SOLAR WARNING 24/01/2012

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Zyraz

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Biggest solar storm since 2005 pummels Earth
- A potent solar flare has unleashed the biggest radiation storm since 2005 and could disrupt some satellite communications in the polar regions, US space weather monitors said Monday.

The event started late Sunday with a moderate-sized solar flare that erupted right near the center of the Sun, said Doug Biesecker, a physicist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Space Weather Prediction Center.

"The flare itself was nothing spectacular, but it sent off a very fast coronal mass ejection traveling four million miles per hour (6.4 million kilometers per hour)," he told AFP.

A rush of radiation in the form of solar protons already has begun bombarding the Earth and is likely to continue through Wednesday.

The radiation storm is the largest of its kind since 2005 but still ranks only a three on the scale of one to five, enough to be considered "strong" but not "severe," he added.

NOAA said its website the S3 ranking means "it could, e.g., cause isolated reboots of computers onboard Earth-orbiting satellites and interfere with polar radio communications."

Biesecker said that when it comes to radiation storms, the polar regions are affected most.

For instance, the storm could spell disruptions to airline flights, oil operations, Arctic exploration and space satellites.

Night-sky viewers in Asia and Europe may be able to witness the aurora, or Northern Lights, late Tuesday as a result of the storm.

"We don't expect major impacts from an event like this," Biesecker said.
"It's the people who need GPS (global positioning system) accuracy of centimeters who have to worry, not people who want to know if you're going to turn the car 30 meters (100 feet) ahead.
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Cape Town - Charged particles from the sun will strike the Earth on Tuesday after a huge solar flare erupted on Monday.

The M9-class solar flare was observed by Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory and erupted from a sunspot on Monday at 03:59 GMT, SpaceWeather.com reported.

The coronal mass ejection or CME is travelling to Earth at 2 200km/s which means that it could potentially cause communications disruptions to networks on the planet that could include disabling satellites in its path.

In the polar regions people could observe spectacular auroras, that may even be visible at lower latitudes.

The CME may have a particular impact in South Africa because of the South Atlantic Anomaly where the Earth's magnetic field is weakest.

The CME is scheduled to hit at about 14:18 GMT on Tuesday and South Africans should take care to avoid being exposed directly to the sun.
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Staying indoors today might be a good idea ?
 
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A powerful solar eruption has sent a massive stream of charged particles toward Earth – due January 24, 2012. Aurora alert at lower latitudes than normal!
solar_flare_1-23-2012-300x212.jpg


An active region on the sun has spawned an M8.7 eruption – nearly an X-flare – that blasted a stream of charged particles toward Earth, due to arrive tomorrow (January 24, 2012). Experts at NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center are saying it is the strongest radiation storm since 2005. The eruption took place last night (January 22) at 9:59 p.m. according to clocks in the central U.S. (03:59 UTC on January 23). There is no danger to you on Earth’s surface, but satellites in orbit might feel the effects and your cell phone might act twitchier than usual. Plus … aurora alert at lower latitudes than normal!

The eruption came from sunspot 1402, on a part of the sun that recently turned into view and has been active for several days. The leading edge of the resulting stream of charged particles – known as a coronal mass ejection, or CME – is expected to reach Earth on January 24 at 8 a.m. CST, or 14 UTC (+/- 7 hours). Mars is due to be struck by the CME, too, on January 25.

Source - Read more


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Grimspoon said:
Huh? :wtf:
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The new weather bill thingy.... like twittering "hurricane to hit at 2pm" which can cause mass panic.


lol @ staying indoors..... it's been raining all morning. I couldn't see the sun (or sky) if I tried.
 
Zyraz said:
Just accept the cancer possibility that might accompany the tan.
For those of us that have kids , very valuable warning in my opinion.
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Only if you just accept the humor possibility that might have accompanied my post. :)

For you guys who have kids, also a very valuable lesson IMO.
 
Hope we get to see some of the aurora, although doubtful.
 
Charged particles from the sun always gives me a warm fuzzy feeling :whistle:
 
Cape Town - The Earth will not bear the brunt of the coronal mass ejection that will hit the planet on Tuesday.

"Its source was an active area about 45° to 50° off the equator of the sun," Kobus Olckers, space weather officer at the Ises Regional Space Weather Warning Centre in Hermanus told News24.

He said that most of the CME would miss the planet, but that minor disruptions were still possible because of the scale of the event.

"Most of the mass - I would say 95% of the mass - is going away from the ecliptic plane, so that thing is going away from all the planets," Olckers said.

The plane of the ecliptic is the plane of the planets around the sun and the Earth would be more vulnerable if a CME were to erupt from the sun's equator.

Fortunate

Earth is fortunate that the CME occurred at a higher solar latitude because it will result in a minimal effect.

"I saw it yesterday [on Monday], we're going to catch the very edge of it. It's coming our way but if we had been 80 million kilometres further up, it would have been bad," Olckers said.

The distance from the Earth to the sun is about 150 million kilometres.

The sun goes through a solar cycle about every 11 years where an increased activity on the surface is observed.

Olckers said that if a CME had to hit the Earth squarely, it would result in devastating consequences.

"Full frontal [hit] that's bad news because it was really energetic."

Internet, satellite and telephone communications could have been disrupted, he added.

Scientists recognise three major categories of solar flares. X-class flares are big and are major events that can trigger planet-wide radio blackouts. M-class flares are medium-sized; they can cause brief radio blackouts that affect Earth's polar regions. C-class flares are small with few noticeable consequences here on Earth.
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Source
 
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