Space Weather Warning

SallyMac writes "The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has issued a Space Weather Warning. On Friday, May 13th, NOAA detected a 'geomagnetic storm of extreme proportions'. From the article: 'This event registered a 9 on the K-Index, which measures the maximum deviation of the Earth's magnetic field in a given three-hour period...The scale ranges from 0 to 9, with 9 being the highest. This was a significant event.' See the article on the NOAA site for more information." Spaceweather.com has details on the resulting auroras.

Comments

Scientists.

[Boss, Pointy Haired]

Why couldn't they use a scale of 1 to 10 like EVERYBODY ELSE?

Re:Scientists.

[twostar]

because they like having more then two options.

Re:Scientists.

[HaloZero]

Because their programmer didn't understand how or why indices started at 0 and not 1, and that s/he could have just incremented after the fact.

Re:Scientists.

[Xypheri]

so what happens when it registers an A on the scale?
or F for that matter?

Re:Scientists.

[trevdak]

Does anyone know how the scale for geomagnetic deviation works?
I assume they use exponential growth (meaning a 4.0 is 10 times more deviant than a 3.0, a 3.0 is 10 times worse than a 2.0, like the Richter scale), with a 1 being standard deviation.

The main question behind my pondering is:
We know that a 9 on the scale must mean "x amount of deviation, and up" and that the values for 2-8 must be spaced in some way logically (e.g. not have a 3 be 100 times as deviant as a 2, but a 4 be only 3 times more deviant than a 3)
So what level would the deviance been measured at if the scale went beyond 9?

Re:Scientists.

[Anonymous Coward]

An A is good...for me to poop on.

Re:Scientists.

[pv2b]

This one goes to 11.

Re:Scientists.

[shut_up_man]

Nigel: Because ours go to nine. See? The numbers all go to nine. Look...right across the board.
Marty: Ahh...oh, I see....
Nigel: Nine...nine...nine....
Marty: ..and most of these instruments go up to ten....
Nigel: Exactly.
Marty: Does that mean it's...safer? Is it any safer?
Nigel: Well, it's one safer, isn't it? It's not ten.

Re:Scientists.

[Rocketship Underpant]

They chose a zero-to-nine scale to avoid filing 10-Ks.

(ouch)

Re:Scientists.

[plaxion]

They probably wanted it to be represented by a single integer and 0..9 is still a scale of ten numbers.

Besides, in many programming languages, array indices start at 0 and not at 1. So from a programming point of view it's quite logical.

Re:Scientists.

[dutchd00d]

You mean "everybody else" as in the Richter scale (3.5-8)? Or the Beaufort scale (0-12)? Or the stellar magnitude scale (-3.5 - ~25)? Or the Fujita scale (F0-F5)?

Re:Scientists.

[dalleboy]

Exactly, let us start storing the year using two digits.

Re:Scientists.

[Capt James McCarthy]

"When we really want to crank it up we go to 11." SpinalTap

Re:Scientists.

[ozbird]

They're keeping ten in reserve - just in case.

"You're on 10, all the way up, all the way up... Where can you go from there? Nowhere." - Nigel Tufnel.

Re:Scientists.

[duffer_01]

I am guessing to avoid the Y29 problem.

Re:Scientists.

[vegaspctech]

The Richter scale starts at zero and has no defined upper limit, although there's a practical limit. 3.5-8 is the What Gets Reported scale. ;-)

Re:Scientists.

[hey!]

Obligatory Spinal Tap reference:

My scale goes all the way to 11.

Re:Scientists.

[theguyfromsaturn]

It's because they like "the power of 3"

Re:Scientists.

[osmic234]

Actually, it doesn't necessarily start at zero - it's a logarithmic scale so negative magnitudes are still meaningful, if not worth worrying about outside seismology research.

And as for 8 being the upper limit - one of the reasons that the Richter magnitude scale isn't actually used anymore is that it saturates at large magnitudes. In other words as earthquakes keep getting bigger, the richter scale doesn't really keep up - it under-reports the actual size. So an earthquake with a moment magnitude (see below) of 7.5 might have a comparable richter magnitude, but one with a moment magnitude of 8.5 or 9.0 might still only have a richter magnitude of 7.5 or 8.0.

Moment magnitudes are calculated from the area of fault surface that actually ruptures, how much it moves, and the rigidity of the surrounding rock. A fault can propagate over long horizontal distances (~1000 km in the Sumatran earthquake last year) but only down to a point where the crust is still rigid enough to crack. It's this factor that is the main control on upper earthquake size. Other wise the rupture could just keep spreading down. Then you could have stupidly large earthquakes like a magnitude 15 or 20 that would crack the earth in half. Well, not really.

Part of the reason is the the richter magnitude scale is a local magnitude - it's not actually giving the true energy release of an earthquake, but how bad it feels at some nearby point (corrected for distance). It's also a bit of a hold-over from the early days of seismology in California. When people started to realise that the are earthquakes outside California as well, the richter magnitude scheme fell out of favour.

Seismologists don't use the richter (local) magnitude scale anymore really. The reason it's still often reported in the news is that after alarge earthquake, reporters call up their local governmental Geological Survey for a size. If the seismologists then try to give the size in a modern, more accurate scale, the reporters tend to say "Moment magnitude? No one knows what that is - how big was it on the Richter scale?". So, even though it's generally out of date, it still manages to be somewhat self-perpuating.

Re:Scientists.

[mattspammail]

Requisite statement about Spinal Tap here.

Re:Scientists.

[GeckoX]

I feel like I'm missing something...what's that from?

All I can think of is that that's a bad rip of the classic Spinal Tap joke..."But...these go to eleven!"

Anyone care to fill me in on the joke?

Re:Scientists.

[Locke2005]

Because they are obviously computer scientists, and all computer scientist have 9 fingers... 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9!

Re:Scientists.

[tOaOMiB]

Or the /. scale (-1 to 5) -- I don't think folk on here have any rights to complain :)

Re:Scientists.

[plaxion]

That on the other hand does not make sense. As many programmers found out.

Coincidence?

[iq in binary]

Friday the 13th?

Re:Coincidence?

[Valcoramizer]

In other news, a black cat was spotted walking underneath an open ladder carrying a salt shaker. This so startled the man on the ladder that he dropped the mirror he was holding, shattering the mirror, and crushing the cat.

Re:Coincidence?

[Anonymous Coward]

In other news, a black cat was spotted walking underneath an open ladder carrying a salt shaker. This so startled the man on the ladder that he dropped the mirror he was holding, shattering the mirror, and crushing the cat.

In sympathy, the sun let out a massive geomagnetic storm.

Re:Coincidence?

[BeerCat]

But... black cat's are lucky, so that cancels out the ladder. There's nothing unlucky about a salt shaker (unless you spill it), while the mirror would have to be really big to be able to shatter and crush

Thanks for the warning.

[syynnapse]

I _would_ have taken the freeway home on friday had I known, but instead I got caught in this horrible weather while traveling through the upper atmosphere.
Way to have 20/20 hindsight NOAA.

So What's the Duration?

[virtigex]

I couldn't get from the article what the duration of disruption is. Anybody know?

Re:So What's the Duration?

[Durinthal]

About 60 hours, according to how long it took the story to get posted.

50's flashback.

[Anonymous Coward]

"This event registered a 9 on the K-Index, which measures the maximum deviation of the Earth's magnetic field in a given three-hour period...The scale ranges from 0 to 9, with 9 being the highest. This was a significant event.'"

Alright everybody DUCK AND COVER!

Re:50's flashback.

[circusboy]

and while your at it, "Stop, Drop, and Roll!"

Shortwaves were dead

[dimss]

There was very poor shortwave propagation yesterday. Now I see why...

1 digit

[backslashdot]

Let me take a guess .. I am prolly totally ofdf here so if you take this as real without verifying that'd be stupid with a zero on a scale of 1 to 10. ..

So anyway .. maybe they zhose to rate from 0 to 9 because if you want to represent "10" you'd need two digits.

Plus it's confusing to start from 1 .. I mean if there is no activity .. you'd want to rate it as zero (null) not 1 (which sort of implies there's some activity.

Re:1 digit

[Breakfast Pants]

What?? To represent 10 you do need 10 digits... unless you have somehow figured out some magic trick none of us here on slashdot know about to somehow represent more than 10 things in 01 digits.

Re:1 digit

[MidnightBrewer]

Plus it's confusing to start from 1 .. I mean if there is no activity .. you'd want to rate it as zero (null) not 1 (which sort of implies there's some activity.

By that logic, you can safely ignore the first item on any prepared by overly clever programmers who think it looks cool to start numbering with zero.

Re:1 digit

[Angostura]

Wouldn't zero rather imply that that the sun had just gone out, in that case?

Re:1 digit

[Fred_A]

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F

There, that's more than 10 things counted with a single digit.

You must be new here :)

Re:1 digit

[dave1g]

I would call those hexits.

Re:1 digit

[ArAgost]

They're still called digits, since "digit" comes from the latin word digitus (which means finger). The deca-, deci-, and similar prefixes (or words) relating to the number ten come from the greek word deka (which means ten) :^)

Re:1 digit

[radar_music]

Binary digits are bits Trinary digits are...

Re:1 digit

[daeley]

Binary digits are bits Trinary digits are...

Trits. ;)

Re:1 digit

[neizvestniy]

are trits. Was something supposed to be funny about that?

Re:1 digit

[aacool]

It's ternary, not trinary, methinks.

From wikipedia,

Ternary is the base 3 numeral system. Ternary digits are known as trits (trinary digit), analogous to bit. This system is also known as trinary.

Although ternary most often refers to a system in which the three numerals, 0, 1 and 2, are all positive integers, the adjective also lends its name to the balanced ternary system, useful for comparison logic.

Re:1 digit

[Eric119]

From the very text you quoted: "This system is also known as trinary."

I need to find a new primary news source.

[Max Threshold]

Shit, man. If they knew about the flare on Friday, how come somebody didn't say something, oh, Saturday or something? I totally missed the auroras.

Is there a RSS feed where I can get this kind of news in a *timely* manner?

Re:I need to find a new primary news source.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sign up to the Spaceweather list at http://science.nasa.gov/news/subscribe.asp?checked =sw

Re:I need to find a new primary news source.

[drbill28]

You can also sign up for AuroraChasers. This will only give you a few minutes warning though. But it will tell you the exact Kp projection for your area. It's helpful if you want to see auroras.

Re:I need to find a new primary news source.

[Velox_SwiftFox]

Because they didn't have any idea that there was going to be an extreme geomagnetic storm on friday. On friday, there was just an ordinary M8 class flare on the sun. Nothing special, it didn't even seem to be aimed at the Earth, but for some strange reason a glob of solar spittle, carrying solar magnetic field with it, held together or constructively interfered with itself, and we got an extra dose of it.

Kind of like the tornado sirens that go off after the tornado has passed. This was less a warning than a report of something that already happened.

Re:I need to find a new primary news source.

[Bad D.N.A.]

Actually it was pretty clear that a CME was coming. When a CME is large enough and fast enough it will drive a shock and these shocks accelerate energetic particles. We have spacecraft that detect these particles well ahead of the approaching CME. It was very clear only a few hours after the flare that the CME (or part of it) was heading this way.

If you go to:

http://www.sec.noaa.gov/ace/EPAM_7d.html

You can see the low energy ions (the lower panel) and the electrons (upper panel).
The initial burst of particles near the end of day 13 was followed by a steady increase in intensity that continued right up until the CME driven shock passed the spacecraft.

Re:I need to find a new primary news source.

[kwerle]

No shit!

So much for "News for Nerds. Stuff that matters."

How about "Dupes for Nerds. Stuff that mattered sometime last week."

Great timing

[Stripsurge]

Two days ago something happened that could have caused some major problems. It didn't. Oh and be sure to catch the auroras yesterday. They sure were great. Thanks for the heads up ;)

Re:Great timing

[killjoe]

The tagline says "news for nerd" well it's for nerds alright but it's not news if it happened two days ago. What's the opposite of news? "olds for nerds"?

Re:Great timing

[tehshen]

What's the opposite of news?

Slashdot

Re:Great timing

[j.blechert]

Forecasters [...] observed [...]
err....

Re:Great timing

[Ark42]

My power went out last night for ~3 hours (2-5am or so) for no particular reason I knew of.

Some other useful links

[tqft]

Scroll down to Satellite Environment plot
http://www.sec.noaa.gov/today.html

there is also a plot which will update live
http://www.sec.noaa.gov/rt_plots/satenv.html

Re:Some other useful links

[Stripsurge]

This one has a nice map of where auroral activity is taking place and shows relative intensity.
http://www.sec.noaa.gov/pmap/pmapN.html

Northen lights

[Brtchlin]

i guess that would explain the light show we saw up here in western canada tonight, very vibrant greens, blues, yellows violets and all dancing like mad. I wonder if anyone else in the world is getting them as well?

Re:Northen lights

[Agret]

I didn't see them.....oh wait i'm in the south! DOH!

Re:Northen lights

[Muhammar]

The auroras were observed all the way to Arizona and California. That's pretty south. Look up the NOAA page.

I miss Arizona - the desert night sky there is the best that I have seen.

Re:Northen lights

[Jugalator]

We might've got them over here in Sweden too (?), but in that case I missed them because I neither regularly read noaa.gov or is a fortune teller... or get outside my basement at night often. :-p

Re:Northen lights

[Agret]

I'm a little further south than that ^_^ Australia!

Re:Northen lights

[zerbot]

Didn't see anything in Seattle. Oh, maybe our perpetual cloud cover had something to do with that.

Re:Northen lights

[sydsavage]

Well, you may have been able to see the Aurora Australis, or Southern Lights, then. See, these magnetic poles, they tend to come in pairs. Apparently, there is one down there in your neighborhood, too.

Read all about it.

Re:Northen lights

[jimwatters]

Check out Clear Skys to see the posibility to see past the clouds in your area.
http://cleardarksky.com/csk/

The Northen lights happen about the clouds so a combination of sun activity and clear skys are needed to view them.

Re:Northen lights

[AndroidCat]

I guess that would explain why the Toronto area was cloudy the last few days. Every damned comet, meteor shower, eclipse, you name it, and someone turns the switch that rolls the clouds in. (And by area, I mean anywhere within a short drive to get away from the major light pollution.)

Re:Northen lights

[GeckoX]

The US of A is entirely confined to the northern hemisphere. Arizona and California are only 'south' insofar as their relativity to other places farther north.

They are not, in fact, 'pretty south' at all with respect to the entire globe, which would matter when concidering a space event that affects the entire earth.

Re:Northen lights

[GeckoX]

Short drive? So you mean a couple of hours then?

Most of southwestern ontario has too much light polution to be able to see the northern lights except in the most extreme circumstances. I highly doubt the clouds would have made a difference.

Re:Northen lights

[AndroidCat]

If you drive far enough up Yonge St, you can always see Aurora. :) If you pick your location carefully, you can get a sky that's fairly dark without going all the way to Algonquin park.

This could be as bad as

[doofer]

the 'perfect space storm' of 1859.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/23oct_supe rstorm.htm

Re:This could be as bad as

[Roland Piguepaille]

That one set telegraph lines on fire. This one didn't cause any physical damage.

Shouldn't affect the Internet

[Teddy_Roosevelt]

Possible impacts from such a geomagnetic storm include widespread power system voltage control problems; some grid systems may experience complete collapse or blackouts.

Bah. What's the worst that could h...[NO CARRIER]

A Sunday Morning Report

[BRock97]

Hell, it would have been nice to know this in advance...

As it was, got out of work about 0800Z Sunday morning and as I was driving home, thought I saw the most bizarre clouds. When I pulled into the driveway, there were these flashes that moved from west to east in the night sky. Since I live next to a small airfield, I assumed it was the lights from there, but when I looked in that direction, they were turned off. So, drove about 20 minutes west of the big city (damn that light) and was treated to a show that words cannot describe. This being my first aurora event, I had didn't know what to expect. I sat and watched for 45 minutes as the sky literally danced. About 30 minutes in, the aurora moved to right above my head and turned into a completely different show with different bands shooting out above me.

To anyone who hasn't witnessed an aurora, take the time to travel someplace that you can view them. It is totally worth the trip.

Judging by the POES Auroral Activity graphic, things are firing up again. Damn my luck that thundershowers are moving in to cloud things up....

Re:A Sunday Morning Report

[Brtchlin]

my huband and I live in a big city in canada (dont laff we think thier big...) lots of ambient light about, but the aurora was very bright and as you described, they danced and changed colours over and over again. Quite the spectical. We see them more frequently than our southern friends, but mostly in bright greens and blues.

Re:A Sunday Morning Report

[Brtchlin]

Well, it was 2:30Am when i posted, but i guess everyone has to be a smartass with perfect grammar and spelling no matter what the hour, even when posting as AC, idiot.

Re:A Sunday Morning Report

[corblix]

To anyone who hasn't witnessed an aurora, take the time to travel someplace that you can view them. It is totally worth the trip.

Absolutely!

Sadly, however, aside from occasional blips like this one, solar activity is in decline. The big spectacles follow an 11-year cycle, with the next peak in 2011, give or take.

Another caveat: In high lattitudes it never gets very dark in the summer. Much better viewing in the fall.

All Quiet...

[dj245]

All Quiet at the Deblois Wood Chip Power Plant. Not even a blip in the output voltage or vars over the past 12 hours.

Re:All Quiet...

[drinkypoo]

It would probably happen in some secondary system in the post-generation stages, like a transformer. Solar flares have often caused magnetic activity that has blown out transformers.

Corrections

[zerbot]

What was observed on the 13th was solar flare activity. It doesn't become a geomagnetic storm until it reaches the earth, which it did on the 15th.

Is it really that hard to copy the right information out of sources?

Re:Corrections

[SallyMac]

I wasn't copying, I was paraphrasing with the wrong understanding. :) Thanks for the clarification :)

well then

[ImaLamer]

What you need is Spaceweather PHONE from the folks at SpaceWeather.com

Here is the list of "Space Weather Alerts" they offer:

• Aurora warnings
  
• Geomagnetic storms
  
• X-class solar flares
  
• CMEs (coronal mass ejection) and solar wind gusts
  
• The Interplanetary Magnetic Field
  
• Solar radiation storms

They'll call you with alerts 48-hours in advance when possible. Pretty cool for $4.95/month. Anyone want to buy it for me as a gift?

just to be sure....

[zxnos]

...i want to be sure i have this right, on a scale that ranges from 0-9, 9 is the 'highest'? fascinating.

Wrong write-up

[Chran]

Noooo ... A solar flare occured Friday, leading to a forecast about the K-9 geomagnetic storm which occured yesterday. Thanks for reading the articles before posting to Slashdot. Woohoo!

Re:Wrong write-up

[drbill28]

I know what you're saying. There's no time on the article. But it could've been posted before 3AM on the 15th. It was just very little warning. Also, the storm is still going on even now. Plus there can be additional minor storms over the next day. In fact I just got an email warning me that Kp has reached 6.0. Which is high for where I am now.

Re:Wrong write-up

[SallyMac]

It was posted way before 3AM, FYI. I submitted it as soon as the posting was put on the NOAA site.

Re:Wrong write-up

[SallyMac]

I read the article completely - it was a misunderstanding on my part, not a lack of reading through. You shouldn't assume that even slashdot posters are perfect! :)

Re:Funny I think...

[zerbot]

They issued their alert on the 13th, this is just a nice PR piece. You can see this months alerts at http://www.sec.noaa.gov/alerts/archive/current_mon th.html.

Yes!

[ImaLamer]

There are pictures from around the world (although mainly the US and Canada) at Spaceweather.com

They have pictures from California, South Dakota, Kansas and Illinois. Actually, I now see two more pages of fantastic photos.

Re:Yes!

[BJH]

They have pictures from California, South Dakota, Kansas and Illinois.

"Around the world", eh? Spoken like a true American.

Re:Yes!

[zxnos]

how can it be 'around the world'? the event lasted 3 hours or so and the other half of the globe was in daylight...

Re:Yes!

[grcumb]

" They have pictures from California, South Dakota, Kansas and Illinois. "

'"Around the world", eh? Spoken like a true American.'

You have to cut them a little slack. From where they stand, California and Kansas look like different planets. 8^)

Re:Yes!

[Kaydet81]

Actually the US does represent a fairly significant slice of the globe in both lattitude and longitude. Also when someone asks what's happening around the world it's pretty difficult to report on more than that with which one is familiar ... typically one would rely on someone in another true part of the world to report on what they know, to get the whole picture.

QuitYerBitchin

Re:Yes!

[sgtrock]

Nope. They don't just look like different planets. Anyone who has visited both knows that they are different planets. In different solar systems. In different galaxies. :)

Re:Yes!

[Tophe]

Since 6 percent is insignificant, please forward me 6 percent of your salary. Thanks.

Re:Yes!

[GeckoX]

Um, pull out an actual globe sometime dude.

Now, find the good ol' u s of a on there.

Now, note that it does NOT include Canada, Mexico, the North Pole, Greenland or any of those other large masses of land around it.

Now try to make that statement again with a straight face.

World Geography 101.

Re:Yes!

[natophonic]

You have to cut them a little slack. From where they stand, California and Kansas look like different planets. 8^)

Acutally, the Kansas School Board has conclusively determined that, in addition to dinosaur fossils being one of Satan's more elaborate tricks, life on other planets simply doesn't exist.

Now I get it!!!

[d474]

"This event registered a 9 on the K-Index..."

...So, a "0" on the "K" index means everything's gonna be "0K". I always wondered where that came from.

Re:Now I get it!!!

[michaelhood]

German. Oll Korrect.

reference

Re:Now I get it!!!

[dustmite]

That is most certainly not German, neither is the origin of the phrase "OK". Did you even read the link that you yourself posted? OK is an Americanism, originating in New York, and is a comical pronunciation of "All Correct". Now, a few people may dispute that explanation, but nobody thinks the origin is German. The first recorded occurrences of the word are all in the US.

Re:Now I get it!!!

[Tophe]

The Straight Dope claims the letters come from the phrase "Oll Korrect." The phrase comes from a curious fad for "comical abbreviations" that swept the country in the 1830s and 1840s. The estimable Oxford Dictionary concurs, while also noting that the term has several foreign equivalents: the Scots "och aye," the Greek "ola kala," the Choctaw Indian "Oke." http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20050321.html

Chicken littles

[krbvroc1]

The sky is falling! The sky is falli

the weather of the past...

[bdigit]

is always alot more accurate once it has occured already. thanks slashdot for making sure we get the weather a few days after it has occured

Re:What does this mean for the little man?

[redJag]

Just to be safe, I'd keep your little man away from it.

Re:Why only NOAA? Why not international?

[GomezAdams]

You've unconvered the great cover up. George Bush and Congelisa Rice have told Chaney to get his pals at Haliburton to create this really, really, top secret Giant Magnetic Device that will fry everyone's brain in the Blue States to clear the way for a Red State migration. The only protection against this new terrible weapon is to wear tin foil under your hat, or if you can find one, a fine holed, metal colander. If the holes are too large then the micro sized Federal agents riding on the magnetic pulses will be able to get through to whisper evil thoughts in your ear and plant tiny alien creatures from Area 52 that will eat your brain. Since you are the one who made this discovery and was foolish enough to post it on the Internet, expect black helicoptors to find you.... Oh no. It's too late. They have you in their sights. Run, run. Run like the wind and don't look back.

3-Hour K-Index Charts

[trevdak]

I found an automatically generated graph here:
http://www.sec.noaa.gov/rt_plots/kp_3d.html

so the dleay is caused by...

[l3v1]

Maybe the 9K itself caused the warining to be posted after the whole shebang has already passed. At least people could've prepared to see great Auroras.

I wore protection!

[bokane]

Boy, good thing I was rockin' the tinfoil chapeau on Friday...

No Problem here

[DigiShaman]

Noppepeee. Noo probbbblleem he 20934 hehrr. I don0932t kn203w what yo.....u are all2342 talking about. THe99999-9re is 980980 da800ta corrupt232342ion you2234 Say0--0????

Re:No Problem here

[NanoGator]

"Noppepeee. Noo probbbblleem he 20934 hehrr. I don0932t kn203w what yo.....u are all2342 talking about. THe99999-9re is 980980 da800ta corrupt232342ion you2234 Say0--0????"

Good thing cell phones were unaffected!

With apologies to Dr. Streetmentioner

[Stealth Potato]

Oh and be sure to catch the auroras yesterday.

Yeah, they're going to have been great. :-)

Anyone who uses the word pedantic

[b00m3rang]

is being pedantic.

Re:Anyone who uses the word pedantic

[hostyle]

Quiet, you donnish prude!

Your geekiness is revealed when...

[CrackedButter]

When you are the first to mention the word "Ion" and "Storm" and then using them to create a joke in relation to the news article.

Re:Your geekiness is revealed when...

[lavaface]

I've looked through the comments and couldn't find the joke you were talking about. Care to elaborate? ;)

Re:Your geekiness is revealed when...

[CrackedButter]

What I said is the joke. The fact that I brought it up because I am referencing Star Trek. Hence me being revealed as the geek.

Is this related to Earth's changing magnetic field

[goat_of_wisdom]

I've read that Earth's magnetic field is getting weaker and will soon reverse its polarity. I wonder if a weakening magnetic field is more susceptible to these kinds of solar flares. (i.e. a normal flare results in a larger perturbation of Earth's magnetic field.)

Re:What does this mean for the little man?

[some guy I know]

can someone tell me if I should be worried or not? What do I expect from this?

1. No.
2. An article about it on Slashdot that is about three days late.
   Oh, and some pretty pictures of aurorae posted on various web sites.
   Beyond that, not much.

Re:Why only NOAA? Why not international?

[pv2b]

You can't use tin foil. That's implanted with secret government RFID equipment they implanted in the tin ore making tin foil actually AMPLIFY the signal.

You need to use aluminum foil. They haven't figured out how to taint Bauxite quite yet.

Clarifiaction.

[some guy I know]

Uh, to clarify answer #1, I meant "No." as in "No, you should not be worried.", not "No, someone can't tell you if you should be worried or not.".
Also, the answer to #2 is what you can expect from this, which is not necessarily what you, personally, do expect from this.
Sorry if that wasn't clear.

Re:Explanation

[jrockway]

I believe that ThinkGeek has a shirt that says, "There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who get jokes where 10 (base 2) is actually 2 (base 10), and those who just got it and feel the need to explain it to everyone."

Which one are you? :)

By maximum devistation

[Timberwolf0122]

By definition total destruction is the maximum devistation I would of thought possible in a 3 hour period, ergo, I should invest in new Sun Block 4000 (warning: frequent use may cause skin cancer)

Also in answer to a question way up the top having a scale of 0-9 does have 10 increments(0's a number too!) and also takes less memory to store;-)

Re:By maximum devistation

[allanc]

0-9 doesn't take any less memory to store than 1-10. You can only get 0-7 with three bits. Anything from 8 through 15 requires four bits. So a 9 and a 10 take the same amount of memory to store.

Unless you're using binary-coded-decimal, of course, but people using binary-coded-decimal get what they deserve.

Re:By maximum devistation

[Timberwolf0122]

or if you store the two digits separately.

Re:By maximum devistation

[allanc]

That's what binary-coded decimal is.

Wrong Day

[OrGoN3]

According to the slashdot article, the geomagnetic storm of extreme proportions happened on Friday, May 13. However, the original article clearly states that they happened on the 15th, and that they predicted on the 13th that they would happen on the 15th. Would have also been great to mention what that meant: Northern Lights

So that explains why...

[FoXDie]

...my dead Grandpa started talking to me from my XM Satellite radio...

In case you are wondering...

Slash Slow

[WrongOne]

Talk about news you CANT use... Basically slashdot is saying you missed your chance to see it. Maybe they dont have any one working over the weekend, to post these stories in a timely manner. Pending aurora = news.. Past aurora = NOT NEWS...

As far south as Arkansas

[Mz6]

Cruising around the NOAA pages a few days ago when this happened, they show live reports from where the Auroras were seen from. THe furthest south that I saw was Fayetville, Arkansas and San Diego California. Auroral activity was pretty strong!

Re:Is this related to Earth's changing magnetic fi

[Anonymous Coward]

The polarity has, and does indeed reverse; however, 'soon' on the scale in which we speak of these events is on the same order as other geologic or paleolithic phenomena:

1000 years: Imminate
1M: Soon
100M: Long
250M+: Distant

While K-index values relate to maximum field purturbance, no, the solar ejectory matter was significantly above 'normal' (it was extreme), and this 9 K event was not an abbreancy related to the Earth's changing magnetic field.

From this I see what's missing from ALL Sci-Fi...

[FraggedSquid]

is an Englishman moaning about the space weather.

Space weather...

[Maljin Jolt]

... is rather blameworthy this week. I am glad I am back home on Earth today.

I was unable to find a link but

[Senor_Programmer]

back in the 1800's there was a period of solar activity that was so extreme that aurora was seen in the Carribean and telegraph operators had to disconnect or reverse their batteries!

Re:Literally

[the way, what're you]

Literally used to be one of those safe words (no BDSM refrence intended) that meant "No, I'm not exaggerating. I was really stuck 9 hours in traffic."

I think that's what the OP meant -- the sky wasn't exaggerating and was really stuck dancing in traffic for 9 hours

Patience...

[HomerJayS]

It is only a matter of time before the rest of the world comes over the to dark side and becomes part of the USA. Then, "America" will really be synonomous with "The World".

Iraq and Afganistan are but stepping stones.

Cell Service?

[Huxley_Dunsany]

I'm located in southern Nevada, and I noticed that I was having terrible cell reception all day yesterday, and I don't think it was just me. I work in a large electronics store, and all day long (esp. in the afternoon), I overheard customers complaining that they were having dropped calls, or at least much more interference than usual. Would a storm like this have an effect on cell phone reception? I did notice at least one or two posts mentioning that short-wave radio was out yesterday...

Just a thought.

Huxley

Slashdot article in error

[laughing!oni]

Actually, the geomagnetic storm was detected on May 15th. The solar flare that caused the geomagnetic storm took place on May 13th. Someone should correct that slashdot article.

Re:Explanation

[JavaLord]

but having the digits 10 gives you four options....

Re:First post?

[ccarson]

Apparently, the Earth magnetic field has decreased by 10% in the last 10 years. During my studies in electrical engineering sub-atomic physics, I learned that a particles velocity can be affected by magnetic fields. Based on Earths weakening magnetic field and the recent increase in solar intensity, I believe this may be one of the reasons causing global warming. If more radiation hits the Earth, shouldn't that also increase the overall temperature of the Earth due to particle scattering and can global warming be contributed to this? I've been bouncing this idea in my head for a while now and I can't see why this MAY not be true.

Re:Explanation

[ergo98]

Well since the original was "1 to 10", that would really be 3 options (0, 1, 10) as 11 would be above the cutoff.

I saw this...

[FooGoo]

from Californian. I just thought Livermore Labs was doing something funky

Protons

[solarlux]

See the second graph on this webpage for a graphical representation of the radiation levels. These are the events where radiation engineers on satellite programs find out if they did their job properly making their equipment hard against single event effects.

Re:Explanation

[jerde]

2 options (1, 10) as 0 would be below the cutoff. :)

Solar Weather Data

[Hoi Polloi]

Here are some sources of realtime data:

X-ray Flux

Solar Terrestrial Activity Report

Realtime ACE Observations

Re:Solar Weather Data

[Pchelka]

The sources of realtime data mentioned in the post by Hoi Polloi are great - if you understand space weather and how to correctly interpret these data. I would guess that the average Slashdot reader does not. spaceweather.com and the main NOAA Space Environment Center are slightly better sources for a layperson. The Education and Outreach section of the Space Environment Center gives a good overview explaining what the geomagnetic indices actually mean. I'm always excited when we can see the aurora in the continental U.S., but I'm not quite sure I understand all the buzz about this geomagnetic storm. As far as I can tell, according to NOAA, this was only a G2 storm. This is a relatively minor event! It is near solar minimum, so geomagnetic storms of any magnitude are not very common right now and this was a special event in that sense. However, I don't remember seeing anything on Slashdot last November when similar levels of geomagnetic activity occurred. I have to admit I am a little perplexed by all of the sudden interest. Unfortunately all this sudden interest in space weather is a bit too late - NASA is probably going to cut funding for a lot of the programs that fund scientists who study the Earth's magnetosphere and space weather.

Re:Scientists. Mine goes to eleven...

[mnemotronic]

With the Tapis Plan, we go to eleven. You see, these CMEs come along, and the scale these other blokes use only goes to 9. So, at 9, they're all the way up - all the way. Where can you go from there? Nowhere. So what we do, if we need that extra push into the lower ionosphere, Eleven.

With apologies to the gang.

Explains strangeness..

[EvilStein]

my GPS has been *really* inaccurate in the past few days. It's also way off on the altitude. (Mountain View, CA is not at 2,800 feet)
Also my Sirius stuff has had more drop-offs than usual, even when the sky was clear outside.

Re:First post?

[ccarson]

At this time, it's important for all parties to keep an open mind about global warming. Your notion that global warming is due to industry is as flimsy as my proposition that the warming is due to a weakening magnetic field and more intense Sun. Just like many things in nature, it's a combination of variables and in this case, we MAY both be right. Saying that there's a problem in my theory is conjecture until further evidence is established.

Avoid Transporter use until storm passes

[StefanJ]

Using a transporter during this interval is just begging to end up in a parallel universe, or split into good and evil halves.

Aurorawatch

[shepuk]

Real-time UK readings, and automated e-mail warning service here:

http://www.dcs.lancs.ac.uk/iono/aurorawatch/rt_act ivity/

Re:First post?

[notasheep]

Except that his notion is also backed by scientists world-wide. Yours is backed by you. Though, I'd love to see some links to articles that back up your proposition - always willing to learn something new.

Until then, I'll place my bet on the more established, and accepted, theory.

my poor, dead router

[demonbug]

Now I'm not saying that I know for certain that this storm killed my router, but SOMETHING sure did between Friday night and Sunday evening. Of course it was a D-Link, so it's just as likely it died of (un?)natural causes.

Same idiot...

[Namlak]

Because the scale was created by the same idiot who programmed the snooze button on almost all digital alarm clocks.

Re:Explanation

[ergo98]

Ah man that was silly of me. You're right.

Re:Friday the thirteenth

[scottv67]

it cost him his soul

Are you sure that you aren't thinking of the Dread Pirate Roberts? ;^)

http://www.thisisawar.com/LaughterPB1.htm

Re:so the delay is caused by...

[Thuktun]

Maybe the 9K itself caused the warining to be posted after the whole shebang has already passed. At least people could've prepared to see great Auroras.

There was a fluctuation in the galactic Zone boundaries and we dropped into a slower Zone. Must be why I'm having computer problems today.

Re:The myth about solar cycles/

[corblix]

I see someone didn't bother to actually RTFA
Link for idiots that can't RTFA

Well, O Anonymous Coward, I did read the article. You pointed me to another one. I hadn't read it yet. Nor have I read thousands of other articles that were not linked to by the original post. How about that?

In any case, thanks for the interesting info. May I suggest you consider being more polite about how you present such things in the future.