Survive Infinite Dangers: The Family Survival Guide of 21st Century Dangers (6 page)

Transistors have an Achilles’ heel. Most are made of silicon (processed sand) and attached wires to junctions that can only be seen with a microscope. On the other hand, the same function in a vacuum tube is a wire the diameter a hundred times the size of a human hair. A nearby static pulse will burn out the very tiny transistor junction but not harm the vacuum tube wires. Close enough and even vacuum tubes are destroyed but the difference is perhaps a million to one. Even a few miles away vacuum tubes might be OK, but not semiconductors! Put an EMP device (two huge capacitor banks one charged with negative volts and the other charged with positive volts then create a picosecond gigantic spark (when brought close enough together they neutralize to zero volts (with the spark) and the wires in every semiconductor smaller in diameter than one thousandth the diameter of a human hair will blow out like a fuse. There is no repairing them without replacing every semiconductor device. A typical simple handheld radio may have a hundred thousand junctions (counting the multitude of junctions that are in integrated circuits (an integrated circuit is basically thousands of transistors in a small package).

If a group, country or whoever wants to put their high technology 1
^st
world country enemy back to the 14
^th
century, they’d use an EMP bomb or bombs. There would be little, or no, physical damage but even automobiles are destroyed. Planes crash, trains stop, busses stop. If your life depends on a pacemaker you drop dead. Unless you have a horse, transportation is walking. Hopefully, you are very close to your safe area as an EMP bomb will immediately create a total breakdown in civil society faster than even a nuclear bomb. Police will be hopelessly outnumbered by looters. The one or two percent of mankind who wait for such opportunities (i.e. “the Rodney King riots”) are out in full-force in no time. If you have more than a mile or two to reach your safe area, run fast and good luck! Get everyone inside and barricade with guns ready preparing for the looters as they go block by block (see the Civil Unrest chapter for some “tricks” to maybe get passed by).

An old DC-3 would probably be big enough to carry a medium sized EMP bomb (I’m a non PhD level EE and I could build a ground based EMP bomb with a dozen technician assistants, a few months of time and do so for well under a million dollars. If the “bombs” are lifted into the air by something like a DC-3 or HUGE balloons line of sight increases and the EMP damage could extend out to hundreds of miles. Spend weeks charging the massive capacitor banks one bank with negative voltage the other positive voltage then bring them closer and closer together until there is a blinding flash that is over in less than a microsecond.

The voltage during that period of time may be millions or even trillions of volts. I know the formulas and other data for the optimum voltage, height above ground and other factors but, of course, will not publish them even though I’m sure our enemies are well aware of the same data. Unfortunately, strong rumors persist of one enemy of the United States being close to having an EMP bomb production line while they mask it with much bombastic talk and saber rattling about nuclear weapons.

It is my belief that EMP is our greatest danger and from ground based EMP “bombs”. A tractor trailer filled with huge capacitors is hard to call a bomb since you won’t find any explosive material such as gun powder or a nuclear weapon. But it is still one half of a very dangerous “bomb”.

Since the effect of EMP was first discovered in the 1950’s, most of our military and some of our government has “radiation hardened” their electronics which includes protection from EMP. All satellites launched since the 1990’s include EMP protection. Commercial and consumer electronics has pretty much ignored this danger. This carries through to systems such as control systems for large dams, hydroelectric plants, some nuclear plants and other systems that, should they fail, could cause great loss of life. So this is more serious than losing use of cell phones and your big screen TV’s. Not knowing which semiconductors might burn out in a particular system there’s no way to tell the failure mode of, say, a nuclear power plant or a hydroelectric dam or a city’s water system.

It’s ironic that third world nations that have little in the way of high tech devices would be least effected. North America and Europe and 1
^st
World Asia and Australia/New Zealand if hit by a strong EMP pulse or pulses would not revert to the 19
^th
century but plunge back to the 14
^th
century. Most horses, buggies, coal lamps, and all that made the 19
^th
century “run” are gone. You have to go back 600 years to reach where we would be. Recovery would probably be impossible. Hundreds of years would pass if North America were to recover at all. Think of a “Mad Max” movie set and that would probably be North America minus 99% of its current population for a long time. As I wrote, I said I wasn’t going to sugar coat anything.

All of the EMP scenarios I’ve read (such as the fictional book “One Second After”) and what I believe our government believes will happen is a nuclear bomb “fine tuned” to maximize EMP would explode high over Nebraska – high enough to cover all of North America. The required ICBM to lift such a weight that high and to have it blow up when triggered is still years away in design by the one country that most worries the United States. So I believe they think they still have a five year window.

After 40 years as an electrical engineer and considerable work in the EMP field it is my belief it would instead be a series of EMP ground based “bombs” placed in rings around about a dozen hi-tech critical areas of our country. I’m sure some are obvious to you; Washington, D.C., Wall Street, and Silicon Valley to name three. They’d all have to be triggered at the same microsecond to not destroy other EMP bombs before they each went off. That would not be difficult. Shut down the electronic world in a dozen areas of our country would cause a cascade effect that would stop the entire country and create immense permanent damage.

Unlike nuclear bomb parts that are tightly controlled, parts to build an EMP bomb are sold every day mostly into the electric power industry. They require huge capacitors and means to charge them. I hope our government is watching the purchase of such parts but I see no sign of it. Let’s hope we stumble across one being assembled in time to shut the entire operation down (if it is happening at all). As I say I rank it as our number one most likely WMD by a wide margin. The first EMP occurred in the 19
^th
century set off by an inventor named Tesla (Google for the story). He blew out the town’s electric power station of Colorado Springs and most of the electric lights. It must have been a huge spark to blow out light bulbs since their wires are a million times larger in diameter than is a semiconductor junction wire.

As you will read later I believe ground-based EMP would be coordinated with cyber warfare and maybe even bio-terrorism.

What can you do to protect your electronics? Not much. Actually, most won’t be of any use except one device; a short wave radio capable of picking up stations on other continents. I recommend the Kaito model KA-500. I have tried a dozen similar radios and it is the best. If radio stations in all of North America left the air you’d have to pick up, say, the BBC in London or Radio Japan to find out what happened. The radio is transistorized (so it would have to be EMP protected). It is powered by batteries, or a crank charger or a small built-in solar panel. So it will not run down with weak batteries. It also has lights of various types. You should take the batteries out of the radio and then wrap the radio with at least two layers of aluminum foil. Why two layers? I set the radio on the strongest AM radio with the volume all the way up and it was still picking up a slight signal with a single wrap. Two layers did the trick. I have four of these radios triple wrapped in aluminum foil. Why four radios? What if the enemy exploded off a second set of bombs a day or week later taking out all of the radios that had been protected? Wrap one as a trial with the batteries in and the volume all the way up on a strong AM station to make sure your aluminum foil is adequate. Do not wrap the batteries directly with foil as that would short out the terminals. EMP would probably not damage batteries as the wires inside batteries are large but I wouldn’t take a chance. Buy plenty of spare batteries for the radios, put them in a cardboard box then tightly wrap them with aluminum foil. Be careful the two poles of the batteries don’t short out both touching, say, aluminum foil. Or (information learned just before publication): place the radio and any other transistorized electronics in a 32 gallon, or larger, galvanized trashcan for complete EMP protection. $18 at Home Depot! How simple!

As I wrote, you may end up being the only news your entire town receives. You’ll want to get word to others but be careful to remain stealth. Write out what happened from the shortwave station then make sure the note cannot be traced back to you. If you are discovered you’ll be a hero for ten minutes then all of your provisions will be taken for the “common good” after martial law is declared.

Trust me; authorities will be going door to door looking for “smart” people who “hoarded” food. See the chapter on stealth to make it appear your house has already been ransacked and not worth looking through. As an aside, another “survivalist manual I consider to be excellent (preparing people for permanent Armageddon while this book is only for six to 12 months) says to put a radio inside of an army ammo steel box for shielding. If you have that book – no! The boxes are painted green and the paint insulates the lid from the base. The ammo box provides no EMP protection! Use aluminum foil and plenty of foil especially around the rod antenna (or the trashcan).

Anyway, if EMP is our Achilles’ heel then this book isn’t going to buy you much. At least with the protected radio you’ll know what happened during your six months of remaining life.

As I say, I recommend the Kaito Voyager model KA-500. I bought 20 portable radios and it is the best of the bunch in sensitivity, stability and features. It even picks up the seven NOAA (Weather Bureau) stations. It runs on throw-away batteries, solar cells and a crank handle that charges a rechargeable battery. It includes lights, a red flasher, super bright LED’s lights for reading, a USB power both in and out socket and other neat features. Nothing can stop it short of EMP or you dropping it off the roof of a building You can buy it on eBay, Amazon or
www.infinitedangers.com
. But forget to keep it double wrapped in foil (or in your EMP trashcan) and it will be destroyed if EMP strikes. It is not indestructible. The transistors inside don’t look charred but they are. All those millions of tiny wires all burnt out like tiny fuse wires. I recommend buying two or three radios. Leave it to a “smart” enemy to follow up with a second EMP bomb to “zap” all radios and electronic equipment that were kept in metal shielding for safety. Bam! The second bomb takes those out three hours later. Be sure to also cover the antenna. Do a test. Switch to the AM band. Tune to the strongest station. Turn the volume all the way up then wrap it twice (or place in trashcan). If you can still hear even a whisper you need a third wrap. Don’t scrimp on foil! After you are satisfied the wrap is enough, unwrap the radios and remove the batteries for long-term storage (corroded unused batteries can destroy the electronic device they are in). Now rewrap the radios as before plus use duct tape for long-term strength.

Some “survivalists build a copper room that is electrically shielded and connected to outside ground rods. Or just a large electrically sealed box large enough to contain many electronic items. You can sound like an electronic wizard by saying you built a Faraday shield room or box. Just hope they don’t ask techie questions. A great weekend project! Sheets of copper with all edges soldered for a tight electrical seal. A smart “survivalist might start with a large wooden box then completely line it with copper soldering all edges using what is called electrical “finger stock” to RFI (radio frequency interference) protect everything in the box when the lid is closed. No radio or electrical pulses or signals can enter the box. Electronic testing companies build entire rooms sometimes as large as a house if they need to test something as large as a large military vehicle. But, for you, a large box is not going to be cheap. Sheets of copper are expensive. Yes, triple aluminum foil will work but not as good as solid sheets of pure copper with all seams soldered for a tightly sealed box. Put all of your electronic survival items such as your radios, GPS, two-way radios, direction finders, and metal detectors (the potential list of important items is long but that crank/solar/battery powered radio is the most important). It appears the simple galvanized trash can with lid tightly in place provides amazing EMP protection plus it does NOT have to be grounded (but it wouldn’t hurt). For the money of a copper room you can buy 200 trash cans!

Any grounding should be to a pure copper ground rod driven at least six feet into the ground. Or connecting to a metal water pipe also provides a good ground to send the EMP burst harmlessly to ground. Try to connect as close to where the pipe enters your home using large wire. Copper wire is best such as copper house wiring. Plastic pipe won’t work at all of course and the larger the wire size the better (lower resistance) and far better than aluminum house wiring commonly found in house wiring of certain eras but now illegal in many areas due to their higher resistance and a higher chance of electrical wiring fires. If your house is older and wired with old style higher resistance aluminum wiring you’re probably fire safe (most building codes now require copper house wiring) although you may want to consider changing to large pure copper (not copper anodized where just the surface is copper but the wire is 95% aluminum. This is especially not good for high amperage (current) devices such as electric ranges and furnace motors. Aluminum foil is fine for shielding but does not compare to copper. “Invest” in copper when you can or the good old galvanized steel trashcan seems to as good as copper!