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.

Re:Should be interesting

[LiquidCoooled]

They are already planning for it, as it happens, there is a storm occuring at the moment (Classed as a Level 3 out of a scale upto 5).
The interested parties (ie utility/communications companies) all know about this and are monitoring the situation. They also estimate Aurora to reach very far south in the next couple of weeks. The article is here.

Re:Should be interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

NASA and the airline industry have run extensive tests on the subject.

At the same time, it's almost like testing for massive floods, earthquakes, fires, and other dieasters. Yeah, it'd be bad if it happens. If it happens. Fortunately these events are rare. We just deal with them when they happen.

Re:Should be interesting

[MikeDataLink]

(most notibly WiFi networks.)

Really? That's odd. I would have placed a lot higher importance or "notability" on cell phone networks and emergency comminucations such as police radio, etc.

Mike

Re:Should be interesting

[twiddlingbits]

I suspect there will be a few problems with some older birds and some of the newer ones too that are not well shielded. Less shield = less weight = lower cost to launch, but also shorter lifetime due to increased radiation exposure for the electronics. Some birds are just turned off until the solar event is below critical levels. SEUs (Single Event Upsets, or bit flips) due to EM levels are handled by special circuitry to minimize the loss of data. The excess energy charge on the spacecraft due to the radiation is dumped in many different ways. Purely mechanical systems are not affected by this storm. Most folks don't know but many LEO sattelites go thru a place called the South Atlantic Anomoly where the Earths own Radiation Fields are very intense and systems have to be turned off for several minutes each orbit. But it can be worse, when the earth gets hit with huge amounts of ultraviolet radiation from geomagnetic storms, the upper atmosphere heats up. This heated air rises, and the density of lower satellite orbits (about 1,000 kilometers) increases significantly. This causes drag to increase on satellites; they slow down and gravity pulls them in towards earth. Unless these satellites are boosted into higher orbits, they'll fall and eventually burn up in earth's atmosphere. Remember Skylab? It was a victim of premature entry just because of higher than expected solar activity. This effect can last for several weeks as the earths electrical field is still expanded from the flare. Systems on the ground are also well shielded, since the incident in Quebec in the 1980s where an intense solar storm knocked out the electrical grid! This is NOT to say NOTHING will happen it's just to say it won't be back to the stone ages. Now if we all lived on Mars we'd be hiding in some DEEP hole. Solar flares and how to handle them will be something that needs intense study prior to a Mars mission.

Re:Should be interesting

[Mod Me God]

Here you go:

Electric utilities in Minnesota and across the country are preparing for potential disruptions in electric supplies this afternoon, when a strong geomagnetic solar storm is expected to hit Earth.

The storm was expected to be most severe Friday, though experts said they didn't anticipate problems with communication networks.

``This is not a super solar storm,'' said Larry Combs, a space weather forecaster with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Environment Center in Boulder.

So far, the storm has interfered with airline communications and radio communications for teams on Mount Everest, Combs said. But problems were not widespread.
Sun as seen from space

The storm, called a ``coronal mass ejection,'' is a mass of solar gas that swept toward Earth at 2 million mph. The usual cycle for such a storm is every 11 years; this one was expected to hit three years ago.

``It is kind of like a snowstorm in June in Colorado,'' Combs said.

Combs said power companies, which are among the center's best customers, have been notified and were taking precautions to avoid voltage problems and blackouts.

Xcel Energy spokesman Paul Adelmann said the company is monitoring the situation, with help from the North American Electric Reliability Council (NAERC).

"Our service area is not susceptible to the effects of solar flares in part because of our geology and research done in conjunction with the (University of Minnesota)," Adelmann said. Xcel does not anticipate any problems, he said, but will continue to monitor the situation for potential repercussions of any neighboring outages.

Satellites also are at risk during such storms but cell phones aren't likely to be affected unless they rely on satellites, Combs said.

``Satellites are built to live out there, but an accumulation of hits can cause problems,'' he said.

Operators can shut them down and put them in what is called a stow position until storms pass. They may need to be boosted back up to their correct altitudes after the storm.

Much like predicting a hurricane, forecasting the impact of a geomagnetic storm is difficult.

``It could just strike a glancing blow or hit head on,'' Combs said.

Bil MacLeslie, general manager for VISI.com, a Minneapolis-based Internet service provider, said the vast majority of customers will see no ill effects from the storm.

"We rely solely on land-based (wired) communications and expect little effect from the storm, but do expect customers to have issues with wireless computer networks, cellular messaging and paging services with content that originates from the Internet," said MacLeslie.

He said customers which use such transmissions may expect to see some degradation in their service.

Concern about the storm was triggered after one of the largest sunspot clusters in years developed over the past three days and produced a coronal mass ejection, similar to a solar flare, at 2 a.m. on Wednesday, forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said.

Lou Leffler, manager for NAERC's critical infrastructure protection , based in New Jersey, said NOAA upgraded the storm to a K7 late this morning.

"The level of intensity is based on a ranking from K1-K9. We normally don't track anything below K5," he said.

NAERC provides updates on such geomagnetic disturbances to utilities throughout the Canada and the continental U.S.

"At this level, some utilities, primarily in the northern hemisphere, may have to take action to reduce the amount of loading to the system," said Leffler. That can include reducing transfers, taking equipment offline and using generators to back up equipment.

John Kappenman, division manager for Metatech Corp. in Duluth, has been studying space weather for 27 years.

"The indicators we're seeing make this a moderate storm, which is not terribly exciting," Kappenman said. "We don't anticipate any disr

Re:Should be interesting

[barakn]

This causes drag to increase on satellites; they slow down and gravity pulls them in towards earth.They actually speed up. But they still fall in. Basically, the drag allows them to trade gravitational potential energy for kinetic energy.

Re:Should be interesting

[ahaning]

Have no fear! Your super-old shortwave radio that your long-dead father used to use will still work.

Hell, you may even get to speak with him through the wormhole so you can change the course of history. (Perhaps you could do something about this Darl McBride guy.)

Just remember to mention Yahoo!

Escape from L.A.?

[naitro]

(maybe something like Escape from L.A.?

You mean... complete crap?

Affect on computer systems

[treat]

I saw several highly improbable hardware failures over the past week, particularly on the 22nd.

What is the likelyhood that this is related to recent unusual solar activity, as opposed to being a simple coincidence?

Re:Affect on computer systems

[freeweed]

I saw several highly improbable hardware failures over the past week, particularly on the 22nd.

What is the likelyhood that this is related to recent unusual solar activity, as opposed to being a simple coincidence?

Seeing as the flare/storm would take a couple of days to reach the Earth, I'd say pretty much 100% that it was a simple conincidence.

Besides, what the article talks about is not an Electro-Magnetic Pulse type effect, where all electronic systems are affected. It's mostly orbiting electronics, and large ground-based systems such as power grids that get hit. I imagine because the large scale infrastructure such as kilometres of power lines turn into huge antennas for this stuff. (IANAP, in case you can't tell :)

Re:Affect on computer systems

[CoyoteGuy]

Seeing as the flare/storm would take a couple of days to reach the Earth, I'd say pretty much 100% that it was a simple conincidence.


Actually, the X-rays produced by the flare travel at the speed of light, and would only take minutes to reach the earth. It's the ball of gases from the coronal release that take 2-4 days to reach Earth you are referring to.

Solar Activity and Humans

[ch-chuck]

I'm really starting to thing there is a close connection between solar activity and economic patterns - all the recessions I can remember, 80-81, 91-92, 2000-2002 have all occured after the peak of a sunspot cycle. What happened after this storm of 1859: The US Civil War.

Re:Solar Activity and Humans

[Mod Me God]

Most US recessions of the last 200 years have started in the first 2 years of their decade.

Do sun spots also follow a 10 year cycle?

[Not that I necessarily justify economic technical analysis... it just seems to purvey].

Re:Solar Activity and Humans

[ShadowBlasko]

Not only does solar activity follow an 11 year cycle, it also *appears* to follow an annual cycle, with solar activity (CME's, sunspots) appearing to peak in late October, early November.

Why is this so odd?

Because a year on the Sun obviously is not the same as a year on the Earth, and scientist (as of yet) have not been able to pin down why solar activity seems to peak this time of year. At the moment (at least, last time I read up on it, which was during the big Auroral display in November of 2001) scientist were at a loss to explain a 12 month cycle in solar activity.

For more information, and very up to date info on the current situation with the storms, current solar wind patterns, and a gallery of GREAT pictures, try spaceweather or also
Spaceweather Now (NOAA)

Okay, typing that out made me feel stupid, so I went and re-read the article on seasonal variations, and found out I was somewhat wrong, there is a terrestrial reason dealing with OUR magnetic field that makes solar activity seem to affect us more. If you would like to read the article, it can be found Here

Anyways, keep looking up this week, (unless you live in Cincinnati like I do, and it will be cloudy most of the beginning of the week) and you might be suprised at what you see.

youre not the first.

[Unknown Poltroon]

Threres a lot of documentaion and specualtion out there about this. look up sunspot cycles and econnomy and youll find a lot. There does seem to be some sort of very loose correlation between them.

Escape from LA? NOOOOOOOOOO!

[Nova Express]

The submitter had to mention Escape from L.A, bringing back a trauma I had successfully surpressed for many years. I saw it in a theater, for free at a preview screening, and still felt ripped off. I want those two hours of my life back! What an enormous waste of talent for everyone involved. I was hoping for the guilty, trashy fun of Escape From New York. Nope. It was just sad, limp and stupid. You've heard of straight to DVD? Escape from LA should have been straight to Mystery Science Theater 3000. A really crummy movie...

I've read a book about this!

[arvindn]

National academies press (nap.edu) has thousands of free (public domain) books online, in pdf format. Many of them are reports of some government committees etc., but if you are prepared to dig around for a while you can find some real gems. I've read about a dozen of the books on the site, and they're really good. Check out Storms from the sun. Its an excellent book, both highly informative and very readable. Chapter 3 in particular ("A sudden conflagration") is about the 1859 storm in question. Enjoy.

(maybe something like Escape from L.A.?)

[papasui]

Holy shit! I hope I never get trapped in a space storm that traps me in the same city as John Carpenter and Kurt Russell.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

No more movie theories!

[toddhisattva]

Don't you wish reporters and scientists would quit naming theories and events after movies?

It's getting to be so bad that the first step in research seems to be, "find a catchy name." It's more important than funding, more important even than the subject of the research. A catchy name will help get funding and therefore should determine the direction of research.

Perhaps it started in the 80s when reporters derided SDI with the title, "Star Wars." It continued with "Out of Africa" in anthropology. Now every weather event is "The Perfect Storm."

We all know that reporters are stupid. But that's no reason to dumb down science so it fits in a movie title!

Science should not be controlled by Oliver Stone.

Telegraph and flux

[goombah99]

When I first read of the telegraphs carching fire I thought BullShit. Afterall the telegraphs were all magneticly driven, low impedance devices--there were no small gaps to arc across or high-impedance low-voltage elements to explode. Moreover the usual situation is that a large loop is relatively hard to induce a lot of current in (transformers try to concentrate flux not spread it out, hence they are made as small as the materials allow).

but then I started thinking about it more carefully. If one had a magnetic event from the sun then what hit the earth would be an earth-wide, coherent magnetic pulse. In this case the larger the loop of wire the greater the current induced. And telegraphs had miles and miles of wires with macroscopically separated loops. thus the induced current must have been enormormous, hence the fires at the low impedance inductors at the ends.

On the other hand, the magnetic flux per area might not have been very large. hence modern electronics which are small, and generally have ground or back planes closs to the wires wont receive much induced current.

in other words the telegraphs were the optimal energy absorbers but modern devices should receive much lower energy coupling.

Re:Telegraph and flux

[Donwulff]

Terrestrial electronics are at practically no risk from solar flares; that's thanks to our atmosphere and magnetosphere. However, yes planetary fluctuations of the planetary magentic field (geomagnetic storms) caused by the proton flux from such an event can and are known to induce huge currents into any large-scale conducts. There's a nice pic near the end of http://www.spacew.com/gic/index.html about what one 1989 geomagnetic storm did to some transformers.

An interesting overview of the threat to power networks in particular is preseted at http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/eiskappenman.html with the lead-on that "Only a few amps are needed to disrupt transformer operation, but over 100 amps have been measured in the grounding connections of transformers in affected areas."

Ofcourse, the problem isn't limited to telegraph and powegrids; all large spans of conducts are affected, such as pipelines, land phoneline systems and even railways. http://sumppu.fmi.fi/MAGN/GIC/ provides realtime data on Geomagnetically Induced Currents (GIC) at some power grids and pipeline operators in the Nordic countries as well as more information on this aspect.

Telegraph disruption?

[Tablizer]

Telegram: "THE BRITISH ARE CEUBLSJF SLKJF SJ"

City Official: Hmmm. I wonder what that meant. Try again, please.

Telegram: "GET FREE PENIS ENLARGER"

City Official: Damn ad-makers. Oh well. Back to work everybody. Nothin' here.

Coronal mass ejection

[peekitty]

Been there. That's the reason I rarely drink Mexican beer anymore.