- 3444 - SOLAR CYCLES - storms on the Sun? While no one can predict exactly when the next big solar super storm or long-lasting storm will hit. The Sun might be 93 million miles away, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have a huge impact on Earth with it’s sunspots.
------------- 3444 - SOLAR CYCLES - storms on the Sun?
- An extremely powerful solar storm pummeled our planet 9,200 years ago, leaving permanent scars on the ice buried deep below Greenland and Antarctica. Ancient ice samples were found that this previously unknown storm is one of the strongest outbursts of solar weather ever detected and would have crippled modern communications systems if it had hit Earth today.
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- The massive storm appears to have hit during a solar minimum, the point during the sun's 11-year cycle when solar outbursts are typically much less common. Because of this unexpected discovery, researchers are concerned that devastating solar storms could hit when we least expect them, and, that Earth might not be prepared when the next big one arrives.
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- These enormous storms are currently not sufficiently included in our risk assessments. It is important to analyze what these events could mean for today's technology and how we can protect ourselves.
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- Solar storms occur when magnetic field lines on the sun's corona (the outermost part of the sun's atmosphere) become tangled up and then violently snap back into place. This sudden magnetic reconnection can release huge amounts of plasma and magnetic field known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which surf across space on the sun's ever-gusting solar wind.
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- If a powerful CME passes over Earth, it can compress the planet's magnetic shield, causing what's known as a geomagnetic storm. Mild geomagnetic storms can damage satellites and interrupt radio transmissions; severe storms, like the "Halloween storms" of 2003, can cause widespread power outages across the world and permanently damage electrical infrastructure, such as power transformers.
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- A sufficiently large solar storm could also ravage the world's undersea internet cables, resulting in an "internet apocalypse" that leaves huge chunks of the world population disconnected for months.
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- CME outbursts typically peak every 11 years or so, when the sun enters the part of its natural activity cycle known as the solar maximum, the time when magnetic activity in the corona is high.
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- Today, satellites can monitor solar outbursts directly. But finding evidence of ancient storms requires some atomic detective work. A study looked for evidence of special particles known as “cosmogenic radionuclides“, radioactive isotopes (versions of elements) created when charged solar particles collide with elements in Earth's atmosphere.
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- These radioactive particles can appear in natural records, like tree rings and ice cores. Analyzing several cores drilled in Antarctica and Greenland where both locations showed a remarkable spike in the radionuclides beryllium-10 and chlorine-36 around 9,200 years ago, indicating that a powerful solar storm swept across Earth at that time.
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- Further analysis of the cores showed that the storm was particularly powerful perhaps on a par with the most powerful solar storm ever detected, which occurred during a solar maximum between the years 775 B.C. and 774 B.C.
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- The newly discovered storm's occurrence during a solar minimum, when magnetic activity on the sun should be low, left the study authors puzzled and alarmed. This storm further pushes the magnitude of a potential worst-case scenario for solar storm events.
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- Researchers now need to detect more ancient, extreme storms in the ice-core and tree-ring records, to determine if there is some sort of pattern beyond the sun's 11-year cycle that dictates when the most extreme storms will occur.
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- How the Sun affects satellites? At the edge of space, the ever-growing fleet of satellites in low-Earth orbit are locked in a constant, precarious battle with friction.
These satellites orbit in a normally quiet region hundreds of miles above the surface, at the edge of Earth's atmosphere.
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- Usually, the satellites only feel a gentle push due to the headwinds of the rarified air there, but extreme storms from the Sun can change Earth's atmosphere enough to pull a satellite farther off orbit in one day than they'd normally experience in a year.
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- These orbital deviations don't cause satellites to fall out of the sky, but they can disrupt their communication with Earth, shorten their lifespan, and can even increase the chances of a terminal collision in space.
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- This effect, known as “orbital drag“, is evidence that less intense, but longer-lasting storms surprisingly have bigger effects on satellites' orbits than the shorter, more severe events.
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- Low-Earth orbit satellites provide the backbone to Earth and weather observations and telecommunications systems. The new research looked at rare extreme historic storms to will help satellite operators better understand satellite lifetimes and dynamics, making the near-Earth space environment safer when the next big super storm hits.
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- This new result highlights the fact that even during less extreme space weather events, orbital drag of satellites is of greater impact than we anticipated. And it is becoming more and more of an issue, simply because we've got more and more and more spacecraft up there.
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- The Solar Dynamics Observatory caught a glimpse of a huge coronal mass ejection, or CME, leaving the Sun on July 23, 2012. If such a CME had hit Earth, it could have caused trillions of dollars in damage to telecommunications and infrastructure.
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- The Sun provides the light to nurture life on Earth, but , it also spews dangerous particles and radiation that can affect astronauts and technology in space. High-energy particles and radiation from the Sun can heat Earth's atmosphere as they collide with common molecules, like nitrogen and oxygen.
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- The heated air rises and causes the atmosphere to expand like a balloon. If a storm is strong enough, it will cause the atmosphere to expand so much that it engulfs the orbits of low-Earth orbit satellites that would otherwise fly through areas with little to no atmosphere.
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- Increased atmosphere is like running in a headwind, it slows you down. For a satellite, this resistance causes it to slow and drop down in altitude. During an extreme magnetic storm event, a satellite could drop nearly a third of a mile in elevation in one day. That's as much as a satellite would typically lose in a year.
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- Scientists are finding that the effects of weaker, but longer-lasting storms might be just as impactful as extreme storm events. Super storms from the Sun are rare, only one has occurred since the dawn of the space age, and it was only half as powerful as the 1921 event. However, in the same period there have been dozens of lesser magnetic storms from the Sun, not all of which have reached Earth.
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- The strongest storms don't necessarily produce the most drag. The effects of a longer, less intense storm can build up over time, ultimately causing more orbital drag than a short, powerful storm.
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- Solar storms disproportionately affect low-Earth orbit satellites, which live within the first 375 miles of space above Earth's surface, which can be enveloped by a swelling atmosphere. The vast majority of new satellites call this region home, including the quickly growing constellations of communications satellites launched by private industries.
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- Once a satellite is knocked out of orbit, the effects only worsen, since at lower altitudes there is more atmosphere and thus more drag, even in calm conditions. The lower a satellite is dragged, the amount of drag it experiences only increases.
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- Orbital drag is bad for a satellite that wants to stay at a working altitude, but it's also bad for nearby satellites that might collide with a satellite that's been dragged off-course. Even tiny pieces of space debris pose a huge risk for satellites, so minimizing collisions is key to keeping the near-Earth environment a functional space for satellites.
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- The new results are just one aspect of space weather and the field of “helophytic“, in which scientists try to understand how activity on the Sun ripples across the solar system and affects Earth.
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- In the 1970s solar activity led to increased drag on NASA's Skylab mission, causing it to deorbit earlier than expected. Improved models over the years have helped scientists better understand the effects of normal solar activity on orbital drag. However, the rarity of extreme events has made it difficult to know exactly how they might affect current satellites.
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- Heliophysics mission is to monitor the Sun's activity. Missions like the Solar Dynamics Observatory and the Solar and Heliophysics Observatory keep a constant eye on the Sun, while other missions like the Ionospheric Connection Explorer, Space Environment Testbeds, and the upcoming Atmospheric Waves Experiment study how space weather and solar variability affect Earth's upper atmosphere and satellites and other technology.
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- While no one can predict exactly when the next big solar super storm or long-lasting storm will hit. The Sun might be 93 million miles away, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have a huge impact on Earth..
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February 3, 2022 SOLAR CYCLES - storms on the Sun 3444
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