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> The field is weakening over South America, and the red area over North America is losing strength.

This nonsensical caption, saying the exact same thing twice while using different words, wins the award for the worst writing I've read today. And I read a lot today.

Sigh, another garbage clickbait headline pointing to a scaremongering article with nothing new to say.

Nice website design, though. Pretty!!

:-(

Was just thinking the same.
A signal for the current state of readership on HN. Article stands at +23 as of this comment.
This reads like a scaremongering article.
Yep, just like the perennial (and nominally true) favorites

"yellowstone will blow up and cripple western civilization"

"a solar storm will blow up our nation's telecommunications infrastructure"

"a super-flu will kill 30% of americans"

Eh? The latter two are nominally true. They could happen whenever, but so far haven't. The former two will definitely happen we just don't know the time scale.

Yellowstone is on a timer that we don't have access to, and there are projects to drill down into it and deplete the heat, giving us electricity and solving the problem.

With respect to the magnetic pole, this is something that is actually happening. Observe

The magnetic pole in 2009: https://tools.wmflabs.org/geohack/geohack.php?pagename=North...

The current position of the magnetic pole: https://tools.wmflabs.org/geohack/geohack.php?pagename=North...

Is it not true? If it is true then it seems like a good idea to let people know, I myself didn't know about this phenomenon before and feel better informed.

If it's not true, or the danger is being far overblown then speak up here and let us know.

It is just as true as the fact that the sun will cut out and either be a black hole or red dwarf and earth will be engulfed in solar waves.

However, just like the little problem with our sun, the next <many> generations will not have to deal with it.

So it is the truth, but not the entire truth.

That's an awful lot more informative than "This reads like a scaremongering article.". Is there more information on the likely timescales?
It's a plug for the book the essay is from. It barely introduces the subject. The book might be interesting and explore all of this stuff in depth, but excerpting a section like this is poor form. It's on a website so it shouldn't be a space issue. If your going to advertise your book like this, the reader should get something out of it.
I think it's sometimes OK for potentially existential risks, don't you think?
> Even flushing a toilet or filling a car’s gas tank would be impossible.

Huh? Is she trying to say those systems will also fail as a result of losing the electric power grid, or something else?

No, poops will be confused about what direction is north if the magnetic field flips, resulting in them migrating up and out of the toilet, instead of down into the sewers.
You need electricity to pump gas and water. However, you might be able to continue flushing your toilet as long as the water tower contains water.
Water towers, huh. We don't even have them in the Netherlands. (not many anyway)
FWIW (I researched it because I found it odd), Google Translate of https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watertoren says:

> In the heyday there were around 260 water towers in the Netherlands. Currently there are still 170 water towers, about half of which are still in use. ... Nowadays, the task of water towers in the Netherlands has been taken over by a control system with frequency-controlled pumps.

I really wish this included a specific when. It points out a lot of dire consequences, but doesn’t give any strong discussion of the immanence of the impending event.
I don't think anybody knows. I find the historical data to be extremely interesting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Magnetic_Pole#/media/Fil...
Seconded. Read and figured I'd missed it, so read again. Also couldn't see any mention of how long it takes. Like "it's happening now, but we think it may X number of years."
I recall reading an article ~10 years ago that said it happens every 25,000 years or so, and that we aren't anywhere close to the next one.
AFAIK, the current understanding is that while geomagnetic reversals happen, they have no periodicity, and can be as quick as hundreds of years apart (a pair of which seems to have occurred around 41,000 years ago), or as long as tens of millions of years (several of which have occurred.)
Why is this trending? They were saying this nonsense on Ancient Aliens on History (which I've watched because it's trash TV and fun,) or all of those other doomsday shows you saw especially around 2012.
The earth's magnetic field plays an important role is protecting the surface from cosmic radiation. Maybe people will start to insist on ECC memory once cosmic rays start messing with their netflix.
Sounds like a rowhammer from outer space.