Solar flares: Earth hit by biggest space storm in almost seven years

(by Andrew Hough) A powerful solar flare has unleashed the biggest radiation storm in nearly seven years as the Sun bombards the Earth with huge amounts of energy.

Large swathes of the planet were hit by the geomagnetic storm amid fears the biggest storm since 2005 could disrupt important communications.

Astronomers warned the storm could affect airline routes, power grids and satellites with the worst of the storm likely to go north of Earth.

But the storm has created a positive side effect with some countries in Asia and Europe, including Britain, being witness to spectacular displays of the Northern Lights at night….read more from The Telegraph (UK)

For up-to-the-minute solar info go to www.spaceweather.com

Posted in Eletromagnetic Field, Solar, solar flares, sun spots | Leave a comment

The Mega-Disaster Just Happened, What To Do?

(NOTE: This is an excerpt from an article in Modern Survival Blog, one of the most informative survival blogs around. Here at LucifersHammer.net I simply try and hit a few highlights from time to time, whereas MSB is a full spectrum operation where you can learn everything from how to grow potatoes in a plastic tub to what the best ways are to defend yourself. Check it out, I highly recommend it.)

You wake up one morning early and turn on the TV and there is an emergency alert going off and on intermittently, in between these messages the news has been in bold red, “breaking news” and “alert”. A mega disaster the doomsayers have long been anticipating has just recently occurred. It can be any of what people consider a mega catastrophe. The mega cataclysm is going to be far more intense in scope than the smaller scale disasters such as the recent earthquakes and weather related calamities that were recoverable and more regional or local rather than worldwide. This one is going to hurt most or all of the world.

If you have not yet been directly affected then you have time, limited, to still ready yourself for the certain chaos to soon follow. The worst course of action for anyone at this point to do is to sit mesmerized at the TV or the internet screen like a deer staring at headlights approaching it. The time to do more is RIGHT NOW. The initial shock period is going to last for awhile for the majority of the population, perhaps several hours. You have to take advantage of the “shock and lull” before all out panic explodes everywhere.

For each person, family, and survival group, you are going to vastly need to have a per-organized plan geared towards your individual needs and your individual unique circumstances. This plan should be written or printed out and is necessary because almost everyone’s thoughts are going to be in spastic convulsions no matter how mentally prepared anyone “feels” they are for ANY disaster. A pre-drawn up plan to deal with a mega disaster, even lesser disasters, will help everyone follow some type of cool heads organization rather than running around in disarray and confusion….read more from Modern Survival Blog

Posted in Food, Preparedness, Stockpiling | Leave a comment

Top 10 Threats of 2012

(by By Arnaud De Borchgrave) On Dec. 18, 2010, a police slap of a vegetable-cum-fruit peddler in the Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid triggered an “Arab Spring” that no one had forecast and that quickly spawned a long, dark Arab winter.

Before the end of January 2011, violent unrest had spread to Egypt. By Feb. 11, after 18 days of riots, the 30-year dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak ended. Less than a week later, Libya exploded. And on Oct. 20, Moammar Gadhafi, Libya’s dictator for 42 years, was mauled and killed by angry revolutionaries.

The top military man in Tripoli is Abdelkrim El Haj, the former al-Qaida operative in Libya who was captured during Gadhafi’s regime, turned over to the United States, renditioned to, and tortured by, Thai authorities. He now says he isn’t holding the United States accountable but expects “those responsible to be brought to trial.”

Former close U.S. ally Egypt will soon fall under the sway of an Islamist Parliament (40 percent Muslim Brotherhood, 25 percent Salafist, or Muslim extremist). Liquor is already out of Cairo stores and can now only be sold to foreigners from locations yet to be determined. Tourism, once 15 percent of national revenue, is down to 5 percent….read more from Newsmax

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Christmas solar plasma belches to hit Earth, Mars – and Mars rover in space

(by Lewis Page) In tune perhaps with the festively-overtaxed digestive processes of many Register readers and hacks, the Sun has lately been giving vent to frightful burning eruptions of internal gas; ones sufficiently awful to mean fatal consequences for unprotected humans in their path.

Fortunately (in the case of the Sun at least) there are no such exposed bystanders. The human race, as it has done for almost its entire history*, is sheltering within the protective magnetic fields of old Earth and top solar boffins expect these to withstand the incoming plasma belches with barely a flicker. An unruffled statement regarding Christmas and Boxing Day Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) hurled out from the Sun toward Earth issued by the US Space Weather Prediction Centre says:

Geophysical Activity Forecast: The geomagnetic field is expected to be at quiet to active levels with a chance for isolated minor storm levels on day one (29 December) as multiple CMEs are expected to arrive. Quiet to unsettled level are expected on day two (30 December) as effects the previous CMEs wane. Predominantly quiet levels are expected on day three (31 December).

Read more from The Register

Posted in Solar, solar flares, Space | Leave a comment

New media hype over Katla volcano

(by Jón Frímann) There apparently is a new media hype over Katla volcano in the British press. This time around it is from BBC News. The news in question claims that a eruption in Katla volcano is going to have a global impact. This is nothing but a exaggeration in my view. While a eruption in Katla volcano might be big, there effects are mostly localized to Iceland. This was clear during the Grímsfjall volcano eruption in May of 2011. Where the global effect was close to zero, there where some flight disruptions. But they where not something major like did happen during Eyjafjalljökull volcano eruption. So the media is overestimating the effects of eruption in Katla volcano. To what end I do not know. But it sure annoyed me, and the scientists that monitor volcanoes in Iceland….read more from the Iceland Volcano and Earthquake blog

To check for more recent posts concerning Iceland volcano activity go directly to the Iceland Volcano and Earthquake blog

Posted in Iceland, Katla, Volcano | Leave a comment