No where in the quote does it reference 2012. Solar flares have happened throughout history and the ancients may just have been frightened when writing their text.
What an awful prediction you have created as you INTERPRETED texts that did not even have that meaning at all. Ask the scholar next to you what they think the same words mean. That is the problem with the bibles we now use - they are open to interpretation and anyone can control someone with their own interpretation.
STOP spreading fear in the name of religion writings.
2012: The End of the World, but not Literally
Moderators: eye_of_tiger, shalimar123
-
govardhanvt
- Posts: 2007
- Joined: Fri May 19, 2006 12:56 pm
-
govardhanvt
- Posts: 2007
- Joined: Fri May 19, 2006 12:56 pm
Space storm alert: 90 seconds from catastrophe
Michael Brooks
23 March 2009
source: newscientist.com
IT IS midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies
above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of
colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora
this far south but their fascination is short-lived. Within a
few seconds, electric bulbs dim and flicker, then become
unusually bright for a fleeting moment. Then all the lights
in the state go out. Within 90 seconds, the entire eastern
half of the US is without power.
A year later and millions of Americans are dead and the
nation's infrastructure lies in tatters. The World Bank
declares America a developing nation. Europe,
Scandinavia, China and Japan are also struggling to
recover from the same fateful event - a violent storm, 150
million kilometres away on the surface of the sun.
It sounds ridiculous. Surely the sun couldn't create so
profound a disaster on Earth. Yet an extraordinary report
funded by NASA and issued by the US National Academy
of Sciences (NAS) in January this year claims it could do
just that.
Over the last few decades, western civilisations have busily sown the seeds of their own destruction. Our modern way of life, with its reliance
on technology, has unwittingly exposed us to an extraordinary danger: plasma balls spewed from the surface of the sun could wipe out our
power grids, with catastrophic consequences.
The projections of just how catastrophic make chilling reading. "We're moving closer and closer to the edge of a possible disaster," says
Daniel Baker, a space weather expert based at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and chair of the NAS committee responsible for the
report.
It is hard to conceive of the sun wiping out a large amount of our hard-earned progress. Nevertheless, it is possible. The surface of the sun
is a roiling mass of plasma - charged high-energy particles - some of which escape the surface and travel through space as the solar wind.
From time to time, that wind carries a billion-tonne glob of plasma, a fireball known as a coronal mass ejection (see "When hell comes to
Earth"). If one should hit the Earth's magnetic shield, the result could be truly devastating.
The incursion of the plasma into our atmosphere causes rapid changes in the configuration of Earth's magnetic field which, in turn, induce
currents in the long wires of the power grids. The grids were not built to handle this sort of direct current electricity. The greatest danger is at
the step-up and step-down transformers used to convert power from its transport voltage to domestically useful voltage. The increased DC
current creates strong magnetic fields that saturate a transformer's magnetic core. The result is runaway current in the transformer's copper
wiring, which rapidly heats up and melts. This is exactly what happened in the Canadian province of Quebec in March 1989, and six million
people spent 9 hours without electricity. But things could get much, much worse than that.
Worse than Katrina
The most serious space weather event in history happened in 1859. It is known as the Carrington event, after the British amateur
astronomer Richard Carrington, who was the first to note its cause: "two patches of intensely bright and white light" emanating from a large
group of sunspots. The Carrington event comprised eight days of severe space weather.
There were eyewitness accounts of stunning auroras, even at equatorial latitudes. The world's telegraph networks experienced severe
disruptions, and Victorian magnetometers were driven off the scale.
Though a solar outburst could conceivably be more powerful, "we haven't found an example of anything worse than a Carrington event", says
James Green, head of NASA's planetary division and an expert on the events of 1859. "From a scientific perspective, that would be the one
that we'd want to survive." However, the prognosis from the NAS analysis is that, thanks to our technological prowess, many of us may not.
There are two problems to face. The first is the modern electricity grid, which is designed to operate at ever higher voltages over ever larger
areas. Though this provides a more efficient way to run the electricity networks, minimising power losses and wastage through
overproduction, it has made them much more vulnerable to space weather. The high-power grids act as particularly efficient antennas,
channelling enormous direct currents into the power transformers.
The second problem is the grid's interdependence with the systems that support our lives: water and sewage treatment, supermarket
delivery infrastructures, power station controls, financial markets and many others all rely on electricity. Put the two together, and it is clear
that a repeat of the Carrington event could produce a catastrophe the likes of which the world has never seen. "It's just the opposite of how
we usually think of natural disasters," says John Kappenman, a power industry analyst with the Metatech Corporation of Goleta, California,
and an advisor to the NAS committee that produced the report. "Usually the less developed regions of the world are most vulnerable, not the
highly sophisticated technological regions."
According to the NAS report, a severe space weather event in the US could induce ground currents that would knock out 300 key
transformers within about 90 seconds, cutting off the power for more than 130 million people (see map). From that moment, the clock is
ticking for America.
First to go - immediately for some people - is drinkable water. Anyone living in a high-rise apartment, where water has to be pumped to
reach them, would be cut off straight away. For the rest, drinking water will still come through the taps for maybe half a day. With no electricity
to pump water from reservoirs, there is no more after that.
There is simply no electrically powered transport: no trains, underground or overground. Our just-in-time culture for delivery networks may
represent the pinnacle of efficiency, but it means that supermarket shelves would empty very quickly - delivery trucks could only keep running
until their tanks ran out of fuel, and there is no electricity to pump any more from the underground tanks at filling stations.
Back-up generators would run at pivotal sites - but only until their fuel ran out. For hospitals, that would mean about 72 hours of running a
bare-bones, essential care only, service. After that, no more modern healthcare.
72 hours of healthcare remaining
The truly shocking finding is that this whole situation would not improve for months, maybe years: melted transformer hubs cannot be
repaired, only replaced. "From the surveys I've done, you might have a few spare transformers around, but installing a new one takes a
well-trained crew a week or more," says Kappenman. "A major electrical utility might have one suitably trained crew, maybe two."
Within a month, then, the handful of spare transformers would be used up. The rest will have to be built to order, something that can take up
to 12 months.
Even when some systems are capable of receiving power again, there is no guarantee there will be any to deliver. Almost all natural gas
and fuel pipelines require electricity to operate. Coal-fired power stations usually keep reserves to last 30 days, but with no transport
systems running to bring more fuel, there will be no electricity in the second month.
30 days of coal left
Nuclear power stations wouldn't fare much better. They are programmed to shut down in the event of serious grid problems and are not
allowed to restart until the power grid is up and running.
With no power for heating, cooling or refrigeration systems, people could begin to die within days. There is immediate danger for those who
rely on medication. Lose power to New Jersey, for instance, and you have lost a major centre of production of pharmaceuticals for the entire
US. Perishable medications such as insulin will soon be in short supply. "In the US alone there are a million people with diabetes,"
Kappenman says. "Shut down production, distribution and storage and you put all those lives at risk in very short order."
Help is not coming any time soon, either. If it is dark from the eastern seaboard to Chicago, some affected areas are hundreds, maybe
thousands of miles away from anyone who might help. And those willing to help are likely to be ill-equipped to deal with the sheer scale of
the disaster. "If a Carrington event happened now, it would be like a hurricane Katrina, but 10 times worse," says Paul Kintner, a plasma
physicist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
In reality, it would be much worse than that. Hurricane Katrina's societal and economic impact has been measured at $81 billion to $125
billion. According to the NAS report, the impact of what it terms a "severe geomagnetic storm scenario" could be as high as $2 trillion. And
that's just the first year after the storm. The NAS puts the recovery time at four to 10 years. It is questionable whether the US would ever
bounce back.
4-10 years to recover
"I don't think the NAS report is scaremongering," says Mike Hapgood, who chairs the European Space Agency's space weather team. Green
agrees. "Scientists are conservative by nature and this group is really thoughtful," he says. "This is a fair and balanced report."
Such nightmare scenarios are not restricted to North America. High latitude nations such as Sweden and Norway have been aware for a
while that, while regular views of the aurora are pretty, they are also reminders of an ever-present threat to their electricity grids. However, the
trend towards installing extremely high voltage grids means that lower latitude countries are also at risk. For example, China is on the way to
implementing a 1000-kilovolt electrical grid, twice the voltage of the US grid. This would be a superb conduit for space weather-induced
disaster because the grid's efficiency to act as an antenna rises as the voltage between the grid and the ground increases. "China is going
to discover at some point that they have a problem," Kappenman says.
Neither is Europe sufficiently prepared. Responsibility for dealing with space weather issues is "very fragmented" in Europe, says Hapgood.
Europe's electricity grids, on the other hand, are highly interconnected and extremely vulnerable to cascading failures. In 2006, the routine
switch-off of a small part of Germany's grid - to let a ship pass safely under high-voltage cables - caused a cascade power failure across
western Europe. In France alone, five million people were left without electricity for two hours. "These systems are so complicated we don't
fully understand the effects of twiddling at one place," Hapgood says. "Most of the time it's alright, but occasionally it will get you."
The good news is that, given enough warning, the utility companies can take precautions, such as adjusting voltages and loads, and
restricting transfers of energy so that sudden spikes in current don't cause cascade failures. There is still more bad news, however. Our
early warning system is becoming more unreliable by the day.
By far the most important indicator of incoming space weather is NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE). The probe, launched in
1997, has a solar orbit that keeps it directly between the sun and Earth. Its uninterrupted view of the sun means it gives us continuous
reports on the direction and velocity of the solar wind and other streams of charged particles that flow past its sensors. ACE can provide
between 15 and 45 minutes' warning of any incoming geomagnetic storms. The power companies need about 15 minutes to prepare their
systems for a critical event, so that would seem passable.
15 minutes' warning
However, observations of the sun and magnetometer readings during the
Carrington event shows that the coronal mass ejection was travelling so fast it
took less than 15 minutes to get from where ACE is positioned to Earth. "It arrived
faster than we can do anything," Hapgood says.
There is another problem. ACE is 11 years old, and operating well beyond its
planned lifespan. The onboard detectors are not as sensitive as they used to be,
and there is no telling when they will finally give up the ghost. Furthermore, its
sensors become saturated in the event of a really powerful solar flare. "It was
built to look at average conditions rather than extremes," Baker says.
He was part of a space weather commission that three years ago warned about
the problems of relying on ACE. "It's been on my mind for a long time," he says.
"To not have a spare, or a strategy to replace it if and when it should fail, is rather
foolish."
There is no replacement for ACE due any time soon. Other solar observation
satellites, such as the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) can provide
some warning, but with less detailed information and - crucially - much later. "It's
quite hard to assess what the impact of losing ACE will be," Hapgood says. "We
will largely lose the early warning capability."
The world will, most probably, yawn at the prospect of a devastating solar storm
until it happens. Kintner says his students show a "deep indifference" when he
lectures on the impact of space weather. But if policy-makers show a similar
indifference in the face of the latest NAS report, it could cost tens of millions of lives, Kappenman reckons. "It could conceivably be the worst
natural disaster possible," he says.
The report outlines the worst case scenario for the US. The "perfect storm" is most likely on a spring or autumn night in a year of heightened
solar activity - something like 2012. Around the equinoxes, the orientation of the Earth's field to the sun makes us particularly vulnerable to a
plasma strike.
What's more, at these times of year, electricity demand is relatively low because no one needs too much heating or air conditioning. With
only a handful of the US grid's power stations running, the system relies on computer algorithms shunting large amounts of power around
the grid and this leaves the network highly vulnerable to sudden spikes.
If ACE has failed by then, or a plasma ball flies at us too fast for any warning from ACE to reach us, the consequences could be staggering.
"A really large storm could be a planetary disaster," Kappenman says.
So what should be done? No one knows yet - the report is meant to spark that conversation. Baker is worried, though, that the odds are
stacked against that conversation really getting started. As the NAS report notes, it is terribly difficult to inspire people to prepare for a
potential crisis that has never happened before and may not happen for decades to come. "It takes a lot of effort to educate policy-makers,
and that is especially true with these low-frequency events," he says.
We should learn the lessons of hurricane Katrina, though, and realise that "unlikely" doesn't mean "won't happen". Especially when the
stakes are so high. The fact is, it could come in the next three or four years - and with devastating effects. "The Carrington event happened
during a mediocre, ho-hum solar cycle," Kintner says. "It came out of nowhere, so we just don't know when something like that is going to
happen again."Michael Brooks
Michael Brooks
23 March 2009
source: newscientist.com
IT IS midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies
above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of
colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora
this far south but their fascination is short-lived. Within a
few seconds, electric bulbs dim and flicker, then become
unusually bright for a fleeting moment. Then all the lights
in the state go out. Within 90 seconds, the entire eastern
half of the US is without power.
A year later and millions of Americans are dead and the
nation's infrastructure lies in tatters. The World Bank
declares America a developing nation. Europe,
Scandinavia, China and Japan are also struggling to
recover from the same fateful event - a violent storm, 150
million kilometres away on the surface of the sun.
It sounds ridiculous. Surely the sun couldn't create so
profound a disaster on Earth. Yet an extraordinary report
funded by NASA and issued by the US National Academy
of Sciences (NAS) in January this year claims it could do
just that.
Over the last few decades, western civilisations have busily sown the seeds of their own destruction. Our modern way of life, with its reliance
on technology, has unwittingly exposed us to an extraordinary danger: plasma balls spewed from the surface of the sun could wipe out our
power grids, with catastrophic consequences.
The projections of just how catastrophic make chilling reading. "We're moving closer and closer to the edge of a possible disaster," says
Daniel Baker, a space weather expert based at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and chair of the NAS committee responsible for the
report.
It is hard to conceive of the sun wiping out a large amount of our hard-earned progress. Nevertheless, it is possible. The surface of the sun
is a roiling mass of plasma - charged high-energy particles - some of which escape the surface and travel through space as the solar wind.
From time to time, that wind carries a billion-tonne glob of plasma, a fireball known as a coronal mass ejection (see "When hell comes to
Earth"). If one should hit the Earth's magnetic shield, the result could be truly devastating.
The incursion of the plasma into our atmosphere causes rapid changes in the configuration of Earth's magnetic field which, in turn, induce
currents in the long wires of the power grids. The grids were not built to handle this sort of direct current electricity. The greatest danger is at
the step-up and step-down transformers used to convert power from its transport voltage to domestically useful voltage. The increased DC
current creates strong magnetic fields that saturate a transformer's magnetic core. The result is runaway current in the transformer's copper
wiring, which rapidly heats up and melts. This is exactly what happened in the Canadian province of Quebec in March 1989, and six million
people spent 9 hours without electricity. But things could get much, much worse than that.
Worse than Katrina
The most serious space weather event in history happened in 1859. It is known as the Carrington event, after the British amateur
astronomer Richard Carrington, who was the first to note its cause: "two patches of intensely bright and white light" emanating from a large
group of sunspots. The Carrington event comprised eight days of severe space weather.
There were eyewitness accounts of stunning auroras, even at equatorial latitudes. The world's telegraph networks experienced severe
disruptions, and Victorian magnetometers were driven off the scale.
Though a solar outburst could conceivably be more powerful, "we haven't found an example of anything worse than a Carrington event", says
James Green, head of NASA's planetary division and an expert on the events of 1859. "From a scientific perspective, that would be the one
that we'd want to survive." However, the prognosis from the NAS analysis is that, thanks to our technological prowess, many of us may not.
There are two problems to face. The first is the modern electricity grid, which is designed to operate at ever higher voltages over ever larger
areas. Though this provides a more efficient way to run the electricity networks, minimising power losses and wastage through
overproduction, it has made them much more vulnerable to space weather. The high-power grids act as particularly efficient antennas,
channelling enormous direct currents into the power transformers.
The second problem is the grid's interdependence with the systems that support our lives: water and sewage treatment, supermarket
delivery infrastructures, power station controls, financial markets and many others all rely on electricity. Put the two together, and it is clear
that a repeat of the Carrington event could produce a catastrophe the likes of which the world has never seen. "It's just the opposite of how
we usually think of natural disasters," says John Kappenman, a power industry analyst with the Metatech Corporation of Goleta, California,
and an advisor to the NAS committee that produced the report. "Usually the less developed regions of the world are most vulnerable, not the
highly sophisticated technological regions."
According to the NAS report, a severe space weather event in the US could induce ground currents that would knock out 300 key
transformers within about 90 seconds, cutting off the power for more than 130 million people (see map). From that moment, the clock is
ticking for America.
First to go - immediately for some people - is drinkable water. Anyone living in a high-rise apartment, where water has to be pumped to
reach them, would be cut off straight away. For the rest, drinking water will still come through the taps for maybe half a day. With no electricity
to pump water from reservoirs, there is no more after that.
There is simply no electrically powered transport: no trains, underground or overground. Our just-in-time culture for delivery networks may
represent the pinnacle of efficiency, but it means that supermarket shelves would empty very quickly - delivery trucks could only keep running
until their tanks ran out of fuel, and there is no electricity to pump any more from the underground tanks at filling stations.
Back-up generators would run at pivotal sites - but only until their fuel ran out. For hospitals, that would mean about 72 hours of running a
bare-bones, essential care only, service. After that, no more modern healthcare.
72 hours of healthcare remaining
The truly shocking finding is that this whole situation would not improve for months, maybe years: melted transformer hubs cannot be
repaired, only replaced. "From the surveys I've done, you might have a few spare transformers around, but installing a new one takes a
well-trained crew a week or more," says Kappenman. "A major electrical utility might have one suitably trained crew, maybe two."
Within a month, then, the handful of spare transformers would be used up. The rest will have to be built to order, something that can take up
to 12 months.
Even when some systems are capable of receiving power again, there is no guarantee there will be any to deliver. Almost all natural gas
and fuel pipelines require electricity to operate. Coal-fired power stations usually keep reserves to last 30 days, but with no transport
systems running to bring more fuel, there will be no electricity in the second month.
30 days of coal left
Nuclear power stations wouldn't fare much better. They are programmed to shut down in the event of serious grid problems and are not
allowed to restart until the power grid is up and running.
With no power for heating, cooling or refrigeration systems, people could begin to die within days. There is immediate danger for those who
rely on medication. Lose power to New Jersey, for instance, and you have lost a major centre of production of pharmaceuticals for the entire
US. Perishable medications such as insulin will soon be in short supply. "In the US alone there are a million people with diabetes,"
Kappenman says. "Shut down production, distribution and storage and you put all those lives at risk in very short order."
Help is not coming any time soon, either. If it is dark from the eastern seaboard to Chicago, some affected areas are hundreds, maybe
thousands of miles away from anyone who might help. And those willing to help are likely to be ill-equipped to deal with the sheer scale of
the disaster. "If a Carrington event happened now, it would be like a hurricane Katrina, but 10 times worse," says Paul Kintner, a plasma
physicist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
In reality, it would be much worse than that. Hurricane Katrina's societal and economic impact has been measured at $81 billion to $125
billion. According to the NAS report, the impact of what it terms a "severe geomagnetic storm scenario" could be as high as $2 trillion. And
that's just the first year after the storm. The NAS puts the recovery time at four to 10 years. It is questionable whether the US would ever
bounce back.
4-10 years to recover
"I don't think the NAS report is scaremongering," says Mike Hapgood, who chairs the European Space Agency's space weather team. Green
agrees. "Scientists are conservative by nature and this group is really thoughtful," he says. "This is a fair and balanced report."
Such nightmare scenarios are not restricted to North America. High latitude nations such as Sweden and Norway have been aware for a
while that, while regular views of the aurora are pretty, they are also reminders of an ever-present threat to their electricity grids. However, the
trend towards installing extremely high voltage grids means that lower latitude countries are also at risk. For example, China is on the way to
implementing a 1000-kilovolt electrical grid, twice the voltage of the US grid. This would be a superb conduit for space weather-induced
disaster because the grid's efficiency to act as an antenna rises as the voltage between the grid and the ground increases. "China is going
to discover at some point that they have a problem," Kappenman says.
Neither is Europe sufficiently prepared. Responsibility for dealing with space weather issues is "very fragmented" in Europe, says Hapgood.
Europe's electricity grids, on the other hand, are highly interconnected and extremely vulnerable to cascading failures. In 2006, the routine
switch-off of a small part of Germany's grid - to let a ship pass safely under high-voltage cables - caused a cascade power failure across
western Europe. In France alone, five million people were left without electricity for two hours. "These systems are so complicated we don't
fully understand the effects of twiddling at one place," Hapgood says. "Most of the time it's alright, but occasionally it will get you."
The good news is that, given enough warning, the utility companies can take precautions, such as adjusting voltages and loads, and
restricting transfers of energy so that sudden spikes in current don't cause cascade failures. There is still more bad news, however. Our
early warning system is becoming more unreliable by the day.
By far the most important indicator of incoming space weather is NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE). The probe, launched in
1997, has a solar orbit that keeps it directly between the sun and Earth. Its uninterrupted view of the sun means it gives us continuous
reports on the direction and velocity of the solar wind and other streams of charged particles that flow past its sensors. ACE can provide
between 15 and 45 minutes' warning of any incoming geomagnetic storms. The power companies need about 15 minutes to prepare their
systems for a critical event, so that would seem passable.
15 minutes' warning
However, observations of the sun and magnetometer readings during the
Carrington event shows that the coronal mass ejection was travelling so fast it
took less than 15 minutes to get from where ACE is positioned to Earth. "It arrived
faster than we can do anything," Hapgood says.
There is another problem. ACE is 11 years old, and operating well beyond its
planned lifespan. The onboard detectors are not as sensitive as they used to be,
and there is no telling when they will finally give up the ghost. Furthermore, its
sensors become saturated in the event of a really powerful solar flare. "It was
built to look at average conditions rather than extremes," Baker says.
He was part of a space weather commission that three years ago warned about
the problems of relying on ACE. "It's been on my mind for a long time," he says.
"To not have a spare, or a strategy to replace it if and when it should fail, is rather
foolish."
There is no replacement for ACE due any time soon. Other solar observation
satellites, such as the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) can provide
some warning, but with less detailed information and - crucially - much later. "It's
quite hard to assess what the impact of losing ACE will be," Hapgood says. "We
will largely lose the early warning capability."
The world will, most probably, yawn at the prospect of a devastating solar storm
until it happens. Kintner says his students show a "deep indifference" when he
lectures on the impact of space weather. But if policy-makers show a similar
indifference in the face of the latest NAS report, it could cost tens of millions of lives, Kappenman reckons. "It could conceivably be the worst
natural disaster possible," he says.
The report outlines the worst case scenario for the US. The "perfect storm" is most likely on a spring or autumn night in a year of heightened
solar activity - something like 2012. Around the equinoxes, the orientation of the Earth's field to the sun makes us particularly vulnerable to a
plasma strike.
What's more, at these times of year, electricity demand is relatively low because no one needs too much heating or air conditioning. With
only a handful of the US grid's power stations running, the system relies on computer algorithms shunting large amounts of power around
the grid and this leaves the network highly vulnerable to sudden spikes.
If ACE has failed by then, or a plasma ball flies at us too fast for any warning from ACE to reach us, the consequences could be staggering.
"A really large storm could be a planetary disaster," Kappenman says.
So what should be done? No one knows yet - the report is meant to spark that conversation. Baker is worried, though, that the odds are
stacked against that conversation really getting started. As the NAS report notes, it is terribly difficult to inspire people to prepare for a
potential crisis that has never happened before and may not happen for decades to come. "It takes a lot of effort to educate policy-makers,
and that is especially true with these low-frequency events," he says.
We should learn the lessons of hurricane Katrina, though, and realise that "unlikely" doesn't mean "won't happen". Especially when the
stakes are so high. The fact is, it could come in the next three or four years - and with devastating effects. "The Carrington event happened
during a mediocre, ho-hum solar cycle," Kintner says. "It came out of nowhere, so we just don't know when something like that is going to
happen again."Michael Brooks
-
govardhanvt
- Posts: 2007
- Joined: Fri May 19, 2006 12:56 pm
-
govardhanvt
- Posts: 2007
- Joined: Fri May 19, 2006 12:56 pm
SEETHING SUNSPOT: Yesterday, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) peered into the dark heart of sunspot 1072 and found it seething with activity.
The curvaceous arcs in this extreme ultraviolet (171 Å) image are magnetic flux tubes filled with million-degree plasma. Occasionally, a magnetic instability causes an explosion, a minor solar flare, which appears in the movie as a brief flash of light. None of these B-class flares was strong enough to effect Earth; they were merely photogenic.
According to NOAA forecasters, sunspot 1072 harbors energy for flares 100 times stronger than this, and there is a 10% chance of such an M-class eruption during the next 24 hours. Shortwave radio blackouts, sudden ionospheric disturbances, and some fantastic movies from SDO could be in the offing. Stay tuned.
The curvaceous arcs in this extreme ultraviolet (171 Å) image are magnetic flux tubes filled with million-degree plasma. Occasionally, a magnetic instability causes an explosion, a minor solar flare, which appears in the movie as a brief flash of light. None of these B-class flares was strong enough to effect Earth; they were merely photogenic.
According to NOAA forecasters, sunspot 1072 harbors energy for flares 100 times stronger than this, and there is a 10% chance of such an M-class eruption during the next 24 hours. Shortwave radio blackouts, sudden ionospheric disturbances, and some fantastic movies from SDO could be in the offing. Stay tuned.
-
govardhanvt
- Posts: 2007
- Joined: Fri May 19, 2006 12:56 pm
For all those who are interested in 2012, here is a link which appears to be interesting
http://2012forum.com
http://2012forum.com
Can Anyboddy Say Fear Mongers???
If anyone would care to find out quickly about what is really behind the cycles of the Mayan calendar I'd suggest a little research be done. it could be started by visiting This link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_calendar
In particular read about the cycle called b'ak'tun. [/i]
Seriously folks... does anyone remember the Y2K scare? How about those Heavens Gate folks in San Diego Calif. The world is going to come to an end but I seriously doubt it is going to be on Dec. 12, 2012. And hey...What the hell you gonna do if it does???Is anything significant even going to happen??? Who knows?
I am absolutely positive that if the government's of the world know anything about some impending great dooms day event coming...they are not going to tell anyone and cause mass panic.
My suggestion is a bottle of Tequila Some limes and salt. and weather permitting a comfortable seat outside with a pretty girl.
And if you see it coming I'd suggest a quick shot followed by a quick kiss to the pretty lady.
So Long And Thanks For All The Fish!!!
In particular read about the cycle called b'ak'tun. [/i]
Seriously folks... does anyone remember the Y2K scare? How about those Heavens Gate folks in San Diego Calif. The world is going to come to an end but I seriously doubt it is going to be on Dec. 12, 2012. And hey...What the hell you gonna do if it does???Is anything significant even going to happen??? Who knows?
I am absolutely positive that if the government's of the world know anything about some impending great dooms day event coming...they are not going to tell anyone and cause mass panic.
My suggestion is a bottle of Tequila Some limes and salt. and weather permitting a comfortable seat outside with a pretty girl.
And if you see it coming I'd suggest a quick shot followed by a quick kiss to the pretty lady.
So Long And Thanks For All The Fish!!!
The science has shown us that there are some very diverse things happening in our sky. The solar flares, the movements of planets are all changes that are being measured and recorded.
What does all this mean in our down here on earth exitence?
The new age of Aquarius as outlined in Astrology is one of the areas to actually seek to understand. Aquarius age of spirituality will be replacing the Picean age of emotionalism. And as we traverse the cusp of these new energies we can see how human existence has handled.
In its usual way it has reated conflicts instead of trying to bring understanding to one another. The wars have increased intensity, the crime in the streets, the have and have nots at it. All the ignoble traits of man have been escalated by this new energy.
2012 is about the height of the Aquarius age of spirituality. We can either be a part of the solution or a part of the problem as the consciousness raises to a new height of awareness of our responsibilities to each other on this planet.
As some of the discussion has shown, it can be seen how the God influence will take a beating. It is not about God but how God is worshiped, blamed or heightened that is the problem. Spirituality is within all human biengs and when they learn to exercise it they will be still be a part of what is the God understanding, just not in the way it is touted in most religions today. It will be about energy and spirit energy is known to be finer than material energy.
What does all this mean in our down here on earth exitence?
The new age of Aquarius as outlined in Astrology is one of the areas to actually seek to understand. Aquarius age of spirituality will be replacing the Picean age of emotionalism. And as we traverse the cusp of these new energies we can see how human existence has handled.
In its usual way it has reated conflicts instead of trying to bring understanding to one another. The wars have increased intensity, the crime in the streets, the have and have nots at it. All the ignoble traits of man have been escalated by this new energy.
2012 is about the height of the Aquarius age of spirituality. We can either be a part of the solution or a part of the problem as the consciousness raises to a new height of awareness of our responsibilities to each other on this planet.
As some of the discussion has shown, it can be seen how the God influence will take a beating. It is not about God but how God is worshiped, blamed or heightened that is the problem. Spirituality is within all human biengs and when they learn to exercise it they will be still be a part of what is the God understanding, just not in the way it is touted in most religions today. It will be about energy and spirit energy is known to be finer than material energy.
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blackspring
- Posts: 53
- Joined: Sun Apr 10, 2011 11:00 am
Wow, there are some scary, extreme predictions out there...and also some enlightening information in the original post. I've enjoyed reading the different posts in this thread, along with their different points of view. I personally find the astronomical information extremely interesting. I knew that the Mayan calendar is supposed to be incredibly accurate, but I wasn't aware that it was tracking our solar system's orbit around the galaxy, nor that 5 of its cycles mark the solar system's movement from one pole of the galaxy to the other. Thank you for providing such information - it has motivated me to go out and do further research into Mayan astronomy.
Thanks for the feedback.
Hey Blackspring,
Thanks for the feedback...I'm glad you enjoyed the post...I've been going to the Yucatan for years to study Mayan Culture...I just thought with all of the doomsday stuff floating around out there, that people should know what the Mayans actually meant by "The End of the World".
Thanks for the feedback...I'm glad you enjoyed the post...I've been going to the Yucatan for years to study Mayan Culture...I just thought with all of the doomsday stuff floating around out there, that people should know what the Mayans actually meant by "The End of the World".
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AgentOfChaos
- Posts: 47
- Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2011 11:45 am
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