I like this one. EA-18G Growler
Hypothetical Doomsday Scenario
- Thread starter MasseyWV
- Start date
I like this one. EA-18G Growler
mjarrels
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Yep, that is the replacement. My understanding is it is not a tail hook airplane, ie, no aircraft carrier capability. Lots of PERDIEM for squadron folks traveling arround the world. Folks living near OLF Coupeville should be happy, no more FCLP's
mark
mark
An EA-6B is not going to make a dent in terms of damaging modern electronics. The potential RF output power at the horn is about 1/3rd the APU output power -- it's just physics. The APU output power is public knowledge. Not only is the directionality poor in general due to yaw/pitch dispersion but lighting up a point target at range is transient rather than theatre-wide.
Wrooster
riptides
Super Member
I thought they went carrier ready last year some time. The image shown also has a tailhook.
Airborne Electronic Attack Squadron (VAQ) 130, the Zappers, landed its squadron’s first operational EA-18G Growler on the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75), July 18.
The Growler, a variant of the F/A-18F Super Hornet, replaced the EA-6B Prowler as the primary electronic warfare strike aircraft for Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 3.
I don't have time to read this whole thread but the long and short of it is one dirty (small explosion, large EMP) nuclear weapon detinated 300 miles above the center of the United States would create an EMP large enough to take out the grid on the entire continent.
If you wanted to bring the United States to its knees the above is the only way to do it. Nobody can beat us in a head to head war. But it doesn't take much of a launch device (a scud launcher would do it) to launch the nuke.
The EMP affects devices with long wires...such as power lines feeding into a transformer.
NASA went on record about a year ago saying that we are due for a large coronal mass ejection (CME) to hit the earth. They happen about every 100 years or so. One of those aimed right at us would take out the grid too.
If you wanted to bring the United States to its knees the above is the only way to do it. Nobody can beat us in a head to head war. But it doesn't take much of a launch device (a scud launcher would do it) to launch the nuke.
The EMP affects devices with long wires...such as power lines feeding into a transformer.
NASA went on record about a year ago saying that we are due for a large coronal mass ejection (CME) to hit the earth. They happen about every 100 years or so. One of those aimed right at us would take out the grid too.
LoL. No, no it wouldn't.
A SCUD-B will barely get to 100 miles altitude if fired straight up. There is no way, using a SCUD-B, to get to 300 miles altitude. Understand that getting from 100 miles to 300 miles altitude requires a lot more than 3 times the fuel -- it's more like 30 times the fuel. There are only 4 or 5 launch platforms capable of >250 miles altitude, and none of them are inexpensive do-it-yourself types even for rouge governments with modest R&D budgets.
In general, a ballistic missile's maximum possible altitude if fired straight up is approximately one half it's specified design range. This is physics, basic energy equations.
There are SCUD-derivatives (e.g., the "Al Hussein") which have greater range than the SCUD-B, but they also have far less payload (again, as an example, the "Al Hussein" can carry just over 1K lbs of warhead).
Wrooster
wrooster you seem to have actual knowledge of this. Plain and simple could a massive sun burst destroy the electrical systems we have? I read in National Geographic that it happened during the telegraph period and it fried all the batteries that ran the telegraph. Could you explain this in words that an old mold designer can understand?
I love mold design! I worked on a project which produced about 2 million parts a year -- we had our own (large) molding shop and did repair on premises but the molds themselves were sourced from vendors in the USA, Portugal, and Singapore. Class A/SP101 molds, a lot of thin wall, typically 6 to 12 cavities, a couple of cams/pulls, EDM'd out of P20 and H10.
Anyway, back to everyone's favorite topic.
There is no easy answer to whether or not a given apparatus will be affected by an NEMP event. There are far too many variables to take into consideration. The range to the detonation, the altitude, the impact of the Compton effect, the angle of wave incidence, the rise time/spectral content of the pulse, the duration, the effective capture area, the protection incorporated in the device, the sensitivity of the circuit, the definition of "failure", etc, all come into play -- and I have left out lots of others. Anyone who says "Item X will fail if EMP happens" is not observing these and other factors and is simply, well, oversimplifying. That said, the electrical power grid is certainly a risk -- long wires lead to a lot of field capture. Modern telecom networks are much, much less of a risk, and in fact that risk is diminishing further every year -- for the simple reason that more and more network (voice and broadband) traffic is carried on fiber and not metallic cable. Compared to how things were done even 20 years ago (when metallic T1 and T3 carrier circuits connected central offices), there is almost no metallic connectivity between central offices today. Even on the subscriber side you see metallic POTS diminishing as more and more homeowners either have fiber to the house (in my case, I have VZ FIOS fiber) and/or use a "derived POTS" from an internet connection.
I am sorry to say that there is no definitive answer to your question. EMP/CME situations which appear "safe" will cause problems in some systems, and not others. EMP/CME situations which you might think would cause electronic Armageddon, don't. Even simulation and testing of apparatus in GTEM cells and anechoic rooms, and subsequent hardening of the design, is not going to "prove" that the end product is immune to all types of EM disturbances.
Wrooster
k0ua
Epic Contributor
And if we get another Carrington event like happened in 1859, you can bend over and kiss your *** goodby, because it is TEOTWAWKI.
James K0UA
James K0UA