What most don't understand is that huge solar storms cause electronic devices to fail. Virtually all of modern civilization depends heavily on electronic based devices. From cell phones to computers, modern washers and dryers to electronic ignition for cars. All this and so much more are subject to damage from super high levels of electromagnetic radiation resulting from a massive solar flare that becomes a direct hit on the earth. The first thing you do once you have been alerted that a massive solar storm is just hours away before impact, is to unplug everything, regardless whether or not it has electronics.  In fact if you can, you want to unplug your entire house from the grid if possible as there will be lots of high voltage that will get in on the power grid that you do not want to get into your home. The primary reason is, it could start a fire in your house if the voltage gets way to high. There are lots of things here to consider, and other considerations that we must look at or we could find ourselves in more trouble then necessary. The survival guide to Super Solar Storms is a comprehensive guide to what we must be prepared for. Sadly this time around the ionosphere is badly damaged (which shields us against electromagnetic radiation) and it's not going to be of much help this time.

Power lines as well as circuit boards act as collectors, collecting electromagnetic energy; if the energy is high enough, it can cause it to break down. Understand that it will take high level to achieve this, big a super solar storm aimed directly at the earth could very well do the trick. Regardless, do you really want to take the chance when the answer to preventing this from happening in the first place is super easy? If you have a lot of electron gear like millions of others, then you are going to want to know how to protect your electronics right down to your car's electronic ignition.