A massive explosion on the sun's surface has triggered the largest solar radiation storm since 2005, hurling charged particles at Earth. (NASA / May 4, 2012)
Posted on 05/05/2012 7:09:10 PM PDT by null and void
A massive explosion on the sun's surface has triggered the largest solar radiation storm since 2005, hurling charged particles at Earth. (NASA / May 4, 2012)
A stream of highly charged particles from the sun is headed straight toward Earth, threatening to plunge cities around the world into darkness and bring the global economy screeching to a halt.
This isn't the premise of the latest doomsday thriller. Massive solar storms have happened before — and another one is likely to occur soon, according to Mike Hapgood, a space weather scientist at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, England.
Much of the planet's electronic equipment, as well as orbiting satellites, have been built to withstand these periodic geomagnetic storms. But the world is still not prepared for a truly damaging solar storm, Hapgood argues in a recent commentary published in the journal Nature.
Hapgood talked with The Times about the potential effects of such a storm and how the world should prepare for it.
We had a recent flare-up of publicity in March thanks to a solar storm that didn't really amount to much. Is this sort of coverage a good thing or a bad thing?
It makes such a good scare story, and it's entertaining. It was a mildly interesting event, certainly, but not at all big-league stuff. It makes people think, "Oh it's nothing really," so experts like myself are in danger of being in the crying-wolf situation. That's something that is a concern to me, personally.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Light is one thing. Particles another. I’ve read, IIRC, of their speeds of 1,000,000 mph or so. That would be about 93 hours.
Apparently the larger solar storm events tend to happen when the sun is more quiet...
There was a solar storm back in the mid to late 1800’s that fused telegraph devices...a similar storm today would do far more damage and it’s only a matter of time.
Repentence is essential for surviving a "Son" storm :-)
You’re just one big frickin’ ray of sunshine aren’t you?
Yes, eventually we are. It may be a sunstorm, a supervolcano, an asteroid or comet strike, a ferocious pandemic, climate change (yes, catastrophic change happens, but not for the reasons the Gorebots say) or something presently unpredictable. Eventually the human race will either be destroyed or reduced to a small remnant. Such catastrophes have happened in the past and will happen again given the passage of time.
The sun is too dangerous. We should reduce our use of the sun.
LOL, with just a little ultraviolet thrown in; oh, and a few million tons of streaming matter traveling at 1,000,000 MPH!
I’m holding out for old age, I am...
So I did.
Be careful what you wish for...I’m damned close to that ending already. Depends on which comes first LOL.
Nice!
Better now than later.....the WX is fair to midland right now.....but later....?????????????????
The Solar Wind could be the “Finger of God” that would touch Obama to really fry him to a crisp!
Let’s see now. “Massive Solar Flare to Create Chaos” story runs, what, about every 1-2 years? For, what, at least the last 3 or 4 decades? And guess what? NOT ONCE, NOT ONCE, I tell you has a “massive” solar flare EVER created chaos! NOT ONE FUCHING TIME!
the joke is on the sun. it will cause the caps to melt raising sea levels but eventually putting out the sun. ha ha to you, sun!
Thanks null and void.
‘Massive solar flare destroys civilization’ story runs every few months on FR...
There is a hope however. There was a period of years on FR where a ‘Lincoln was gay’ story appeared several times a year but thankfully those seem to have fallen out of fashion.
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