What would happen if the Earth had a total blackout for a few days?

[Red Squirrel]

Saw this on Facebook, I was skeptical and turns out it's fake:

http://www.bibobuzz.com/index.php/e...014-3-days-in-black-without-sun-nasa-confirms

But let's say something like that was to actually happen, what effect would it have on the planet? Would it just get really cold but nothing out of the ordinary considering it's winter and already in -30's anyway? Or would it reach extreme cold temps like -100's and even colder? There's always sun shining on one part of the planet (I guess we could say about 1/2) so for it to be in total darkness globally, I imagine that could cause some interesting weather patterns.

 

[William Gaatjes]

3 Days no sun and the earth continues to rotate around.

No more heating of the earth.
No more ionizing of the atmosphere.
No more solar wind.

I do not know. I think we first would get violent storms and temperature would drop then 3 days later when the sun starts to shine again, we would get more violent storms and temperature would rise and in the end it would be like it never happened, storms settling down to regular weather patterns. I think that ocean current flows are like a flywheel and keep temperature sort of stable but we would get very violent storms as a result.
Not "biblical flood" type storms, For that we need earthquakes to generate a lot of tsunamis together with violent storms like ...(forgot the name). And i doubt earthquakes would happen during a 3 day solar black out.

 

[sandorski]

It would get real cold. Probably enough to cause Crop failures in regions having Summer. I suspect anyway.

 

[DigDog]

they are talking electrical bulbs failing, not sun going away.

an actual blackout, mmk?

so, the answer is: in small detail, there would be panic and chaos. in the big picture, nothing would happen.

 

[sandorski]

they are talking electrical bulbs failing, not sun going away.

an actual blackout, mmk?

so, the answer is: in small detail, there would be panic and chaos. in the big picture, nothing would happen.

Oh, then there would be a Baby Boom.

 

[AD5MB]

web site said sun outage, not power outage.

to know what would happen peruse this website:

http://www.survivalistboards.com/

It would be TEOTWAWKI it and everybody would grab their BOB and take the BOV to the BOL because the SHTF.

I find their communications recharges my dingbatteries very quickly. the more confident they sound, the less they know.

 

[master_shake_]

why not just look at the northern part of the earth?

they go without sunlight for extended amounts of time

 

[Ventanni]

Huge baby boom 9 months later, guaranteed. Trust me on that one.

And no, I'm not kidding rofl.

 

[Red Squirrel]

why not just look at the northern part of the earth?

they go without sunlight for extended amounts of time

I would imagine the fact that the rest of the Earth gets sun has some effect on keeping control though.

But yeah, I would definitely imagine a big babyboom. :biggrin:

And probably a huge increase in pollution because of all the generators running for those 3 days. On the other hand if the sun was to "turn off" the grid would probably work fine in general but solar/wind would probably be a bit sketchy. Nuclear would continue to run fine and so would fossil fuels. Which brings an interesting thought... once a true green energy is found and fully used it would probably be good if it can somehow be stored in the form of a combustion fuel for emergencies.

 

[Paul98]

If the sun stopped working for any amount of time physics would be going crazy thus we would have much worse things to worry about.

 

[Matt1970]

Since when does a solar storm block out the sun?

 

[fjmeat]

Huge baby boom 9 months later, guaranteed. Trust me on that one.

And no, I'm not kidding rofl.

True that. When Hurricane Ike hit and most of Houston had no power for 2 weeks straight. The boom was pretty impressive 9 months later.

If we had no sun for 3 days - it'll be a worldwide baby boom for sure.

 

[mcbaes72]

See Pitch Black movie, damn those flying monsters!

Let's see, weather changes, crops dying, severe cold temperatures, mass hysteria with looting and other crime. Then, there's vampires to worry about, too.

 

[piasabird]

What is going to block out the sun and the moon and candles and flashlights and heaters made with clay pots and candles? Natural gas can make heat also as well as charcoal, and wood stoves, coal, etc.

The atmosphere holds in heat.

 

[DigDog]

crops wouldnt die because of 72 hours without sunlight .. wtf kinda crops are you growing.

 

[sandorski]

crops wouldnt die because of 72 hours without sunlight .. wtf kinda crops are you growing.

Cold would probably kill some crops. How many depends on how cold it would become.

 

[sm625]

Well in a typical day the temperature drops by 30 degrees after just 8 hours of darkness. So extreme inland temperatures would probably drop 60-100 degrees after 3 days of total darkness. But near the ocean? Temperatures would only drop a few degrees per day.

The major dynamic would be the mass compression of inland air masses, and the resulting weather patterns that emerge. Warm wet air would be drawn in from over the oceans towards the center of the continents. After 3 days you would have utterly massive and highly destructive storm systems. Look at the very slight differences in barometric pressure that resulted in storms like the one that wrecked the Edmund Fitzgerald. We would easily shatter all records, by far. What is going to stop pressure from dropping all the way down to 25, 23 even under 20? Hell just a drop to 28.5 is a guaranteed major weather event. To go under 28 we're talking cat 5 hurricane force winds, and freezing cold temperatures to boot. These would be ramping up in strength even as the sun came back. The sun might even add to the power of the storm until it finally dissipates. You'd see several feet of snow in places like Iowa and Nebraska. Perhaps several dozen feet, in just a few days. The engine driving the snow would be massive and continental, we cannot even conceive of how much snow could be generated, because storms normally cant get that big. But they can if a continent just goes dark for days. All crops would be destroyed. The inland crops by the blizzard, the california/florida crops would be taken out by the wind and rain. 10 million dead in america within a week. 30 million in a month.

 

[Biftheunderstudy]

Perhaps this might help:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qF3ejw7JJuc

 

[DrPizza]

Well in a typical day the temperature drops by 30 degrees after just 8 hours of darkness. So extreme inland temperatures would probably drop 60-100 degrees after 3 days of total darkness. But near the ocean? Temperatures would only drop a few degrees per day.

The major dynamic would be the mass compression of inland air masses, and the resulting weather patterns that emerge. Warm wet air would be drawn in from over the oceans towards the center of the continents. After 3 days you would have utterly massive and highly destructive storm systems. Look at the very slight differences in barometric pressure that resulted in storms like the one that wrecked the Edmund Fitzgerald. We would easily shatter all records, by far. What is going to stop pressure from dropping all the way down to 25, 23 even under 20? Hell just a drop to 28.5 is a guaranteed major weather event. To go under 28 we're talking cat 5 hurricane force winds, and freezing cold temperatures to boot. These would be ramping up in strength even as the sun came back. The sun might even add to the power of the storm until it finally dissipates. You'd see several feet of snow in places like Iowa and Nebraska. Perhaps several dozen feet, in just a few days. The engine driving the snow would be massive and continental, we cannot even conceive of how much snow could be generated, because storms normally cant get that big. But they can if a continent just goes dark for days. All crops would be destroyed. The inland crops by the blizzard, the california/florida crops would be taken out by the wind and rain. 10 million dead in america within a week. 30 million in a month.

You appear to be assuming the temperature would drop linearly. I don't think it would. Also, 30 degrees seems a bit high, especially when it's colder.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Perhaps this might help:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qF3ejw7JJuc

That's really cool, never even considered gravity. Or the fact that gravity "travels" at speed of light, that's awesome.

 

[sandorski]

You appear to be assuming the temperature would drop linearly. I don't think it would. Also, 30 degrees seems a bit high, especially when it's colder.

Indeed. However, even after the initial 8 hour drop in temperature, many crops are already close to having their growth stunted. Although, just not having light would probably stunt crop growth in itself.

 

[Revolution 11]

What would happen is that the Earth and all the other planets would rapidly slingshot themselves out of the Solar System. Everyone on Earth would freeze within a matter of weeks and human civilization would be crushed in a eternal ice age as the Earth flies off in the dark of space, a newly anointed rogue planet.

The only way to lose planet-wide sunlight is if the Sun itself disappears, which means no gravity. Now if you are talking about a orbital cloaking field....

 

[Tr4nd]

Oh, then there would be a Baby Boom.

Hehehe, that's true.

 

[sm625]

The only way to lose planet-wide sunlight is if the Sun itself disappears, which means no gravity. Now if you are talking about a orbital cloaking field....

I had assumed this. If the sun actually just plain disappeared completely, it would be pointless to discuss the resulting weather. The gravitational event would cause instantaneous mass earthquakes all around the world at the same time as we would all be thrust into pure darkness. Most lights would of course go out. So we would be experiencing these earthquakes in total darness. It would be a total nightmare and half the survivors would go completely mad. I doubt that anyone at all would survive the first few hours of this. A simultaneous shift of the earth's trajectory at 1G? I'm thinking mile high waves.

 

[dkozloski]

Give a phone call to the mayor of Barrow, Alaska. He can answer all your questions for you.