Doomsday scenarios

Most people just want to carry on their everyday business, and not worry about things that will probably never happen. Preppers are different – they don’t want to worry about these things, they want to make sure that given a doomsday catastrophe, they will not have to worry. However, different people attach different weight to each possibility, and which ones they take seriously enough to prepare for, will differ from person to person. We’ve created a list of the most commonly anticipated scenarios. (We’ve missed out the mad ones!):

Nuclear War – this is probably the one of most concern at the moment, given the events occurring in Ukraine

Global Pandemic – Five years ago, I watched a programme on TV, where fanatical preppers were extolling the virtues of being prepared for a global pandemic. At the time, most people would have considered these guys to be a bit mad. At the time, the viruses of most concern were (and still are) things like Ebola and Green Monkey Fever – nasty diseases with high mortality, that occur infrequently in areas of low population, but which could easily be transferred to a heavily populated city, given the low cost and high prevalence of air flights, and from any major city, to most other major cities within 48hours, if the virus was sufficiently contagious. Roll forward to May 2020, and the beginning of the global covid pandemic sees the modern world enter new territory, with massive restrictions on travel between countries and within countries, and lockdowns across many parts of the world. I took my daughters to my local town one Saturday night. Normally, the town centre would be buzzing with revellers out to enjoy their ‘night-on-the-town’, multiple pubs would be open with customers spilling out onto the streets. The pavements would be filled with people, the roads with endless traffic, and your ears would be filled with the sound of music, vehicles, and inebriated drinkers. However, on this night, the town was dead. Every pub and every shop was closed. No traffic flowed. The town was silent. We parked up and walked right down the middle of the road, no fear of being hit by a car as there were none. We walked for 20minutes, down the length of the main street and back. In the process, we saw maybe 5 or 6 other people….and that was it. It was quite sureal, and I hope my daughters will remember that evening for a long time.

Climate Change – I think many people have become apathetic about climate change over the last decade. The potential catastrophe has not gone away. In fact, it has become closer, and perhaps more extreme that we anticipated. The reasons for this apathy are many: financial, or they feel that they have made enough effort, or that it is pointless as it’s inevitable, or that other issues are more pressing, to suggest a few.

Flooding – More frequent and more severe flooding is one of the key effects of climate change. Just as we saw in 2005 in New Orleans, where 80% was under water, and water of significant depth too – some parts flooded with 4.6metres of water. The emergency relief effort was heavily criticised for being woefully inadequate. In 2022, severe flooding hit Pakistan, resulting in 1/3 of the country being under water, resulting in tens of thousands of injuries and deaths, and ongoing problems such as restricted access to clean drinking water for millions of people even six months after the event.

Asteroid impact – The likelihood of a catastrophic asteroid impact is low, but the risk is, statistically nevertheless there. Millions of tiny pieces of space rock hit our atmosphere every day – scientists estimate something in the order of 48tons daily. Most are the size of a grain of dust, but some are larger. But the larger they are, the more infrequent they are. Meteorites that are large enough to survive burning up in the atmosphere, to actually reach the ground are much less common – probably in the order of 17,000 meteorites a year [meteors burn up in the atmosphere, but if they are large enough to hit the ground, they are called meteorites]. Meteorites that are large enough to cause significant damage to buildings or vegetation are very few and far between – maybe once every few years. Rocks big enough to do very serious damage to the planet (5km diameter), are extremely rare……but nevertheless do hit our planet regularly. In the last 600million years, this has happened about 60times. So we would expect a catastrophic impact approximately once every 10million years.

Cyber-Attacks, and Artificial Intelligence – This is a relatively new possibility. With the increasing reliance on automation and interconnected computers through communication networks, it is becoming easier for hackers intent on malicious activity to carry out their aims. Similarly, Artificial Intelligence has only recently become a concern – over the last few years, the capabilities have increased dramatically, and A.I. now has the capability to appear human-like in its responses and in its learning capacity. Top researchers and investors in this area have suddenly started to voice their concerns, as the rate of improvement is so great, that it is anticipated A.I. will potentially exceed human intelligence in the near future, leading to concerns as to how A.I. would seek to use its greater powers. Block-buster movies have suggested the type of catastrophic outcomes that might occur. Although unlikely, there is a real concern that A.I. could potentially one day take drastic action to solve climate change problems, which might not be at all beneficial to human-kind!

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