If most humans disappeared...?

[Jon G]

I don't know if this is the right place to post this but I am interested in what would happen if most humans disappeared from the face of the earth. By most I am talking about approximately 99.995%, leaving about 5 out of every 100,000 behind. And by disappeared I mean exactly that, not died, but vanished.

 

What would happen to power supplies? electricity/gas etc, water supplies, power stations, nuclear power stations, oil rigs, etc etc?

 

I want to get an idea of what things would shut down immediately, what things would keep running for some time, what would explode, meltdown etc? What about satellites?

 

What would happen to the eco system, wildlife etc? What about domestic animals and captive animals?

 

As you can probably guess this is research for a novel, where the said situation occurs. Apart from the very unscientific cause, I want the resulting setting of the story to be as scientifically accurate as possible. I appreciate any and all responses.

 

Jon G

[Ringer]

The history channel had something like this. Life after people check it out

[skyhook]

rough estimate world population...7 000 000 000. and 0.005% of world population is 350000 people. divide by estimated 189 countries gives 1851 people per country. Just a very rough estimate.

You looking for some kind of fantasy story ? Now we have lots of multi-storey buildings. If people just disappeared, there will not be rotting corpses or skeletons lying around, which I'm expecting if that armageddon event is real. Depending on the time, some plants will start growing in the cracks of buildings. In the tropics, strangler figs grows on buildings, the seeds are dispersed by birds and when the aerial roots systems reach a water source on the ground, it grow rapidly into trees. No one or very few people live in these tall buildings, as electricity is needed to power the elevators and lights. Climbing to the top of these skyscrapers via staircases, to view the scenery at sunrise might be a sport. Maybe you have some village outcast living there. So these buildings are not maintained. For those western cities, I suppose you have what they call Tumble weeds rolling through the streets. Earthquakes might created a more hazardous environment as huge cracks are seen in buildings after major earthquakes and now no one is pulling these buildings down to rebuild. A dust layer accumulate for areas that are dry. Bats or some nocturnal birds with strange cries started nesting in these caves. These caves are dangerous as the concrete is spalling, occasional glass windows falling from great heights, and the staircases are unstable and may give way. The interior of shopping malls size buildings is like labyrinth, and its all dark inside. People now live on huge estates, and have 10 kids on average, grows their own crops. Some wise guys will advice people not to go to the old cities. but as usual, some young guys wants some adventures, like treasure hunting.

 

The roads will be empty, very very few cars use the huge network of roads. Potholes appeared in roads. No engine hum can be heard. When you are used to hearing the buzz of the road and suddenly it just disappeared, it is strange feeling. Like some kind of loneliness, when you are at the sand dunes or at the beach.

 

Satellites will still be orbiting the earth, although unmanned. It is solar powered? and may work for a while. once it entered the atmosphere, it probably burn itself away, or reduce into debris. I'm not sure about nuclear plants, read before one book about Chernobyl after the disaster. In the book, it says after some years, wildlife has took over the land and other stuff, the radioactive waste are buried, but it takes many many years for the half life of radioactive waste to decay.

 

If talking about 350000 people, surely there are some engineers and scientists among them, and they can maintain a simpler systems. Although some knowledge are lost, as modern man are quite specialized in some skills. The numerous libraries of old books will hold some knowledge, but the books are rapidly disintegrating. Electricity can be generated from salvaged Solar panels from some energy companies. Noisy diesel powered generators at night. The light bulbs may have been salvaged too. There will be no need for Wall street. no NASDEQ exchange. The fuel might be biodiesel. The huge refineries seems complex to operate, but biodiesel can be DIY as I saw that at some websites.

Lastly, the people will have no religion, but maybe someone found a book or two. The end. <br>

Edited September 5, 2010 by skyhook

[Fuzzwood]

Burn those books ==> perfect world?

[lemur]

good question about power plants. I think most would run out of fuel and the nuclear ones have automatic safety shutoffs that would stop them. Recent history suggests that deep ocean oil drilling rigs would continue to harvest oil until someone stopped the flow. Solar panels would keep generating electricity, as would windmills assuming their generators were engaged.

 

The interesting question I would have with your scenario is whether people would all move together to a single city/community, or whether they would attempt to construct a new way of life with relatively few people in the cities they were in. Or would they become nomadic, roaming from place to place to consume what was left behind by all the disappeared people.

[tomgwyther]

Throughout most of human history, we've been hunter-gathers. So, I'd imagine we'd very quickly return to living like cave men.