The 'Perfect Space Storm' Of 1859

Polyploid Pimp writes "Bruce Tsurutani of JPL recently published a paper on the 'perfect space storm' of 1859. Apparently, this solar superstorm was so massive that it knocked out telegraphs across the Northern Hemisphere, and the aurora borealis could be seen as far south as Hawaii, Havana, and Rome. Among other interesting notes, the amount of sunlight produced in the region of this solar flare actually doubled! Although the article does not discuss in detail the effects of a solar storm of this size on our current technologies, we can all imagine (maybe something like Escape from L.A.?)"

Comments

Should be interesting

[jamesjw]

Should be interesting to see what happens when the next large barrage of solar winds and large EM fields hit, as everyone may recall a few years ago with one storm a large number of pager satellites and base stations were disrupted, something bigger could certainly bring down large amounts of sattelite based internet infastructure and play havoc with ground based equipment (most notibly WiFi networks.)

Should we be testing equipment now to minimise the unknown impact of such a natural event?

-- Jim.

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