Solar Storm Prediction – 2012

I don’t recall whether this was ever brought to mention as a possibility for the 2012 event that people are concerned about. While cleaning out my email archives today, I found this link to the article below. It’s definitely worth reading in its entirety if you have a couple of minutes.

I’m thinking this is probably closer to reality than an “end of days.” On another note, maybe ‘end of days’ is nothing more than end of daylight as we know it until our grids are back up and running.

Thoughts?

Amplify’d from www.foxnews.com

Powerful Solar Storm Could Shut Down U.S. for Months

Friday, January 09, 2009

By Robert Roy Britt

A new study from the National Academy of Sciences outlines grim possibilities on Earth for a worst-case scenario solar storm.

The prediction is based in part on a major solar storm in 1859 that caused telegraph wires to short out in the United States and Europe, igniting widespread fires.

“A contemporary repetition of the [1859] event would cause significantly more extensive (and possibly catastrophic) social and economic disruptions,” the researchers conclude.

When the sun is in the active phase of its 11-year cycle, it can unleash powerful magnetic storms that disable satellites, threaten astronaut safety, and even disrupt communication systems on Earth.

“Emergency services would be strained, and command and control might be lost,” write the researchers, led by Daniel Baker, director of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

— In 1989, the sun unleashed a tempest that knocked out power to all of Quebec, Canada.

— A remarkable 2003 rampage included 10 major solar flares over a two-week period, knocking out two Earth-orbiting satellites and crippling an instrument aboard a Mars orbiter.

The race is on for better forecasting abilities, as the next peak in solar activity is expected to come around 2012.

Some scientists expect the next peak to bring more severe events than other recent peaks. Read more at www.foxnews.com

 

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Lab-Made Organs – A New Cure?

Great article. Read it for the “how’d they do that?!” Very cool.

Amplify’d from www.cnn.com

Lab-made organ implanted for first time

July 8, 2011 9:32 a.m. EDT

(CNN) — For the first time, a patient has received a synthetic windpipe that was created in a lab with the patient’s own stem cells and without using human donor tissue

Previous lab-generated transplants either used a segment of donor windpipe or involved tissue only, not an organ.

On June 9, doctors implanted this synthetic windpipe into a 36-year-old man with late-stage tracheal cancer at Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm. The patient is doing well and is expected to be released from the hospital

Creating the synthetic structure for the trachea in the current case took 10 to 12 days, compared with waiting months for an organ donor Read more at www.cnn.com

 

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An Interesting Bit on Earth’s Radioactivity

This ‘unclipped’ article: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20702-darkenergy-fingerprints-found-in-ancient-radiation.html is a good read too!

Amplify’d from www.newscientist.com

Best ever measurement of Earth’s radioactivity

16:43 19 July 2011 by Melissae Fellet

Ghostly subatomic particles streaming from Earth’s interior have enabled the most precise measurement yet of our planet’s radioactivity.

These particles, called antineutrinos, suggest that about half of Earth’s heat comes from the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium – and give clues to the location of geological stashes of these elements. Read more at www.newscientist.com

 

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Spectacular T-L Video of Australia Night Sky

This is by far and wide the best #time-lapse video (EVER) that I have seen by a “hobbyist.”  Bravo to Alex Cherney, hobbyist astronomer in Melbourne, AUS.  His website is http://www.terrastro.com and his images are for sale at RedBubble.com.  Do a search on his name and his work should result for you. There are a few short videos at his Terrastro site but this one comes via an article at Wired.com by Danielle Venton on July 6, 2011.  If you have about 2 mins and want to unwind, play this in full screen for great effect.  Blew my hair back.  😉

Not sure if I can embed here so here are some links:

Ocean Sky from Alex Cherney on Vimeo.

Otherwise:  Enjoy full article at Wired by clicking here.

Peace!

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