A mass of energetic particles ejected from the Sun arrived at earth last night, causing auroras visible as far south as North Georgia and reports even in the Savannah/Charleston area. If you missed out, don’t despair, there are possibly two more Coronal Mass Ejections (CME) on the way with a potentially stronger one arriving today. A CME can play havoc with the earth’s magnetic field and hit satellites with high speed particles causing glitches and even damage sensitive electronics. Here’s the latest updates from the Space Weather Prediction Center, part of NOAA:
These geomagnetic storms are getting a lot more attention lately for several reasons. To explain that, first we need to look at a bit of history and Science!
It was first noticed that the sun had intermittent dark spots by Chinese astronomers perhaps as early as 800 BC. By 300 BC both Chinese and Greek astronomers were watching them, the earliest systematic tracking of them was by Chinese court astronomers in 28 BC. While our sun is by most standards pretty constant (and fortunately for us, compared to a lot of stars it is), its energy output does vary, especially in the short term in certain wavelengths. In 1843 the German astronomer Samuel Schwabe figured out that the spots come and go in an 11 year cycle. They also figured out that, in what on the surface seems a contradiction, fewer sunspots are associated with less energy reaching the earth and cooler temperatures. That’s a fascinating topic on it’s own. By 1908 George Hale figured out that sunspots are associated with the sun’s magnetic field and that every 11 years the sun’s entire magnetic field “reverses” – so one entire cycle is actually 22 years. During the peak of a cycle, the sun is extremely active, with many sunspots, flares, and CME’s, whereas at other times it is far quieter.
We now know that sunspots are cooler areas on the sun’s surface caused by its magnetic field, and that they usually occur in pairs with opposite magnetic polarity. Using the right kinds of sensors, we can actually see the complex loops in the sun’s magnetic field. Here is a view from this morning showing lines of force made visible by iron being concentrated in the magnetic field:
Coronal Mass Ejections or CMEs are associated with sunspot groups (active regions) where turbulence in the sun’s magnetic field caused material to be ejected from the sun’s surface. CME’s occur frequently – many times a day during the active part of the 11 year solar cycle. Here is an animation of the last few days of solar activity, you can see there has been a lot of spewage (flares, CME, etc):
They are only a problem when one is ejected in line with the Earth. The high speed particles can play havoc with satellites – in the animation you can actually see lots more noise at the end of the animation caused by these particles. Here is a plot of high speed electrons over the last couple of days:
The normal solar wind pushes the magnetic field closer to the earth on the sun-facing side, and away a bit on the night side … this is a plot showing what the field looked like over the weekend, with some weaker but less “stormy” events pushing the field away on the night side.
Now take a look at this: here’s what we mean by “havoc” , the plot from over night isn’t so pretty and uniform!
All those energetic particles and the magnetic fields they generate interacting with the earth’s magnetic field causes auroras. As mentioned above, there are a couple more CME’s that seem to be headed this way, so we may get more auroras visible in the South tonight. You can monitor the SWPC dashboard and aurora forecast to see if it’s worth going outside in the cold.
So why is this “suddenly” in the news recently? The first is we have a lot more satellites and data to study the sun. The new GOES satellites have solar telescopes on them to watch the sun, as well as space environment sensors watching the magnetic field, high speed ions, and so forth. (all of these plots were generated from data I received directly from GOES over a 4.5 meter antenna). We now have satellites located closer to the sun, such as the DSCOVR satellite that stays at the L1 point about a million miles from the earth in line with the sun, and can provide advance warnings of incoming masses.
The other reason has to do with the solar cycles. The last cycle was not as active as usual, and during the one before that, 22 years ago, we did not have as many tools to observe them. Also, the explosion of technology that depends on satellites such as GPS, and sensitive tech on earth such as the internet and other electronics means we are much more vulnerable to disruptions than we were during previous cycles.
This raises a key point. In 1859 the earth encountered a massive CME. It caused vivid auroras all the way to the equator, tremendous impacts to the telegraph network, which was the only wide-scale electrical network at the time. If such an event happened today, it would likely cause widespread damage to satellites, electronics, and the electrical grid. Fortunately, with advanced warning, precautions can be taken to mitigate the impacts.
Finally, as with many science stories, the intensity of the coverage is directly proportional to the scary/pretty graphics and ability to “doom” … 😛
Did someone say Burning Skies? Of course that means Battle Beast …
Check out the studio version – it’s intense.
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Thanks for this great article!
Beautifully informative
Txs!