solar storms and electronics

[GrayHare]

FIRE people like to be prepared. Is anyone here taking measures in case the current solar storms disrupt electronics?

 

[youbet]

What "measures" might you have in mind?

 

[upupandaway]

Electronics are becoming more and more resilient due to how memory is stored. You can't control the grid so you are reducing your question to your own personal electronics. They are resilient now to the point where magnets hold chargers to the actual device. Flash memory is not as susceptible to EM as our old spinning disks were. If infrastructure gets knocked out you will have to deal with it. I'm assuming a generator would be enough. Right now if we lose power from the grid I can run my media server and cable modem for as long as I have gas to supply the generator. I have a gasoline generator and not a natural gas whole house system. My xfinity netpop in my neighborhood has about 2 days of battery backup before they go down. I know this from experience. After that Verizon seems to keep chugging along. If you let us know what your are thinking you need to prepare for I could expand on your options.

 

[marko]

Could be solar storm of last week, or could be something else, but over the past 4 days I've noticed a marked slowdown of the internet, my surveillance cameras all lost connection, routers had to be rebooted, timers losing their minds, etc. A few stores also have had "computer problems".

 

[Aerides]

bury them in the sand? Not sure what one would do if there was a concern.

 

[Rianne]

My icon is a pic of the solar storm in Illinois!!! Whatever disruption was worth it. That pic was not the most dramatic. I happen to like purple.

 

[GrayHare]

A solar storm is perhaps the most likely major disruptive event Earth will encounter this century. It's great to have a safe withdrawal rate below 4%, but that's worthless if, for example, you can't access funds because a solar storm has erased all record of your brokerage account. Given the number of posts here about SWR, mortgages, etc. it seems to me reasonable to also discuss the current solar cycle since it has a measurable chance to disrupt FIRE plans.

As individuals we can't protect the stock market, much less the whole planet, from a repeat Carrington Event, but there are some inexpensive things that might make a local difference. I keep a small, battery-powered, multi-band radio in a metal box (Faraday cage). I have recent paper copies of the state of financial accounts. I maintain multiple accounts so that if one gets zapped, maybe the other will still be accessible. Yes, it's impractical to prepare for the risk of the entire electrical system getting fried. However, if only, say, 25% of electronic devices are damaged, I suspect there are other simple preparations that could make life a bit easier.

 

[Sunset]

^^^^^^^^^^^^ I keep some cash at home, probably not enough, but there is a cost of missing out on 5% interest.

Since this massive solar storm did nothing that I noticed, I'm thinking a solar storm in the future is a non-event for me. Now a nuclear EMP would be bad in many ways.

 

[dixonge]

If you think today's electronics are *less* robust than telegraph lines from almost 200 years ago, you are not dealing with reality...

 

[skyking1]

I put the network equipment on the powered plugs of a UPS and the rest on the unpowered protected plugs. I have done that for years. I don't know why I bother powering the network gear in an outage, as the provider quits soon after the power goes out. It does serve to keep everything going in those brief power surges.