v0.8 08:00 Dec25th 2023 occasionally updated
19dec23... given the rest of the solar watching and reporting industry is peaking, there's not much to do here other than maintain the links to the solar news sites. And say "told you so...." 😉
Solar activity continues to peak - get ready for more storms, CMEs and even EMPs?
v0.66 19:00 May23rd 2023 continually updated
Here's a really significant use for solar activity observations, discovered developed by a Japanese researcher..
hard evidence of historic solar flare events in tree ring analysis.
Solar activity in this cycle continues to peak with plenty of action reported daily on the usual space with that websites.
v0.65 19:00 May 5th 2023
Coronation day tomorrow - and it's all going on Solarwise... no sign of a comet though...
Solar Eruptions Aimed at Earth, Significant Uptick, Tornados, Volcanos
v0.61 15:30 April 24th 2023 continually updated
This solar cycle is proving to be more feisty and unpredictable than any of the experts expected. And do not forget that the experts had no idea what mechanism drove the 11 year cycle as recently as 2016.
This not a Carrington event, but it is the biggest storm for over ten years, and might be a precursor. We have never previously had as much delicate electronic equipment to be tested by exposure to this type of radiation, so fingers are crossed. Everyone is watching closely... There is a big session on the subject with the SpaceWeatherWoman..
Breaking twitter news
Follow the news at Spaceweather.com
April 24th https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=24&month=04&year=2023
Previous post:
v0.53 15:30 April 6th 2023
Someone just noted...
“May 6th - King Charles' Coronation day - was the date of the death of
Edward 3rd in 1910, and also a visit from Halley's Comet. Given the current state of solar activity, there is a reasonable (ie not at all impossible) likelihood of
a major solar storm on Coronation day – could it be another Big One? Are the Gods playing with us?”
So Keep an eye on Spaceweather.com and SpaceweatherWoman
And now this unexpected event... "SEVERE GEOMAGNETIC STORM: Forecasters did not see this one coming. On March 23-24, auroras spread into the United States as far south as New Mexico (+32.8N) during a severe (category G4) geomagnetic storm--the most intense in nearly 6 years. The cause of the storm is still unclear; it may have been the ripple effect of a near-miss CME on March 23rd."
This image was taken by Peter Forister on March 23, 2023 @
Luray, Virginia, USA
Hot on the heels of other recent significant solar events... hold tight while cycle 25 gets into its srirde
As the solar cycle peaks, reports of Miyake events and solar coronal mass ejections (CMEs) are becoming worrying. Once again, the primary caveat for all of us is that politicians know they have no ability to influence anything that the sun might fling at us, so it's easier not to mention it and worry the public.
The basics of Solar Storms explained:
"The sun. Smooth and round and peaceful. Except when it suddenly vomits radiation and plasma in random directions. These solar flares and coronal mass ejections, or CMEs can hit earth and have serious consequences for humanity.
How exactly do they work, how bad could they be - and can we prepare for them?"
An excellent current update from Anton Petrov...
https://youtu.be/mJCytV7PUzk
And about Miyake ... which we suffer about every 1000 years judged from Dendrochronology techniques...
So here's another global challenge… nobody was prepared for the covid pandemic although we knew they happen throughout human history; and we know these solar events happen... but there is little evidence of any contingency preparations. It could yet be the ultimate gamble, so politicians distract the population with all manner of irrelevant nonsense, and maybe gamble with economics in the hope and expectation that the day of reckoning may never arrive on their watch? Conspiracy theories don't get much bigger than this, do they? 😉
We won't mention nuclear war just yet, since nature has its own "nuclear" challenge sitting 93m miles away.
Opinion remains split
on C19 origins - ranging from entirely synthesized in a lab, or mutated through
the animal kingdom – with or without human intervention; but one thing for
certain is that governments took the opportunity to exploit and leverage fear
and panic to impose Orwellian levels of information and population control. And even a formerly "free society" like Canada adopted totalitarian control of citizens’ bank accounts on flimsy pretexts.… for the greater good, of course!
So what
about the next global challenge? Barely anyone is prepared for the next
Carrington Event: which poses a REAL threat to all electrical and electronic systems
on (and off) the planet. And is totally outside the scope of human control - both
to predict accurately, and mitigate in any way.
Politicians hate events that involve the sun, because not only are they powerless to intervene, there is no way to tax the wretched thing in the same way that fossil fuels have been cash cows for a century.
A “Carrington Event” is an occasional massive solar flare and explosive coronal mass ejection (CME), first observed and noted by Richard Carrington in 1868. Another is guaranteed to happen again, with potentially catastrophic global consequences that are concentrated in a day or less, causing disruption and panic on a scale well beyond any pandemic.
Some good news is that we are in a position to develop emergency provisions that can also provide benefits that are generally applicable to all types of large scale “unplanned emergent” events that might occur around challenges like climate and meteor impact. As well as acts of war and terrorism. But this type of major solar event means that anything connected to a piece of wire that is exposed to electromagnetic waves will be vulnerable.
External antennas, overhead cables and wiring in general, but also
less obviously the cables that are strung through the roof spaces of most buildings
are pretty much open to the effects of a magnetic storm. The 1868 event set induced currents of such ferocity that telegraph cables caught fire. These were just about the only form of exposed cabling at that time.
In 2022, cables are everywhere, the majority are above ground and exposed to risk, from power
grids to communications systems and medical electronics.
- Probably half the digital TV and radio services will fail within minutes
- Most will be immediate total failures, not progressive degradation
- GPS satellite fleets will be damaged – possibly wiped out
- (Many critical transport systems and components are highly likely to fail
- A substantial number of people will (have to) stop working to concentrate on survival
- A full dystopian breakdown of society and survival of the best armed and most brutal is likely
- The idea of stoic UK society rallying around with wartime spirit, digging for England and “looking out for each other” needs revising
A Carrington event was first/last noted in 1869. Prior to then with no electrical installations to be affected, they would have passed unnoticed apart from unusually intense aurora. This has been estimated to happen every 150 years (1859 + 150 = 2009).
The NOW opportunity is to develop a resilient strategy to enable the (remaining) powers in control to communicate coherently and consistently with the population of the world - once the lights go out.
This means radio, as Marconi intended it, direct from transmitter to receiver – not via vast (vulnerable) switching networks from studios to DAB multiplexes and internet hubs.
Shielded safe containers with broadcast and off-grid power systems can be supplied to national and local government to help them inform and maintain order.
Solar charged radios held in reserve to deploy to the masses, to maintain comms through the anarchy.
All cheap, all proven, all scalable. It just needs governments to recognise the threat, and to have learned from their pandemic handling shit show, and barely dip into disaster mitigation budgets.
There is one final parting shot. The earth's magnetic core is presently doing some strange and unpredictable things, possibly influenced by the activity in the sun, but nobody knows for sure. But if the magnetosphere should be significantly weakened or even collapse as a result of the magnetic pole migration, then the earth has no shield against the blast of high energy particles from the sun ...and the atmosphere will be stripped in much the same way we believe that Mars was stripped of its atmosphere millions of years ago. Which would mean lights out for all life on earth.
Please keep in mind how the magnetosphere flux lines that guide the high energy solar particles to earth (and create the aurora) focus/coincide at the magnetic pole. Which has been wandering a lot recently. And the molten core is slowing… possibly influenced by the present solar maximum.
* Magnetic pole migration is discussed here
But whatever else, please don't stop being preoccupied 0.04% of CO2 in the atmosphere.
