Solar Flares, Grid Collapse, & Nuclear Catastrophe

[Star Man]

400 Chernobyls: Solar Flares, Electromagnetic Pulses and Nuclear Armageddon

Saturday, 24 March 2012 00:00 By Matthew Stein, Truthout | News Analysis
Downloaded March 24, 2012 from https://truth-out.org/news/item/7301...ear-armageddon

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I'm reprinting the first paragraphs of a long article from Truthout today describing a scenario of nuclear devastation that would result from an extreme solar Geomagnetic Disturbance (GMD). Until reading this highly researched article that provides a wealth of citations to support its conclusions, I had no idea of the vulnerability of the nation's electrical grid to catastrophic collapse in a once-every-sixty-five-years extreme GMD, like the one that happened in 1921. Worse, we won't just lose our email when this happens; within 2-5 days the back-up cooling systems at our 104 nuclear plants run out of gas, and the reactors and the spent rods explode . . . all around the world. Here is a topic no one is talking about. Government has done studies. Politicians and the nuclear power industry say we have nothing to worry about. Read for yourself and make your own conclusions. I've given you the URL for the full article. Truthout asks that the article not be republished, so I've only give a few paragraphs.

Star Man

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There are nearly 450 nuclear reactors in the world, with hundreds more being planned or under construction. There are 104 of these reactors in the United States and 195 in Europe. Imagine what havoc it would wreak on our civilization and the planet's ecosystems if we were to suddenly witness not just one or two nuclear meltdowns, but 400 or more!

How likely is it that our world might experience an event that could ultimately cause hundreds of reactors to fail and melt down at approximately the same time? I venture to say that, unless we take significant protective measures, this apocalyptic scenario is not only possible, but probable.


Consider the ongoing problems caused by three reactor core meltdowns, explosions and breached containment vessels at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi facility and the subsequent health and environmental issues. Consider the millions of innocent victims who have already died or continue to suffer from horrific radiation-related health problems ("Chernobyl AIDS," epidemic cancers, chronic fatigue, etcetera) resulting from the Chernobyl reactor explosions, fires and fallout. If just two serious nuclear disasters, spaced 25 years apart, could cause such horrendous environmental catastrophes, it is hard to imagine how we could ever hope to recover from hundreds of similar nuclear incidents occurring simultaneously across the planet. Since more than one-third of all Americans live within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant, this is a serious issue that should be given top priority.[1]

In the past 152 years, Earth has been struck by roughly 100 solar storms, causing significant geomagnetic disturbances (GMD), two of which were powerful enough to rank as "extreme GMDs." If an extreme GMD of such magnitude were to occur today, in all likelihood, it would initiate a chain of events leading to catastrophic failures at the vast majority of our world's nuclear reactors, similar to but over 100 times worse than, the disasters at both Chernobyl and Fukushima. When massive solar flares launch a huge mass of highly charged plasma (a coronal mass ejection, or CME) directly toward Earth, colliding with our planet's outer atmosphere and magnetosphere, the result is a significant geomagnetic disturbance.


The last extreme GMD of a magnitude that could collapse much of the US grid was in May of 1921, long before the advent of modern electronics, widespread electric power grids, and nuclear power plants. We are, mostly, blissfully unaware of this threat and unprepared for its consequences. The good news is that relatively affordable equipment and processes could be installed to protect critical components in the electric power grid and its nuclear reactors, thereby averting this "end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it" scenario. The bad news is that even though panels of scientists and engineers have studied the problem, and the bipartisan Congressional electromagnetic pulse (EMP) commission has presented a list of specific recommendations to Congress, our leaders have yet to approve and implement any significant preventative measures.
Most of us believe that an emergency like this could never happen, and that, if it could, our "authorities" would do everything in their power to prevent such an apocalypse. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. "How could this happen?" you might ask.

Go to Truth-out.org to read the entire article.