A “perfect coronal mass ejection” could be a nightmare

I wonder if there's a Paleo-proxy or some kind of natural record that could be used to trace the frequency and magnitude of these events throughout Earth's geological past and if anyone is looking into it? For example we can look at the ocean sediments (usually by measuring changes in isotopic ratio of different compounds) and infer a great deal on temperature, carbon cycling, polar reversal, ocean circulation, chemistry etc. going back millions of years. It would be really neat and helpful if we discovered a proxy that we could use to trace solar flares hitting earth.

This reminds me of the warnings about a coronavirus pandemic from over 10 years ago.<p>We know from geological records that these are periodic events that happened every so often. We are due for one, and it is in our best interest to take the periodicity of nature seriously.

The current weakening of Earth&#x27;s Geomagnetic field (Geomagnetic Excursion) would leave Earth relatively unprotected from a CME as well. Weakened Geomagnetic Fields seem to be correlated to mass extinction&#x2F;evolution events.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;full&#x2F;10.1029&#x2F;2018RG000629" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;full&#x2F;10.1029&#x2F;201...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S0012821X14001629" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S0012821X1...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;abs&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S1342937X16000319" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;abs&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S13429...</a>

I am not an astrophysicist, but I don&#x27;t see any reason to doubt the study&#x27;s conclusions. But isn&#x27;t the more pressing question the probability of such a CME hitting the Earth? The sun is not small, and CMEs could be ejected away from it in any direction, I would think relatively few of them hit any of the planets?

The timing of the Carrington Event was strangely fortuitous - only when a few telegraph lines had been installed. So the cost of the adverse event was relatively minor. Good thing the aliens controlling our simulation tested us early.

It can be avoided if we will start to protect our electronics and networks right now. At least most critical ones. The protection technology is available already, just need to be integrated everywhere.

Starlink?<p>I&#x27;d rather have fibre on the ground for a lot of reasons, but if enough people moved to LEO orbit sats, and then huge numbers of them get affected by reduced magnetosphere protection, the compounding problems here are huge.

It would be interesting to model the way different societies would deal with such an event. Some presumably would have a run on toilet paper and other essentials. Other societies might ration resources on a need basis.

This makes me think about Taleb&#x27;s fragile vs robust vs antifragile systems with relation to the power grid.<p>Is a nation-sized power grid even a good idea anymore? If most places were powered by a local cooperative solar + wind + storage system, it would be less efficient, but wouldn&#x27;t it also be a lot more robust against a CME, and also everything else? Individual systems would go down all the time, but overall the system as a whole would never be able to be taken down by pretty much anything.

Just here to point out this idea (no spoilers) is a major plot point in the Oppenheimer Alternative, the newest book by famed science fiction author Robert Sawyer. A good read.

Given all the ICS security threats of late I wonder has any government gamed out how to take advantage of an impending CME. For example preventing a shutdown of critical CME vulnerable equipment to cause maximum damage. Given the CME is the thing doing the damage it would be a hard one politically to push back on if tracks were covered by the actor.

This is why I haven’t bought doge coin

Depending solely on electricity is a bad idea. In a past weather event that lead to a power loss for nearly two weeks, everyone I knew was thankful to have piped natural gas. I am not sure I trust electric cars and fully electric homes to be sufficiently redundant.

This kills all the satellites in our orbit as well? Satellites are already vulnerable to solar events and magnetic anomalies like SAA.<p>In additional to everything on Earth being wiped out would this would create a mini Kessler Syndrome since all satellites are now space junk which we will never be able to communicate with again?

I don&#x27;t really get the &quot;nightmare&quot; consequences. Sure, some electric systems will go down &#x2F; maybe burn down. But few people will die, right?<p>When I saw nightmare in the title, I expected something like humanity will be wiped out, or maybe just 90% of us.<p>Can somebody clarify?

There are already a few measures that can be taken to prevent extensive safe to the grid from an CME<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;LLO9WxVO9s8" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;LLO9WxVO9s8</a>

How about creating a mass-ejection-storm-powered sunwards satellite, that creates a magnetic field and allows earth to orbit in its &quot;calmer&quot; cone-wake? It would be basically just &quot;dead&quot; components + coolant at point of event, held in place till then by a steering module.<p>I don&#x27;t subscribe to the incident statistics on this anymore. We had similar incident statistics pre-chernobyl, pre-fukushima and they are not mereley useless, they are actually harmful and dangerous. They prevent discussion, calm down politicans and public, fuel a short-sighted prevent-cost-at-allcost-preventionism that sabotages any disaster awareness and preparedness.

Does anyone have an idea of what a CME direct hit would do to a residential solar&#x2F;battery system?<p>Would the outcomes for grid-connected and off-grid systems be different?

Will my desktop and laptop survive such perfect CME ?

Is there anything that a citizen can do today to advocate for preparing for an event like this?

Knowing the high probability of this, I’m curious how everyone will change their day today.

Would I finally get to see the northern lights from the equator?