Europe is big. From a German POV Sturmey Archer were exotics, and allegedly not that good compared against anything (well maintained) by Fichtel&Sachs. I don't even remember what was on my early road bikes anymore, but certain it was neither Campagnolo or Shimano.
Later on I rode Campagnolo, they were reliable and easy to maintain. Anything Shimano I cursed and avoided like the plague. Because that was sensitive shit, not good to maintain, and degraded fast. It was like it was made to be thrown away after few uses, just to save a few grams.
All that aside, this gave you a real advantage: https://connexchain.com/en/ :-) They were called different at the time, just Wipperman maybe, but didn't really matter.
You just asked your dealer for the good chains made in Solingen, and got these.
Put a chewing gum in it, push a coin or credit card atop it, for a fast fix. Use Fantastic Fast Foam by Lunar Meta Materials for more permanent repair.
What do the engines have to do with plasma around the hull, or rather its leading edges, caused by supersonic speed, which never ever even enter them?
And if you're thinking of the exhaust, why would that matter at all for signals reception and transmission, with the exception of a small cone from right behind?
We've experienced nothing like Carrington-event scale after that happened. Luckily so, I think.
Then there are things like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miyake_event which we have located several traces of in geological records. They are at least a magnitude stronger than anything which Carrington carried. And statistically long overdue.
If one of these happened today, that would be a really interesting experience.
Er. All the DataCenters we are building are protected from carrington/Miyake event type damage right?}
I assume the "data-centers in space" idea that company worth 2 trillion dollars is supposed to be working on has been figured out so that carrington events aren't a problem too.
> From a national security perspective, it's also not a risk that comes from an adversary, it's not something Russia/China/Iran/[insert country] can do to us...
That's a valid point. I guess in my mind an EMP is an act of aggression that has viable ways of being stopped (as opposed to mitigated) whereas a solar storm is agnostic to anything happening on Earth. Even if the mechanism is similar, they are different problems with different solutions.
I believe the US already tracks (or attempts to track) anything resembling a missile headed our way, and there are systems that can take these down before they detonate and cause problems. You can't exactly "stop" a solar flare from hitting Earth. Additionally, we can also use diplomacy to create the conditions where China (or anyone else) won't want to EMP us (or at least won't benefit from doing it, even if they do want to), but we can't do that with the Sun.
And that's where my point on prioritization comes into play. We're more likely to invest in technology like Israel's Iron Dome to prevent an EMP from another nation than we would a full scale re-build of the grid to mitigate what amounts to an act of God from the sun.
If an enemy nation wanted to conduct an EMP attack, they wouldn't need to do it with an ICBM that we'd be able to identify as such. Getting an object into LEO would not, on its own, stand out, and would provide an avenue for attack (or the threat of an attack) that would not be detectable in the same way as an ICBM launch.
Of course, the harm to their own systems would be substantial as well given that it would have a huge impact on satellites in orbit, not just systems on the ground.
True. It would admittedly be a much different and more challenging problem to stop something coming back in from Space as opposed to an ICBM - you're right there.
But yea the mutually assured misery that it might cause in LEO for everyone would make this only likely form a truly rogue state. Maybe NK, but trying to identify who the threat would be changes this from a solar flare risk/mitigation discussion fully to a geopolitical theory one ;)
> more challenging problem to stop something coming back in from Space as opposed to an ICBM
Well, the reason I point out LEO is that Starfish Prime was detonated at 250 miles, that's within the range of a low Earth orbit. You don't need to return anything to Earth to have the desired effect, or even have it on an Earthward trajectory (such as deorbiting the satellite).
EDIT:
> would make this only likely form a truly rogue state
Can't we really? AFAIUI it's mostly charged particles coming in relatively slow, or rather us/Earth entering their path, like walking into a lawn sprinkler.
Not Gamma-, or X-Rays hitting us directly at the speed of light in direct line of sight.
Now imagine a cluster of satellites which puts them in orbit between us, and the Sun, or rather enough of them in front of Earths surface at dawn. Because that side is 'forward' on Earths track around the Sun.
These sats could be mostly dormant, to be set in rotation, unspooling really long thin wires, electrically charged by whichever means. Like a giant electromagnetic umbrella. Slowing the stuff down, or diverting it outright.
I think that would be valuable, even if they would have to be discarded after 'one time use'.
My "we can't do that with the sun" statement was re: being able to use diplomacy to avoid it, not that there aren't theoretical (albeit far fetched) solutions. We can't create the conditions where the sun doesn't "want" to solar flare us - it's random chance and uncorrelated to anything we do. We can influence the "odds" for something like an EMP (or LEO nuke detonation) happening.
If we had an unlimited budget to prioritize science fiction projects like this, then sure man, I guess there's solutions that could exist that shield the planet entirely lol
Funny. Just tested that because I'm always told: too complicated, nothing will work!
And got no check at all.
Edit: Maybe it depends on where you come from, or what they think you come from. Or using VPN. Wrong browser with insufficient base for uBo. uBo configured wrong. (Not?) using an ad-blocking DNS-Server, so that shit doesn't even make it to your local uBo?
Tested from Hamburg, Germany via private tunnel from my home in Colorado, which also works.
Threat intel of the IP or network you're coming from matter as much as anything else. FirefoxLinux on a clean IP can access places ChromeWindows on a dirty high-risk IP cannot.
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