September baseline
The master summary placed a catastrophic solar event roughly 30,000 years ago, devastating Gaerath and rendering Searath-Lúm uninhabitable.
October continuity update
The current working chronology moves the historical catastrophe to roughly 6,000 years ago (~4000 BCE, flexible). It should not be a solar event so enormous that Earth ought to show corresponding devastation; a Gaerath-specific convergence of solar activity, atmospheric/magnetic vulnerability, ecological stress and technological cascades is a better fit.
Aftermath
Gaerath survives, rebuilds underground over centuries, and eventually attempts to locate/reconnect with lost Earth colonies.
Superseded catastrophe variants recovered in Reference material:
One old Genesis version placed collapse ~21,000 years ago after a Zephyria Cloud/solar event, with impacts, magnetosphere failure, atmospheric loss, storms, cooling, and radiation. A later Field Chronicle variant instead made the command AI Khepri seize a weather lattice and destabilize the planetary field. Neither should overwrite the current ~4000 BCE working model, which favors a Gaerath-specific convergence of solar activity, atmospheric/magnetospheric weakness, and ecological/technological cascades rather than an AI-caused fall.
Open questions
- Exact astrophysical mechanism and date remain to be stress-tested.
Related entries
Ancient Earth Colonies · Gaian Magnetics and Travel · The Forgetting