How life on Earth as we know it could have been transformed just two years ago – and only a few scientists noticed
I was at a barbecue in West Sussex this weekend and had an interesting chat with a family friend called Gerry Bond who told me about a recent event that could have changed life on Earth as we currently enjoy it.
On 23 July 2012, the sun unleashed two massive clouds of plasma that barely missed a catastrophic encounter with the Earth’s atmosphere. These plasma clouds, known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs), comprised a solar storm thought to be the most powerful in at least 150 years.
Fortunately, the blast site of the CMEs was not directed at Earth. Had this event occurred a week earlier when the point of eruption was Earth-facing, the outcome could have been disastrous.A CME double whammy of this potency striking Earth would probably cripple satellite communications and could severely damage the power grid.
NASA offers this sobering assessment:
“Analysts believe that a direct hit . . . could cause widespread power blackouts, disabling everything that plugs into a wall socket. Most people wouldn’t even be able to flush their toilet because urban water supplies largely rely on electric pumps. . . . According to a study by the National Academy of Sciences, the total economic impact could exceed $2 trillion or 20 times greater than the costs of a Hurricane Katrina. Multiton transformers damaged by such a storm might take years to repair.”
You can see the latest discussion of this event here.
Of course, CMEs are the not the only occurrence that could transform or even destroy humankind. If you’d like to be aware of some other possibilities, check out this book review.