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Coronal Mass Ejection Hits Earth
astroengine writes "On Tuesday, the Earth was hit by a coronal mass ejection (CME), triggering a 'moderate' geomagnetic storm, igniting aurorae at high latitudes. The CME in question was launched from the sun early on Sunday and space weather scientists predicted its arrival on Aug. 3 — the vast magnetic bubble of solar plasma arrived on schedule."
Damn it, we need to shoot back. Don't let the Sun see us flinch, make sure that we retaliate in kind!
-- I really need to bleed off some of this
Galactic porn. Very awesome. Earth was left glowing and satisfied.
There's a spot in User Info for World of Warcraft account names? Really?
where Dr. Crusher was commanding the Enterprise. She used Dr. Raega's (Farengi scientist) metaphasic shield to enter a star's corona with the Borg in persuit, and then fired the phasers at the star just below the Borg ship.
Moral of the story? Sucks get caught in a CME.
"Be prepared, son. That's my motto. Be prepared." --Joe Hallenbeck
Monitor the results.
I am not interested in articles about life extension advancements.
The sun just lost a contact.
This post may or may not contain cancer causing materials.
However, the bad news is that satellites might go if a bigger storm comes along.
...mass ejection of corona like this, it was spring break in Cancun.
"Give someone a program, frustrate them for a day... Teach someone to program, frustrate them for a lifetime."
SPACE WEATHER!!!
On the surface, not so much - the magnetosphere funnels those charged particles to the magnetic poles, where they interact with the atmosphere and create the stunning light shows we call auroras. That said, they can induce currents to flow, especially in long lines (think power lines) which can cause circuit breakers to trip, cutting off the grid and causing power outages.
In space, they cause lots of havoc with satellites - ranging from simple loss of communication (moving charged particles generate EM radiation, after all - same ones that cause power outages mentioned above), to complete destruction if it burns out some control circuits. So not only are the electronics rad-hard, but there are shut down protocols to temporarily turn satellites "off" to prevent damage. A dead satellite is a huge cloud of space junk waiting to happen, after all, especially if you can't deorbit it.
Of course, the magnetosphere is supposed to be weakening in time for a supposed pole reversal, in which case life will get pretty interesting.
This CME didn't result in any damage to satellites, though. Not sure if there weren't other effects (power outages, notable) caused, though.
The additional bit of good news (if you're a VHF amateur radio operator, or FM or TV broadcast DXer) is that there should be interesting propagation of VHF radio signals refracting off of the aurora, perhaps as far as 2000 km. The bad news is that the same ionization that refracts the VHF signals attenuates HF signals, so if you're an HF amateur radio operator or short-wave listener, the paths over the poles will be closed for a few days.
I guess the additional bad news if you're a VHF broadcaster (FM or over-the-air TV) is that you can expect a lot of calls from the public complaining about poor reception, as signals from far away interfere with yours. :-/
Took this photo of the aurora last night in the short window of full darkness before the moon came up.
There will be another shooting opportunity tonight, if the geomagnetic storm continues.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.