The Rembis Report and Other Fascinating Topics - Volume XLV

Think you are ready?

You are not.

Sure, you saved every last thing you wrote on your hard drive, you backed it up to the cloud. You made sure to write down all your passwords on a little scrap of paper and taped it on the front of your computer. You made copies of all the photos you want to keep in extra files, maybe even got yourself an external hard drive for safe keeping, plus, you put them in the cloud, too. Same goes for all your favorite videos. You have all your favorites in one place, on your phone, bookmarked where you can access them whenever you like, and you trust YouTube, Vimeo, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and all the rest of the streaming services to keep things right where you can find them forever and ever.

You've got it made!

Not so fast.

Did you print anything out? Or is all just digital? If you have words and photos you want to save, you had better get them processed and printed, because when that huge Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) pops out of the sun and starts barreling through space at a million miles an hour, if you even find out about it, you will only have five days to get the ink and paper you need to secure whatever posterity you want to drag along with you into the dark. Don't worry too much about saving movies. Without electricity, you won't be able to watch those anyway, so -

Mike! I have electricity already! What is this drivel? What are you on about now?

Okay, settle down, let me explain. As a person born to hoard, I find it comforting to keep everything I truly enjoy in the way of words and pictures. I like looking at photos of my past and things I have written. I like saving my files, so I know where everything is, and can reach my digital shelves in few clicks to find my stuff and look at it, whenever I like. That's all. I just like having all of my stuff.

So do a lot of other folks. But, as we find ourselves exponentially further from the past with every second, saving options change due to incompatibility issues. Upgrades to hardware are necessary to keep your files accessible and safe. Cords change almost daily, it seems. But, no matter how prepared you are, there will always be the lingering possibility that an EMP will come from a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) of the Sun, and hit the Earth dead center, thus wiping out every digital file on the planet, making paper the way to go, if you ever want to gaze at that lovely photo of Aunt Betsy and Uncle Herman ever again.

There is no imminent threat today. There might be a few seconds after I send this, but I have no way to predict that.

Funny side note - this issue is late because my internet went out just before I was about to finish it. So, deliveries will be on Thursdays now.

In case you have not heard much about EMPs and CMEs, please allow me to enlighten you. An electromagnetic pulse is a burst of energy that is emitted from the sun during a coronal mass ejection. These happen all the time. The sun is an active ball of gas that is undergoing thermonuclear fusion, burning tons of hydrogen and spewing out solar flares all day long. That is what it does, that is it's thing. They go out in every direction, into space, and are basically of no concern to us, until one of them starts heading towards Earth.

Most are small bursts that delight us with the aurora borealis (Northern Lights) when charged particles hit the upper atmosphere. There might be some radio interference in the way of static, and the occasional blackout of a small power grid, but major inconveniences are rare.

That's what makes it ever more likely that the big one is coming. You spin a roulette wheel long enough and the ball eventually lands on that green double zero. Same thing with the Sun. It is an active dynamo that is always doing something, shooting ejecta out somewhere. Round and round and round she goes, where she stops, nobody knows.

And that is what makes the possibility of electrical annihilation so exciting. You never know when it is going to happen.

We have all experienced a black out at some point. Most generally last a few minutes or hours. Sometimes, it is a nice experience to see the town shut down in the early summer evening and you step outside to look up at the stars. You might say hi to your neighbors, or step off down to your local tavern where they have lit candles and lanterns and shoot pool in the dark with no jukebox to drown out your conversation. For a minute, you think to yourself, "Wouldn't it be great if it was always like this?"

It used to be. A couple centuries ago it was like this all the time. So, for a while, you welcome the dark. Your phone still lights up and you can check the news for when your grid should come back on. By midnight all is well and the ice cream in your freezer is still basically intact.

Life goes on.

This was not the big one. This was just the single green zero. It will roll around again, to be sure.

And there is no need to panic because scientists monitor the Sun and all other space weather for threats to our planet. For a closer look at our star, AKA The Sun, please visit Helioviewer.org, and see what it is doing right now. You can create your own video like I did. This is what it looked like over the last month.

When the big one is on the way, you will get ample warning. Approximately 93 hours to be exact. When I mentioned plasma shooting at us at a million miles per hour, that is more or less an educated guess. Not mine, but the scientific communal estimate.

So, in about 4 days, give or take a few hours, you may experience some inconvenience in the way of electricity. I mean there won't be any. None. It will be gone. Everything not wrapped up safe in a Faraday Cage will be toast. What time of day will it affect you? Unknown. But let's say it is that early evening scenario, right after dinner. You heard the news - "They said it was going to be here, but I don't see anything. Cable's still going, maybe it missed us. Just a bunch of hype. That stupid Rembis Rep-" and - lights out.

You still go outside and check out the night sky, but maybe going down to the pub isn't such a great idea after all. On the way there, you notice that all the cars on the street are dead. They just stopped in their tracks. Their batteries are shot and there is no way to jump start them. Your phone is dead, too. You can't even call up Ghostbusters and watch it again, because this is it.

A few time zones to the east, everybody asleep will miss their alarms and wake up to an exceptionally quiet morning. Birds chirping, waves lapping, that's about it. A little further east from there, the big one hits during rush hour, and it is bad. Those losing control of vehicles of every size will cause major crashes, and emergency personnel will be unable to respond. Everyone will have to rely on those around them for help. Fires will start and will be difficult to put out. Sailors adrift at sea will have to rely on old school seamanship to steer whatever they have. Boilers will work, but their computers won't. Neither will their compass. Remember, it was a magnetic storm. Aside from the sun, moon and stars, in the sky, there will be no other way to navigate. So, a lot of sailors will be okay for a while. They won't realize that it is not just their boat. If they have been out on assignment for while, some fellows lose track of time, melt back into old world sensibilities and relax, ignoring whatever news may happen to come their way, for days at a time. So, some crew members will be well informed, and they will have to break it to poor Harry that the last time they "heard anything on the radio, it was stupid Rembis Report and they said the world was probably going to end, but I don't buy that crap."

But Harry knows better. If this was the big one, he is ready. He has hoarded books and candy bars, and knows that they are all better off finding a nice quiet island and do some fishing than to enter any major port, because in big cities, chaos will reign. Imagine The Walking Dead without zombies, no electricity, and no way to start a vehicle. No automatic vehicles because all batteries are dead. It will be all bicycles and horses, so you had better learn to ride.

At high noon on the other side of the world, those in the hemisphere opposite your summer, will be in the midst of winter. If they don't have fireplaces, they had better start building them, and so should you, if you plan to stay anywhere that it snows, because you will not stop winter.

Restaurants will become more essential now than ever. Those touched by the supply chains that run them and feed everyone will have to think quick and smart and get their act together. A lot of people will soon become farmers, whether they like it or not. Same goes for hunting. And unfortunately, some people with firearms will not be so nice as those you know and trust with them.

A few time zones to your west it is late afternoon. The big one hits during the evening rush. Traffic was busier than usual because so many people were trying to get to whatever place they thought would be safe. They saw the news and knew it was coming. Some didn't care and decided they would deal with it if they had to, but others got as far down the road as they could and have grabbed their bags, loaded their Radio Flyer wagons and are walking now.

Air traffic was halted the day before, in preparation, so planes will not fall out of the sky. And nothing will fly again except birds, not for quite a while. Hot air balloons have an advantage, but you really have to already own one and know what you are doing to control those things. Clearly, your vacation plans will need to change.

I know what you are thinking "What would it take to survive this?"

First of all, luck. Remember, it's just like roulette or any other game of chance, odds are that this is not going to happen in your lifetime, and the house always wins in the end. But if we are lucky enough to experience the special devastating circumstance of a monstrous EMP, it will pay now for you to plan ahead. The Outdoor Life Survival Guide is about as simple and comprehensive as it gets, and offers some alternative doomsday scenarios, too.

Even if we knew it was going to happen, and exactly when, we are not prepared, not completely. But there is an up side to all this.

Up side? Really?

Absolutely. While humanity deteriorates to some extent, the Earth will thrive. Greenhouse gases will stop being pumped into the atmosphere. Trash will stop being produced. Food will grow without chemicals. Wild animal populations are likely to increase. Fisheries will rebound. The air will clear as pollution decreases. Without electricity there will be no way to launch a nuclear warhead. A natural apocalypse like this can save the world. That is the up side.

Before Mother Nature finally hits the reset button, you should get as ready as you need to be. Gather your books and photos and make sure to print out this Rembis Report, and all the other ones, too, so you will have ample entertainment when it all goes down.

And make sure to pick up a copy of the first 35 Volumes!

However you choose to celebrate, have a Happy Cinco de Mayo, Mother's Day, and Apocalypse!