I found this a while ago, and it took me a little while to find it again. When you have a telescope and a telescope console in your control panel, you can get advanced warnings for disasters. I haven’t found them very useful because I want my colonists to keep working for as long as they can.
Here are the warning levels I found. I have yet to verify these:
| detected | 10 hours out |
| hitting soon | 5 hours out |
| imminent | NOW |
Keep in mind that solar flares will only happen during daylight hours. If you get a warning at night, it won’t happen until daytime. Perhaps this can result in extra time.
Disaster Preparedness Tips
As soon as the warning of “imminent” happens (which you don’t need a telescope or console for), I immediately enter Security controls (F6) and enable the Yellow Alert Mode, and disable all mines. Once everyone is in, you can disable all Airlocks and turn off the Yellow Alert if the sound is annoying. Disable any Starports or Landing Pads to save power, since no ships will be landing during this time.
When is it Over?
I think the easiest way to know when the disaster is over is to listen for the tense music to stop. For sandstorms the strong winds will stop. During solar flares the brightness of all the buildings is increased, and it will go back to normal once it’s over. But this can be hard to tell.
How do you prepare for disasters?
