Well, isn’t that a coincidence

About a month ago, I wrote a little piece on CMEs-Coronal Mass Ejections. They’re one of those things that don’t make a big difference on Earth often enough and so are pretty much ignored by the public-until satellites fail or the grid goes down.

In that piece, I noted an article that said we were underestimating the damage that CMEs could cause, and that there was a new worst-case scenario-two CMEs, back to back. One clears the path for the other, like the offensive line opening a hole for the running back.

It seems we’ve had exactly that happen, and it happened on March 13, 1989-the failure of the Hydro-Quebec grid that caused a blackout that left millions in the dark.

I’m not saying we need to panic and run buy up all the EMP-proof trashcans. (I’m not convinced that the concept would even work. But it’s yet another thing to bear in mind.

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