NASA: Solar flare will not end the world in 2012

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NASA officials, in a statement released on November 10, have denied the latest doomsday predictions making the rounds that the world will end in a massive solar flare in 2012.

NASA denied stories being peddled by Armageddon prophets that the sun will shoot out a massive flare that will travel across space and burn the world to ashes. NASA, in its statement, titled, Killer Solar Flares Are a Physical Impossibility, noted:

"...some people worry that a gigantic 'killer solar flare' could hurl enough energy to destroy Earth. Citing the accurate fact that solar activity is currently ramping up in its standard 11-year cycle, there are those who believe that 2012 could be coincident with such a flare."

But NASA pointed out that the peak in the sun's activity will come in 2013 and not 2012. NASA referred to a flare that occurred in October 28, 2003, which it says is the most powerful flare ever measured by scientists. In spite of its power, the flare, according to NASA, did not end the world, because:

"...there simply isn't enough energy in the sun to send a killer fireball 93 million miles to destroy Earth."

Speculations that the world will end in 2012 have been popularized by doomsday preachers who say the Mayan calender will expire on December 21, 2012. End-of-world date setters say the end of the Mayan 5,126-year epoch marks, also, the end of the world.

Expectations of "end of the world" has led to flourishing of wild speculations on what will cause the end of the world. Till recently, many end-of-world date setters were certain that a fictitious planet Nibiru, also called Planet X, said to be four times Earth's size will stray into our solar system and collide with Earth. Others have speculated that Comet Elenin will align with other heavenly bodies and provoke cataclysmic earthquakes. Even more recently, reports of approach of asteroid 2005 YU55 caused a flurry of predictions that the asteroid would either impact with Earth or bring a catastrophic end to the world by gravitational traction.

Recent reports by astronomers that the sun is moving toward its 11-year cycle activity peak led to the speculations that a massive solar flare will end the world in 2012.

NASA acknowledges, however, that while solar flares cannot literally "end the world," massive flares do affect the Earth in less dramatic ways. Solar flares, for instance, affect Earth's upper atmosphere and may disrupt satellite communication systems. Another form of the sun's activity called coronal mass ejections (CMEs) may have more dramatic effect. A CME, according to NASA, could disrupt GPS signals and radio communications. But not even the most powerful CME can bring about the end of the world, NASA assures everyone