Sunday, January 8, 2023

3814 - SOLAR CYCLE - peaking its activity?

 

          -  3814  -   SOLAR  CYCLE  -  peaking its activity?    On January 4, 2023,  Earth will reached its closest point to the sun all year in an annual event     called “perihelion”. The precise distance varies from year to year, but          perihelion 2023 will see our planet orbiting 91.4 million miles from the sun,          or roughly 3 million miles closer than Earth's “aphelion”, its farthest point      from the sun, which will occur on July 6, 2023.



----------------  3814  -  SOLAR  CYCLE  -  peaking its activity?

-  On January 4 and 5, a slow-moving glob of solar particles called a coronal mass ejection (CME) will slam into Earth's magnetic field.

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-  The collision is expected to trigger a minor “G1-class geomagnetic storm” that could briefly frazzle power grids, cause radio blackouts and push colorful auroras much farther south than usual, possibly as far south as Michigan and Maine in the United States.

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-  Earth doesn't orbit the sun in a perfect circle but rather in a wobbly ellipse. This elliptical orbit naturally means Earth moves closer to the sun during certain parts of the year and farther away during others.

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    -     For many years now, Earth's perihelion has occurred within a few weeks of   the winter solstice, the official beginning of winter in the Northern   Hemisphere, when the North Pole is at its farthest tilt away from the sun and        the South Pole tilts closer toward the sun.

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     -     However, this marriage of solstice and perihelion is just a coincidence; the   solstice is all about Earth's tilt toward or away from the sun, while perihelion      is about the planet's physical distance from the sun.

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                    -  The actual date of perihelion is always shifting, changing by about two      days every century due to small quirks in our planet's orbit. In the year 1246,        perihelion and the winter solstice actually occurred on the same day.   Thousands of years from now, in the year 6430, perihelion will line up      perfectly with the spring equinox on March 20.

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          -   It's also pure coincidence that this year's   perihelion lines up with a           geomagnetic storm.  These storms occur when charged solar particles crash   into Earth's magnetic field ( the magnetosphere ), compressing it slightly and       allowing some           particles to rain down on the planet's upper atmosphere.

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        -   Most geomagnetic storms are minor, resulting in clearer auroras and            occasional radio blackouts at high latitudes. But some, such as the infamous Carrington Event of 1859, can push auroras from both poles all the way down to the equator and cause mass electrical disruptions around the world.

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-     Geomagnetic storms are triggered by “CMEs”, giant outbursts of charged     particles released from the sun when magnetic-field lines at the sun's   surface become too tangled and suddenly snap. These magnetic tangles         are often associated with sunspots, dark regions of intense magnetic   activity that periodically open and close on the sun's surface.

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    -     If a sunspot is pointed toward Earth during one of these magnetic snaps, the resulting CME will blast toward us over the course of several days. The   CME expected to hit Earth on January 4 and 5 burst out of an Earth-facing sunspot on December 30.

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-        The sun follows an 11-year cycle of activity, with more    sunspots and more magnetic disturbances appearing close to the period of peak activity, known       as the solar maximum. NASA predicts that the next solar maximum will    occur in July 2025. As this point approaches, solar storms will become more   frequent and more intense.

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-  Jamuary 7, 2023      SOLAR  CYCLE  -  peaking its activity?         3814                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

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            --------------------- ---  Sunday, January 8, 2023  ---------------------------

 

 

 

 

     

 

 

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