The scenario painted by scientist William R. Graham was grim. In testifying before the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday, July 10, he described the "catastrophe" which could occur if any one of our enemies managed to detonate an "E" bomb, or Electromagnetic Pulse device, in the atmosphere above the United States.

I have to admit to pleading ignorance when I heard the term "E-Bomb." Doesn't an "e-bomb" come in your e-mail and have something to do with Trojan Horse viruses? Apparently not. The real "E bomb" is much worse, and the more techno-dependent you are, the worse it could to be.

You see, Graham (who was formerly Ronald Reagan's top science advisor) believes Iran's not-so-secret recent missile tests are being conducted in order to determine if its Shahab-3 ballistic missiles, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, can be detonated while still in high altitude flight, which would allow an EMP attack to take place on whatever was beneath the target.

Of course Iran is only one in a long line of countries and/or terrorist groups who might actually be nutty enough to try using a device like this. But there's no question regarding their stated enthusiasm about wanting to wipe America, as well as Israel, "completely off the map," one way or another.

The scary thing is, if it's done right, an EMP blast has the ability to send any country it hits right back into the 1800s, as everything electrical and/or having computer chips gets internally fried and becomes useless. Think televisions. Light sockets. Gas pumps. Cars with onboard computers.

Think "being Amish" for six months or more.

And don't tell the kids, but it also means they'd have to be Amish, too. Their iPods, cell phones, video games and computers would become utterly useless in a flash of light and the smell of melted wiring. (See? There's a bright side to everything.)

And almost all of us would survive to live through it, because in an EMP attack, the threat comes not from killing people, but "killing electrons," as Graham explained. It's the subsequent unraveling of society which is the goal of the EMP strike, not mass casualties.

The EMP scenario is one of those doomsday/evil terrorist theories which none of us took very seriously until 9/11, when we realized that there were actually people crazy enough to fly airplanes full of human beings into skyscrapers, which were also full of human beings. We realized at that moment that the possibilities were endless in regards to what some of our enemies would do to get to us.

And while I must say that I do not consider myself a survivalist or "doomsday watcher" by any means, I do think about all potential disasters and how to prepare myself and my family for them.

So how would most of us fare if every computer chip and electrical circuit in our home and our community was suddenly fried from the inside out? Not well. We live in a culture that throws a fit when the power goes out for 15 minutes. How would we handle it being out for six months or more?

Back when I was a kid, we lost power for three days after the 1971 earthquake in Los Angeles. I remember my mother trying to feed us out of the contents of our freezer as quickly as possible, before the food spoiled. I remember my dad trying to find charcoal, so we could cook food on the barbecue, and cursing that he didn't have enough matches on hand. And I remember how very, very quiet it was without the constant background hum of traffic on the streets of my neighborhood.

In some ways, it seemed like a vacation from our real lives. With no television and only battery powered radios being used by our parents to get news updates, we kids roamed the neighborhood, playing hide-and-seek during the day, and board games by candlelight in the evening. There were no stores, schools or banks open, since there was no power. But at the end of three days, the lights came back on and life returned to normal.

But when I think of living that lifestyle of semi-permanent camping for half a year or more, it's daunting.

So often we take for granted that our food comes from the supermarket, our water comes out of the faucet, and our days and nights will be filled with the world, brought to us by our computers, our televisions, and our cell phones. For young people (many of whom have never lived through any kind of natural disaster), it would certainly be an unimagined shift to a different way of life.

So do I think an EMP attack is an imminent probability? No. But nonetheless, I do think that most of us need to be better prepared for the next disaster (whatever it is) than we are; to have things like matches, battery-powered radios, and extra water on hand, and to train our children that food and water can come from other places than the supermarket.

Maybe we'd all better learn how to "go Amish," just in case we ever have to.

Diane Sayre is a freelance writer living in Hanford.

(July 28, 2008)