Most of us love catastrophes, especially of cosmic scale. Solar storms have been promising the same every now and then. It now turns out the much-awaited 2012 calamity could be one of the sun's doing.
Astronomers are predicting that a massive solar storm, much bigger in potential than the one that caused spectacular light shows on Earth earlier this month, is to strike our planet in 2012 with a force of 100 million hydrogen bombs. The findings are published in the most recent issue of Australasian Science.
Similar storms back in 1859 and 1921 caused worldwide chaos, wiping out telegraph wires on a massive scale. The 2012 storm has the potential to be even more disruptive."The general consensus among general astronomers (and certainly solar astronomers) is that this coming Solar maximum (2012 but possibly later into 2013) will be the most violent in 100 years," News.com.au quoted astronomy lecturer and columnist Dave Reneke as saying.
Dr Richard Fisher, director of NASA's Heliophysics division, told Reneke the super storm would hit like "a bolt of lightning", causing catastrophic consequences for the world's health, emergency services and national security unless precautions are taken.
NASA said that a recent report by the National Academy of Sciences found that if a similar storm occurred today, it could cause "1 to 2 trillion dollars in damages to society's high-tech infrastructure and require four to 10 years for complete recovery".
As the sun enters a new phase called Solar Cycle 24, it has every potential of knocking off the earth's power grid. What can we do to make sure the system does nto collapse? Any smart ideas?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment