Will an EMP knock out the Power Grid
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Topic: Will an EMP knock out the Power Grid
Posted By: Medclinician
Subject: Will an EMP knock out the Power Grid
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 7:12am
For many years we have been tracking the use of an EMP to knock out the power grid. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_pulse - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_pulse
This was dramatized in the movie War of the Worlds - new version - to the tune of Pandemic Now by Medclinician - When The Lights Go Out
Any nation with the ability to launch a satellite could pull this off. Basically a nuke hooked to a low altitude satellite could produce some serious problems in the East Coast area in the United States. South Korea has the ability to do this and nuclear weapons. As per new releases and projected dates - Iran most certainly has nukes. If they have not made them, they could easily buy them. The face of the world as we know it has changed with battleships fleeing the area as well as American Jets backing away to avoid confrontation. A power vacuum was created and now some the most unstable and dangerous countries in the Middle East are moving to fill it.
Medclinician
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Replies:
Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 8:27am
United States intelligence and other agencies, including the major power companies have been aware of this for years. Some of us have worked to create alternative power sources, as well as shielding electronics, Faraday cage technology, and to move much of the grid underground.
Although, we live in times where some of the leadership are taking big hits in credibility, be aware there are people who work everyday and have stopped thousands of potential attacks on U.S. soil from terrorists. This is more than just fiction as in 24 Hours. The fact there has been no nuclear explosions on our soil is no accident, and the heroes who have helped stopped this are unknown to the public and will remain so. Some will die and never receive credit for having stopped one or more nuclear plots to destroy New York City or other major cities in the U.S.
We live in an era of sensationalism, drama, and the use of the press to scare people and control them. There are spins pushed very heavily such as the fact 9/11 was used to put in place surveillance which was invasive and took away our rights of privacy.
The question has always been, and remains, how effective these tools have been or will be in the event of a "Lone Wolf" There is no question that many of the rogue nations have nuclear weapons. So, as you watch this - the threat is real. It would take a bit more than a single burst though and over the years there have been improvements in protecting the Grid. Thank you to the men and women who work 24/7 to protect our country. Amidst all the attacks - we will remain free, united, and despite raw displays of power by any other nation - still very powerful.
Medclinician
Pandemic Now - When the Lights Go Out
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: Satori
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 8:59am
related
Lights Out by Ted Koppel
this is non-fiction yet another warning about our vulnerability to cyber attack
http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/246944/lights-out-by-ted-koppel/
"In this tour de force of investigative reporting, Ted Koppel reveals that a major cyberattack on America’s power grid is not only possible but likely, that it would be devastating, and that the United States is shockingly unprepared."
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Posted By: DeepThinker
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 1:25pm
I am not afraid of an EMP. You would need a nation state to sponsor it and, it would be very obvious who is at fault and they would be turned into glass.
What I am afraid of is a cyber attack. It takes very little resources, and can be almost untraceable, and can do just as much damage!
Sorry Satori... I didn't notice that you posted almost the same thing :)
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Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 3:11pm
DeepThinker wrote:
I am not afraid of an EMP. You would need a nation state to sponsor it and, it would be very obvious who is at fault and they would be turned into glass.
What I am afraid of is a cyber attack. It takes very little resources, and can be almost untraceable, and can do just as much damage!
Sorry Satori... I didn't notice that you posted almost the same thing :)
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We have been under cyber attacks for many years. Recently there have been some major hits as well as what is likely several "enfoldings" (my word) which are much nastier than viruses or worms and simply do not exist to most detection software. Some have clocks or flags to go off and if touched can set off a Denial of Service multi-focal from thousands of directions which by pure brute force are very bad.
A point here was the Saddam Hussein was launching Scud missiles and he did not care about being identified or vaporized by our nukes. If you do not fully understand the suicidal mentality of going to Paradise or bringing about World War to hasten things along, that has been the nemesis of Western civilization in dealing with the Middle East. Some would.
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: DeepThinker
Date Posted: October 15 2015 at 3:25pm
Medclincian I hear the point you made. However I don't think Saddam is a good example though. Yes he did lob missiles at Isreal. However you do notice... He never strapped any of his really nasty stuff to them. Just standard conventional warheads. Yes there are suicidal people in the world. I am not discounting this. This is a very strong reason why I am afraid of Iran.
All that being said I think my point still stands. By human nature people in power like power. An emp would require state sponsorship. State sponsorship would need to come from someone in a high level power... they will want to maintain their power. Also an emp attack would require a nuclear weapon and a missile. I am pretty sure we have decent technology to monitor movements of nukes, if not for sure we have great technology for tracking missiles.
With enough resources devoted to a cyber attack, you could shut down our power grid, you could make our nuclear reactors melt down, you could shut off our water pumping ability and destroy sewage treatment plants causing widespread illness. All of this with very little ability to track or intervene by our powers that be.
Please don't take my posts to mean I am discounting an EMP attack... just in our modern world I think there are much greater threats. 20 years ago an EMP attack was probably the worst that could happen to us... now I am not so sure.
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Posted By: Turboguy
Date Posted: October 20 2015 at 5:34pm
DeepThinker wrote:
I am not afraid of an EMP. You would need a nation state to sponsor it and, it would be very obvious who is at fault and they would be turned into glass.
What I am afraid of is a cyber attack. It takes very little resources, and can be almost untraceable, and can do just as much damage!
Sorry Satori... I didn't notice that you posted almost the same thing :)
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Furthermore, EMP is a highly overblown threat.
HUGELY overblown.
Induced amperage is directly proportional to antenna length.
Most consumer electronics (those with long windings excluded) simply do not have enough conductor length to induce any more voltage/amperage than is induced when you insert the batteries and press "On."
------------- Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views. - William F. Buckley
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Posted By: Satori
Date Posted: October 20 2015 at 5:54pm
yeah the government is so unconcerned about EMP thats why they reopened Cheyenne Mountain
pic of a major transformer damaged by solar flare
https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=melted+transformers+solar+flare&view=detailv2&qpvt=melted+transformers+solar+flare&id=37FC8CBA56E196629B41B7B95809E4F080726E9D&selectedIndex=0&ccid=UxgMU9%2fb&simid=608012205583371927&thid=OIP.M53180c53dfdb8ab7011a73cac8747767o0&ajaxhist=0
who cares whether you iPad gets fried or not if the grid goes down for any real length of time which it will if it is hit by an EMP or major solar flare
all the studies and threat scenarios done show a LOT of people are gonna die
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Posted By: ozarkcountryboy
Date Posted: October 24 2015 at 7:19am
Very real threat!
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Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: October 26 2015 at 9:27am
DeepThinker wrote:
Medclincian I hear the point you made. However I don't think Saddam is a good example though. Yes he did lob missiles at Isreal. However you do notice... He never strapped any of his really nasty stuff to them. Just standard conventional warheads. Yes there are suicidal people in the world. I am not discounting this. This is a very strong reason why I am afraid of Iran.
All that being said I think my point still stands. By human nature people in power like power. An emp would require state sponsorship. State sponsorship would need to come from someone in a high level power... they will want to maintain their power. Also an emp attack would require a nuclear weapon and a missile. I am pretty sure we have decent technology to monitor movements of nukes, if not for sure we have great technology for tracking missiles.
With enough resources devoted to a cyber attack, you could shut down our power grid, you could make our nuclear reactors melt down, you could shut off our water pumping ability and destroy sewage treatment plants causing widespread illness. All of this with very little ability to track or intervene by our powers that be.
Please don't take my posts to mean I am discounting an EMP attack... just in our modern world I think there are much greater threats. 20 years ago an EMP attack was probably the worst that could happen to us... now I am not so sure.
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Certainly agree with you that currently there are bigger fish to fry in terms of threats. The threat of a bio-weapon attack is probably near the top of the list next to cyber. We definitely are seeing China and other nations refining their tools and testing them as well as Russia in terms of hacking and infiltrating government employees and heads of intelligence personal computers.
I was aware of the power grid issue several years ago and was told it was unlikely the grid would be up for more than two years given the sheer growth of information on it attack or not.
The entire mind set here is basically the terr*rist operating as a lone w*lf without any connection to M*slims or extremist groups pulling something off with minimal resources. At one time they were worried someone would make explosives from manure and blow up a power station. It was said the 6 terr*rists could really hit hard and there were projects trying to figure out ways to block this. Well you aren't going to block horse whatever - you may be able to track plutonium in New York but a few nut jobs like in Boston who are all fired up against America can be a real danger.
South Korea and Iran can launch satellites and are both planning more ambitious ones which could carry a nuclear warhead. This could be dropped and set off at high altitude. No one has told me that this is not effective. If it isn't, why all the work the Faraday cages and beds that are shielded with the computer inside?
check this out http://www.nextgov.com/defense/2012/09/electromagnetic-pulse-could-knock-out-us-power-grid/58069/%20 - http://www.nextgov.com/defense/2012/09/electromagnetic-pulse-could-knock-out-us-power-grid/58069/
U.S. power grids and other civilian infrastructure are not prepared for
electromagnetic pulses that could result from weapons or violent space
weather, according to testimony at a congressional subcommittee hearing
Wednesday.
Panelists at the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity,
Infrastructure Protection and Security Technologies, told Chairman Dan
Lungren R-Calif., that there were serious flaws in the nation’s
infrastructure that could allow for EMP events to shut down power and
communications for extended periods of time.
“Our civilian grid, which the Defense Department relies upon for 99
percent of its electricity needs, is vulnerable to these kinds of
dangers,” Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., testified during the hearing.
Franks, one of the leaders of the http://franks.house.gov/press_releases/510 - Congressional EMP Caucus , sponsored legislation in 2011 to protect U.S. infrastructure in the event of an attack by an EMP weapon.
http://homeland.house.gov/sites/homeland.house.gov/files/Testimony%20-%20Aimone.pdf - Michael Aimone ,
a director of business enterprise integration at Defense, said the
Pentagon had pursued a “two-track approach” to mitigate the impact an
EMP attack could have on Defense facilities. He said his plan relied on
both in-house capabilities to maintain power and electronics and a means
to communicate and coordinate with outside partners.
“DoD recently adopted an explicit mission assurance strategy, which is
focused on ensuring operational continuity in an all-hazard threat
environment,” Aimone said.
EMP disruptions and attacks can be triggered by various events,
including high-altitude or low-altitude nuclear weapons detonations,
locally based radio frequency weapons, and solar weather. One of the
largest impacts from an EMP-based disruption was in Quebec in 1989, when
nearly http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0509/How-a-solar-flare-could-send-us-back-to-the-Stone-Age - 6 million people lost power because of a geomagnetic storm.
Brandon Wales, of the Homeland Security Department’s National
Protection and Programs Directorate, said DHS was working with federal
agencies on contingency plans for an EMP event. He said Federal
Emergency Management Agency was establishing lines of communication with
key agencies in case an EMP event occurs, and that Homeland Security
Secretary Janet Napolitano had commissioned a report in 2011 to study
the impact of space-based EMP attacks.
“DHS has pursued a deeper understanding of the EMP threat, as well as
its potential impacts, effective mitigation strategies, and a greater
level of public awareness and readiness in cooperation with other
federal agencies and private equipment and system owners and operators
through various communications channels,” http://homeland.house.gov/sites/homeland.house.gov/files/Testimony%20-%20Wales_0.pdf - Wales said .
Common standards for power grid equipment are a major issue according
to Joseph McClelland, director of the Office of Electric Reliability at
the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. He said current standards to
protect infrastructure and equipment do not address the many levels
within the power grid and should be updated.
“Protecting the electric generation, transmission and distribution
systems from severe damage due to an EMP-related event would involve
vulnerability assessments at every level of electric infrastructure,”
McClelland said.
Chris Beck, president of the Electric Infrastructure Security Council,
said the cost of protecting key infrastructure from EMP attacks was
small, and added the bigger problem was getting the word out about the
issue.
“The primary needs seem to be for education to increase awareness and
willingness to address the problem, and for coordination to address the
complex government and corporate administrative structures of even the
most critical infrastructures,” Beck said.
Public interest in EMPs piqued during the Republican primaries, when former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich http://news.discovery.com/space/is-newt-gingrichs-emp-doomsday-a-reality-111212.html - explained the threat of the EMP weapons during his stump speeches. He http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/31/newt-gingrich-emp_n_1724081.html - issued a statement
following a recent severe storm in the Washington area, saying the
power outages were just a taste of what the scenario following EMP
weapon would be like.
comment: It is a real threat and people in intelligence and with our security realize this. It you will search on this topic you will find in one search this thread comes up #4. This is public information and people should know.
Medclinician
"There is no privacy on the Internet, in our homes, offices, cell phones, or any place above ground on the planet. Most of us are under constant or at least possible observation using our smart phones to locate us, our web cam and cameras on those phones which can watch us and our thermal signature as we sit by windows from which voices can be detected at some distance. This is not paranoia - it is the reality of 2015 - and we must type, speak, and word every communication as if the whole world could see it and still continue to voice what we feel and believe without fear - with courage and purpose to try and create a better world. "
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: November 02 2015 at 8:07pm
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/11/02/white-house-is-preparing-for-catastrophic-solar-flares.html?intcmp=hpbt4%20 - http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/11/02/white-house-is-preparing-for-catastrophic-solar-flares.html?intcmp=hpbt4
If a giant solar flare hit the Earth, it could knock out the entire
power grid, meaning no more new Justin Bieber singles, no more televised
presidential debates, and no more Facebook photos of babies.
But it wouldn't be all good news. The https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2015/10/29/white-house-releases-action-plan-to-confront-real-and-present-space-weather-threats/?tid=sm_fb - Washington Post
reports the electromagnetic pulse—or EMP—created by such an event could
wipe out electricity for months on end, creating a global catastrophe.
That's why the White House released its https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2015/10/28/enhancing-national-preparedness-space-weather-events - National Space Weather Strategy on Thursday. According to the http://www.chron.com/news/nation-world/space/article/White-House-releases-plan-for-if-EMP-wipes-out-6601215.php - Houston Chronicle , the multiagency plan details how the US will prepare for—and deal with—a massive EMP from space weather.
The six-step plan requires government agencies,
schools, the media, the insurance industry, nonprofits, and more to work
together. In other words: We might be doomed. “This is a real and
present danger," the White House's assistant director for space weather
tells the Post. Back in 1859, a huge solar storm did impact
Earth and caused some sparking telegraph lines. The National Academy of
Sciences says something like that today could mean a $2 trillion
economic hit. Something like that http://www.newser.com/story/191522/solar-blast-nearly-sent-earth-to-stone-age.html - almost did happen in 2012 ,
when NASA says we were nearly hit by two large plasma clouds. "If it
had hit, we would still be picking up the pieces," one physicist says.
The White House's new plan calls for the US to get better at predicting
space weather, shore up our infrastructure against EMPs, and more, the Chronicle reports. It's a plan we may truly need: The Post quotes NASA as stating there's a 12% chance of a giant solar flare in the next 10 years. (Escape doomsday in a http://www.newser.com/story/143646/escape-doomsday-in-a-luxury-missile-silo.html - luxury missile silo .) comment: even without terrorists, nature may take us out itself
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: jacksdad
Date Posted: November 03 2015 at 10:09am
Posted By: DeepThinker
Date Posted: November 04 2015 at 1:52pm
Jacksdad I agree with you 100%... IMO the Sun going crazy is a much bigger threat than someone letting off a nuke above our heads.
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Posted By: Satori
Date Posted: November 04 2015 at 2:26pm
just a little taste
Sweden: Solar flare causes flight delays
http://news.yahoo.com/sweden-solar-flare-causes-flight-delays-172626613.html;_ylt=AwrC1C1KRDpWXQsAR.jQtDMD;_ylu=X3oDMTBzdWd2cWI5BGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxMAR2dGlkAwRzZWMDc3I-
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Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: January 05 2016 at 3:21pm
Will bring this up again - only I am moving it to Off Topic - and including threats by Isis as well as other possible way the grid could go down.
Medclinician
"not if, but when."
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: Medclinician
Date Posted: July 15 2016 at 6:38am
The threat has been there a long time and if our enemies do decide to attack, this is much more likely.
------------- "not if but when" the original Medclinician
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: July 15 2016 at 7:04pm
Yep, if it happens we will be in a big pile of s^it! My 93 year old mother just the other day mentioned the power grid going down...she must have heard it on TV. She was alarmed I told her that is why I am a prepper! She was silent.
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