http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com
http://albertpeia.com/empburst.htm
Sometimes we all get a
little reminder of just how completely and totally dependent we are on the
power grid. Massive thunderstorms that ripped through Ohio,
West Virginia, Maryland,
Washington D.C.
and Virginia
left millions without power over the weekend. At this point it is being
projected that some people may not get power back until the end of the
week. The "super derecho"
storm that pounded the Washington
D.C. area on Friday night with
hurricane-force winds is being called unprecedented. But the truth is
that there are other events that could happen that would be far more damaging
to our power grid. For example, a substantial EMP burst over a major U.S. city would
fry virtually all of the electronics in the city and take the power grid in the
area down indefinitely. A gigantic EMP burst over the entire country
(caused by a massive solar storm or a very large nuclear explosion high in the
atmosphere) could theoretically take down the entire national power grid.
Just try to imagine a world where nobody has any electricity, nobody can pump
gas, nobody can use their credit cards or get any more money, where most
vehicles won't start, where nobody has the Internet, where all cell phones are
dead and where nobody can heat or cool their homes. That is how serious
an EMP burst could potentially be. We are talking about an event that
could be millions of times worse than 9/11.
Hopefully
this latest storm has reminded Americans about how vulnerable our power grid
really is and about how close we really are to being knocked back to the late
1800s.
Let's
review some of the damage that this "super derecho"
storm caused to the D.C. area....
-Thousands
of businesses have been forced to close temporarily because they cannot operate
without electricity
-Many
federal agencies were closed on Monday because there was
no power
-Many
911 call centers throughout Northern Virginia were down over the weekend and could not
respond to emergencies
-Without
electricity, many families have not been able to cook warm meals
-Without
warm water, many families have not been able to take hot showers
-A "boil water advisory
"
was put into effect for several areas of northern Virginia
-Many families that still do not have
power are in danger of losing much of the food in their refrigerators and freezers
-Many gas
stations were not able to operate because of a lack of electricity and so this
has made filling up the gas tank a major hassle for many families
-Hundreds of
traffic lights are still out and this is making
commuting a major problem in some areas
-Without air conditioning many families are
absolutely sweltering as high temperatures remain well above 90 degrees
-During the power outage some people have been
without cell phone service because many cell phone towers were inoperable
-Without electricity, thousands upon thousands of
people have not been able to use their computers for several days and this is
causing a lot of frustration
-Several major websites were totally knocked offline
by the storms as Robert McMillan of Wired Magazine explained....
Hurricane-like
storms knocked an Amazon data center in Ashburn,
Virginia, offline last night, and
a chunk of the internet felt it. The six-hour incident temporarily cut off a
number of popular internet services, including Netflix, Pinterest,
Heroku, and Instagram.
But to be honest
this was not a major disaster.
After a few days
the damage will be fixed and people will start to forget what just happened.
Well, what if
the damage was permanent and the entire nation had to go without electricity
for the foreseeable future? The following is from a USA Today article by Dan Vergano....
The sky erupts. Cities darken,
food spoils and homes fall silent. Civilization collapses.
End-of-the-world
novel? A video game? Or could such a scenario loom in America's
future?
There is talk of catastrophe ahead, depending on whom
you believe, because of the threat of an electromagnetic pulse triggered by
either a supersized solar storm or terrorist A-bomb, both capable of disabling
the electric grid that powers modern life.
As I have written about previously, an EMP
attack could fundamentally change life in America in a single instant.
What would you do if such a
scenario happened?
Would you try to go
somewhere? Even if the electronics in your car were not totally fried,
you would not be able to pump more gas anywhere.
Would you try to call
someone? Most phones would be totally dead and all normal communications
networks would be down. So who would you call?
Would you bunker down and try
to survive on what you have at home? Most of the food in your
refrigerator and freezer would rapidly go bad and most Americans only have
enough food to last a few days or a few weeks. In addition, most
Americans would no longer be able to heat or cool their homes, so extreme cold
and extreme heat would become huge problems very quickly.
How in the world would any of
us survive in a world without electricity?
In past centuries our
forefathers knew how to survive in such a world, but most of us do not have the
same skills or resources that they had.
The following is how an
article in the Wall Street Journal once described
what a massive EMP burst would do to this nation....
No American would necessarily die in the initial
attack, but what comes next is potentially catastrophic. The pulse would wipe
out most electronics and telecommunications, including the power grid. Millions
could die for want of modern medical care or even of starvation since farmers
wouldn't be able to harvest crops and distributors wouldn't be able to get food
to supermarkets. Commissioner Lowell Wood calls EMP attack a "giant
continental time machine" that would move us back more than a century in
technology to the late 1800s.
What would you do if you were suddenly cut off from
all electricity, all money, all modern forms of communication, all modern forms
of transportation and all modern forms of shopping?
Don't think that it can't happen.
Scientists tell us that massive EMP bursts generated
by gigantic solar storms have hit our planet in the past and that it is
inevitable that it will happen again.
In addition, nations all over the planet are aware of
what an EMP burst can do and have been developing "Super-EMP" weapons
that can take power grids down in a single strike.
The following is a short excerpt from a statement by
Dr. Peter Vincent Pry to the United
States Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism,
Technology and Homeland Security on March 8th, 2005....
Russian and Chinese military scientists in open source
writings describe the basic principles of nuclear weapons designed specifically
to generate an enhanced-EMP effect, that they term "Super-EMP"
weapons. "Super-EMP" weapons, according to these foreign open source
writings, can destroy even the best protected U.S. military and civilian
electronic systems.
That doesn't sound good.
But perhaps even more troubling is that North Korea has
been reportedly developing this type of weapon. In fact, it has been
reported that North Korea
may have tested a "Super-EMP" weapon all the way back in 2009....
North Korea’s last round of tests, conducted in May
2009, appear to have included a “super-EMP” weapon, capable of emitting enough
gamma rays to disable the electric power grid across most of the lower 48
states
In time, these kinds of weapons will get into more
and more hands.
Will someone try to use this kind of weapon at some
point?
Frank Gaffney, the president of the Center for
Security Policy, believes that a single EMP burst could potentially end up
killing the vast majority of the population of the United States....
"Within a
year of that attack, nine out of 10 Americans would be dead, because we can't
support a population of the present size in urban centers and the like without
electricity"
Once you
understand these kinds of threats, it makes it a lot easier to understand why preppers are so busy preparing for the future.
Our world is becoming incredibly unstable. Another major economic crisis could hit us at any
time, war in the Middle East could erupt
without warning, earthquakes and other natural disasters are becoming more
frequent and society seems to get a little crazier with each passing day.
The era of
tremendous peace and prosperity that we have all been enjoying is rapidly
coming to an end. In a world filled with instability and chaos, it only
seems prudent to take some precautions.
You might want
to get prepared while you still have time.
