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Around 2010, I read a report about the Carrington Event, considered to be one of the most powerful solar storms ever recorded in history.  Here is what happened…..

“On Thursday, Sept. 1, 1859, British astronomer, Richard Carrington, was sketching the projected image of a solar flare. As he observed a large sunspot group, two kidney shaped spots of blinding light appeared on his shaped glass screen, where an 11 inch image of the sun rapidly changed as he watched.

The next day at dawn, virtually the entire world witnessed auroras in every color, blazing forth so brightly that witnesses reported being able to read newspapers by their light at night.  Similar experiences were reported at latitudes as far south as Cuba and Hawaii. Normally, equatorial auroras are unheard of.

Today’s astronomers say that Richard Carrington recorded an extremely rare magnetic explosion of some sort, just above the Sun’s surface.  Also, the only “electronic” system in existence at the time was the telegraph, which was powered by wet-cell batteries, and worked by the simple opening and closing of switches. 

The clacking keys transmitted code along a primitive system of electrical wires.  Following the Carrington event, these systems began to malfunction on a worldwide basis.  So strong was the electrical induction of the earth’s magnetic fields that sparks set the telegraph paper on fire by this solar flare.  Incredibly, when the operators disconnected the wet-cell batteries that powered the telegraph, the telegraphs still continued to function, so strong was the electrical induction.

Experts say that if such an event were to happen today, it would “blow-up” our national electric grid, hence producing a global catastrophe.  Not only would this happen to our country, but nations throughout the world that uses a system of electrical distribution like ours which practically every nation does.

Currently we have technology that wasn’t dreamed of in 1859 – a system of high-voltage electric power grids.  Not only that, but these grids are controlled by computers, which control hundreds of huge transformers.  The National Academy of Sciences issued a report that is chilling in its implications.  It states if another Carrington event (or even a similar eruption of lesser power) were to happen today, the entire U. S. power grid would burn out within a period of a minute or two!

Think of it, everything electrical would stop – lights, motors, air-conditioning, heating, communications, the internet and more.  A real emergency would ensue.  Transportation would halt.  Supermarkets would run out of food.  Gas station pumps would cease to function because gasoline would not be able to be pumped.  Financial markets and banks do business electronically so they would shut down!  There can be no question about it, such an event would bring the civilized world to a halt.”  Truly, America would “stand still”.

The Carrington Event took place in 1859.  That was over 150 years ago!  Is there any concern today for an event like that taking place today?  Definitely!  On Dec. 15, 2010 Liz Goodwin reported in “The Lookout” that a series of solar filaments which had been lurking atop the sun for weeks finally exploded releasing releasing high energy plasma into the solar system.  So significant was this outburst of electromagnetic energy from these explosive solar flares, NASA scientists dubbed it “The Great Eruption”.  NASA scientist Karel Schrijver concluded, “We see that solar storms can be global events, playing out on scales we scarcely imagined before.”  Thankfully, these high energy storms disperse before reaching our atmosphere.  But precedent certainly shows this will not always be as the Carrington Event has shown.

But it just wasn’t the danger of natural events that began my concern of how to protect my family against one of the most catastrophic dangers involving the takedown of the national electric grid.  Actually, it was a terrorist act that actually took place that really got my attention.  Here is what happened….

On April 16, 2013 a trio of men slipped past security cameras in a remote substation in upstate California.  They were able to cut power to the site’s emergency phone system.  Armed with military assault rifles, they rained down bullets on critical equipment.  The attack took less than 20 minutes, destroyed $15 million in equipment and most important…nearly caused a statewide blackout across California.  Thankfully, quick thinking engineers where able to redirect the flow of electricity before losing control of the entire system. 

The conclusion: Jon Wellinghoff, former chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), called it “The most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred”.  The Wall Street Journal quoted a former official who believes the attack was merely a “dress rehearsal for a larger event.”  And Rich Lordan, a senior executive for the Electric Power Research Institute, said the attack “appears to be preparation for an act of war”.  But these are not the only voices crying “DANGER”.

Consider what the head of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security had to say, “There is an imminent threat from ISIS to the national electric grid.”  Also Iran and North Korea are both actively pursuing ways to take down our grid, according to President Reagan’s former Science Advisor, Dr. William Graham. (10/1/22 UPDATE: Today, China may pose to be the greatest threat to our country regarding the use of ng a EMP weapon.  To read the details, CLICK HERE and check the section “Present Dangers” in the link “What is a Safe Haven Home”)

David Fessler, an electrical engineer and chief Energy and Infrastructure Strategist for one of the top financial firms in the world believes this event could portend incredible devastation to our country.  His analysis has revealed that there are approximately 55,000 substations in our country.  According to FERC, and this is their exact language: “Destroy NINE interconnected substations…and the entire Untied States GRID would be down for at least 18 months, and probably longer.”  If such an event takes place, it would knock out power to more than 300 million Americans.  Our nation has approximately 350 million people living on its mainland, therefore, for all practical purposes this would affect the entire nation. 

Where does the problem in all this lie?  It’s the availability and sustainability of electrical transformers. John Kappenman of MetaTech states when electric transformers blow, they can’t be repaired in the field.  And most will not be able to be repaired due to level of destruction each one would sustain.  He states that at this time, there is a one to three year delay between placing an order for a new transformer and getting one.⁴  And herein lies the reason why it could take America 18 months to recover from a catastrophe such as this, if not longer.

That is why I believe the takedown of the national electrical grid is one of the greatest dangers we face in our nation at this time.  Just think about it, not having electricity for 18 months or longer.  And it’s not only solar flares we have to be worried about.  Mankind induced catastrophies can also cause the same.  For example, nuclear warfare, EMP atmospheric produced nuclear detonations, cyber-warfare, terrorist attacks can also cause the same.

Please consider the seriousness of this situation and the danger it poses.  Realize that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has come to this conclusion, not some self serving “off the grid” guru or financial promoter trying to capitalize on fear and “end of the world” scenarios.

So what would it be like if we lost electricity for an extended period of time?  Essentially, our entire economy would be brought down.  Consider the collateral effects: all electronic transactions could not be executed.  Stores could not process credit card transactions, which most of America relies on to conduct business.  Even cash transactions could not be properly executed since registers could not operate.  Vendors could not be paid.  Banks would be shut down because the mass of people wanting to get cash would overwhelm the system multiple times over.  Not only that, banks could not carry out electronic transactions or money transfers either, making them totally non-functional.  The entire banking system would freeze-up and then collapse.  With so little cash, even if registers or tills could be manually operated, people for the most part would not have enough cash to pay for anything. 

Since gas stations rely on electrical pumps to deliver gas into gas tanks, cars would soon not be able to operate until electricity was restored.  You no longer could go to work unless you lived but a few miles from your workplace.  But what good would that do if your business needs electricity to operate.  And even if your company was totally energy self-sufficient, goods and services no longer could be delivered because fuel is not available.  City and town water would probably shut down because these pumps require electricity as well.  Unless you had natural gas, you would not be able to cook food.  And whatever you have in your frig will spoil within a few days.  If you live in Florida and other hot temperate spots in the nation than the only thing which would bake or boil is you because of temperatures going into the high 90’s and possibly triple digits inside your home – especially in the summer.

Moreover, financial stock markets and brokerage firms will also be frozen.  Therefore, you most likely will not be able to perform vital stock market transactions.  If so, you will probably lose it all since the markets will tank to levels never seen before.  Sadly, there is nothing you will be able to do about it. Even if emergency electrical power was available for phone service, the system would be so overwhelmed, you most likely would not be able to get through to execute your trades.  And even if you could, like banks, stock brokerage firms would not be able to process electronic transactions.  Worse, if you wanted to liquidate your accounts to get sorely needed cash, this again will also not be possible because like banks, they will not have the cash to cover the requests.  Can you grasp the enormity of the problem?  Can even conceive of the utter devastation this will bring?”

No, not really.  One can never fully grasp the immensity and collateral effects that can take place with the collapse of the electric grid of this magnitude.  And to add even greater weight to a potential catalyst that can bring on an electrical grid failure, we now need to be concerned about cyberattacks.  We now know that cyberwarfare attacks have this capability as well.  The closest example of this was the takedown of Colonial Pipeline. Here is what happened according to Wikepedia….

On May 7, 2021, Colonial Pipeline, an American oil pipeline system that originates in Houston, Texas that primarily  transports gasoline and jet fuel suffered a ransomware cyberattack that impacted computerized equipment managing its pipeline. The company halted all pipeline operations to contain the attack. Overseen by the FBI, the company paid the amount that was asked by the hacker group (75 bitcoins or $4.4 million) within several hours.  Upon receipt of the ransom, an IT tool was provided to the Colonial Pipeline Company by DarkSide to restore the system.

Within a few days, fuel shortages began to appear in five states, mostly in the south.  Thankfully, by May 15, eight days later, all Colonial Pipeline systems returned to normal. 

What were the effects of this attack?  The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration issued a regional emergency declaration for 17 states and Washington, D.C., to keep fuel supply lines open on May 9.  Although Colonial does primarily operate in the southeastern United States, it transports gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from Texas to as far away as New York.  Incredibly, about 45% of all fuel consumed on the East Coast arrives via this pipeline system.  In the final analysis, it was the largest cyberattack on an oil infrastructure target in the history of the United States. 

Can you imagine the consequences of such an attack on multiple fronts?  Energy distribution systems, electric grid distribution systems, banking and even communication systems.  The list could be endless.  Therefore, a well coordinated high level cyberattack by any hacker or hacker group could result in serious shutdowns involving infrastructure management systems.  This could involve local, regional and even national shutdowns with catastrophic consequences. 

As though this wasn’t a sufficient cause to have one consider possible solutions to combat such devastating events, add to this another danger such as a nuclear generated electromagnetic pulse (EMP), possibly the most dangerous as the potential for its use is at the highest level. An nuclear EMP is not a natural event such as the Carrington Event, but brought about by man himself.  Essientially, a nuclear generated EMP is almost identical to a solar electromagnetic pulse.  In this case, a fairly good sized nuclear warhead is exploded in our atmosphere well above ground, around 12-24 miles high. Amazingly, there are hardly any blast effects experienced on the ground rendering the area free of physical damage.  However, the electromagnetic pulse generated is great enough where practically all electronic devices (any device that contains and is controlled by computer chips) such as computers, TVs, cars, appliances – almost everything – is “fried” by the pulse.  It has been determined that 9 to 12 strategically placed nuclear weapons in our atmosphere throughout our country could take down the entire national electric grid. This is something to be seriously concerned about.

The following account is a fictional yet accurate portrayal of a nuclear induced EMP event that takes down America’s electrical grid.  In this account, we share a likely scenario that would play out if one owned a Safe Haven Home.  We hope this will give you a hopeful view for what a Safe Haven Home can do for you, especially one that’s located in a great refuge location.