thousands upon thousands of smaller aircraft which are controlled by cables attached to the yolk... In addition, every air and sea captain worth their salt/wings can navigate if their electronic systems fail. Control Towers and aircraft have light-guns/maps/E6-B's and ships have lighthouses/maps/Sextants.

More realistically, if only the satellites go offline for GPS and other telecommunication, there is still the LORAN system and its offspring that can be rapidly put back into service (see: flip the "on" switch)

Not to mention many amateur radio systems still use old tubes which are far more impervious to a little burst of radiation than the transistor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_light_signals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_flight_control_system

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sextant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E6B

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LORAN

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_tube

Is it really hard to do a bit of research before such grandiose claims of gloom and doom (and the inability to prevent it) are made?

If the traffic lights are taken out, how can there be gridlock? Traffic flows better when traffic lights are broken.

Investments

I myself will be investing my money in buying up tin foil futures as they price is going to sky rocket when every man and their hamster will want a tin foil hat next year.

And then Global Warming, right.? I heard the science is settled on that.

may not be time to wrap you computer in tinfoil yet

damn I just got a job lot in.

Time to..

Erect those solar panels I've had laying about in the garage for a year. That way I can be be self sufficient and charge all those devices and gadgets that won't work!

Interesting

The sun is reportedly going into a period where less solar activity exists, despite the fact that this should be one of the more active periods.

Somehow though, this period of lesser activity will provide risk to our cities?

Yes, but,

Who's to blame for this? Will there be and inquiry into it? What health and safety precautions should we take? More importantly from whom do we seek compensation?

I have nothing to contribute to the discussion....

But after all these comet/solar flare/financial catastrophe articles, I demand that we get a "We're all gonna die!!" icon.....

Reminds me of Y2K warnings

nt

BOFH

Solar flares are already listed on the BOFH excuse list. No news here, move along now... :)

SOLAR BEWARE

If my memory serves me correctly Canada had a massive power outage in 1989 due to the last big solar flare. Several million people lost power for around nine hours.

Strange as it may seem, not one igloo was flattened, and not one polar bear was killed. I think the safest thing to do is spend whole of 2012 in an igloo with your head stuck up a polar bears bum