Catch-all Solar Flare Thread

[shrapnel]

This is a thread for posting about potential incoming solar flares and the like. Rather than having DICE threads every time one happens, please just post a link to the article or whatever, explaining the forecast and such for whatever activity you are talking about. Polite discussion on whether a given event is something to be worried about is welcomed, but please refrain from cruelly calling everyone idiots. Similarly, please refrain from calling everyone who is not in agreement with you about the severity of a given storm, names.

PLEASE NOTE- this is not a thread for discussing solar flares in general. There are a number of Contingency Preparation and Planning threads on the subject, where you are welcome to discuss preparing for flares and subsequent geomagnetic storms. Just some helpful places to start, should you be looking for that sort of discussion:

http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=74613&hilit=carrington+event
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=74576&hilit=carrington+event
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=65213&hilit=carrington+event
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=51058&hilit=carrington+event
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=64950&hilit=carrington+event
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=82859

Now I shall write a few keywords, so that searching for this thread is easier. Coronal mass ejection. CME. Carrington event. 1859. Electromagnetic pulse. EMP. Extinction level event. Geomagnetic storm. Aurora. Others as I think of them.

[Squidi]

http://www.bentoncourier.com/content/br ... e-church-c

Unexplained fire on solar flare day knocks out utilities. Could be unrelated. Could be the 110 degree days and lots of air conditioners.

[Bunsen]

http://www.bentoncourier.com/content/breaking-news-power-outage-benton-leaves-large-portion-town-without-power-northside-church-c

Unexplained fire on solar flare day knocks out utilities. Could be unrelated. Could be the 110 degree days and lots of air conditioners.

In Arkansas? That's unrelated. Geomagnetic storm effects are concentrated near the poles -- anything that would slightly mess with power stations in Arkansas would black out most of Canada and Scandinavia, and they didn't see much of anything.

In other news, the strongest solar flare of the current cycle -- an X6.9 -- happened this morning. The sunspot that created it is right on the edge of the visible half of the sun, though, so the rather significant CME it created is not directed at Earth. Had this happened while the sunspot was facing Earth, the aforementioned northerly areas could have been in for some power interruptions.

[NoAm]

Shrap, thank you for the consideration and re-link.

Just a heads up, for those that follow this info.
Increasing solar activity and the threat that coronal mass ejections (CME) pose to Earth has prompted NASA to convene a news briefing at its Headquarter building in Washington on Thursday afternoon.
The briefing will air live on NASA Television and the agency’s website at 2:00 PM EDT (7:00 PM GMT).

I was just sent an email, with these links.
Not sure if it's time to run out to buy faraday cages, but definitely something to listen to and be aware of.

http://www.myweathertech.com/2011/08/17/solar-flare-activity-prompting-nasa-to-convene-a-news-briefing-thursday-in-washington/
http://techprotectbag.com/

[Bunsen]

The sun isn't doing anything special right this minute, so this is probably just another "The new solar cycle is ramping up, things might happen" announcement.

And there has never, in the history of humanity, been a solar event that would have made a Faraday cage useful. If it's not hooked up (with a DC connection, not through a transformer) to miles of wire, it cannot be damaged by a geomagnetic storm. The other effects of a large flare or CME only matter to things in space or the upper atmosphere.

[Necrodamus]

The sun isn't doing anything special right this minute, so this is probably just another "The new solar cycle is ramping up, things might happen" announcement.

And there has never, in the history of humanity, been a solar event that would have made a Faraday cage useful. If it's not hooked up (with a DC connection, not through a transformer) to miles of wire, it cannot be damaged by a geomagnetic storm. The other effects of a large flare or CME only matter to things in space or the upper atmosphere.

This is quite true, but... there has never, in the history of humanity been a solar flare of massive magnitude with a society that is semiconductor based!

[Bunsen]

The sun isn't doing anything special right this minute, so this is probably just another "The new solar cycle is ramping up, things might happen" announcement.

And there has never, in the history of humanity, been a solar event that would have made a Faraday cage useful. If it's not hooked up (with a DC connection, not through a transformer) to miles of wire, it cannot be damaged by a geomagnetic storm. The other effects of a large flare or CME only matter to things in space or the upper atmosphere.

This is quite true, but... there has never, in the history of humanity been a solar flare with a society that is semiconductor based!

Yes there has. There have been thousands of solar flares since computers became commonplace. There have even been large geomagnetic storms -- ask anybody who was hanging around Quebec in March of 1989. Solar activity, no matter how dramatic, has no effect on small (i.e. less than a mile or so long) objects at ground level. Ten thousand Carrington events at once would not affect the circuitry of a laptop computer in the least, provided it was not plugged in at the time. Please, please consider checking your facts instead of talking out of your ass about this.

[mad scientist]

The sun isn't doing anything special right this minute, so this is probably just another "The new solar cycle is ramping up, things might happen" announcement.

And there has never, in the history of humanity, been a solar event that would have made a Faraday cage useful. If it's not hooked up (with a DC connection, not through a transformer) to miles of wire, it cannot be damaged by a geomagnetic storm. The other effects of a large flare or CME only matter to things in space or the upper atmosphere.

What you're saying here is mostly right, and I know you have the good intention of making people aware that a CME is much different from a nuclear bomb based EMP. For the sake of clarity though, I'd like to point out that where you say that a device must be hooked up "with a DC connection, not through a transformer" is a little misleading.

Any large conductor (like miles of wire) will have a high DC voltage induced on it by a strong CME. This high voltage has the potential to break down insulation (if any), arc to ground (or anything at a different voltage), and generate large amounts of heat ultimately melting, burning, or otherwise damaging anything nearby. This will happen to your miles of wire whether you have DC, AC, or no power on the wires.

Also, while a utility transformer doesn't have a direct DC connection between the primary and secondary, that doesn't necessarily mean that everything downstream of the transformer (your house) is safe. A high voltage spike on the primary side could easily break down insulation and arc to the secondary, subjecting the house wiring to the voltage spike.

[NoAm]

The sun isn't doing anything special right this minute, so this is probably just another "The new solar cycle is ramping up, things might happen" announcement.

And there has never, in the history of humanity, been a solar event that would have made a Faraday cage useful. If it's not hooked up (with a DC connection, not through a transformer) to miles of wire, it cannot be damaged by a geomagnetic storm. The other effects of a large flare or CME only matter to things in space or the upper atmosphere.

What you're saying here is mostly right, and I know you have the good intention of making people aware that a CME is much different from a nuclear bomb based EMP. For the sake of clarity though, I'd like to point out that where you say that a device must be hooked up "with a DC connection, not through a transformer" is a little misleading.

Any large conductor (like miles of wire) will have a high DC voltage induced on it by a strong CME. This high voltage has the potential to break down insulation (if any), arc to ground (or anything at a different voltage), and generate large amounts of heat ultimately melting, burning, or otherwise damaging anything nearby. This will happen to your miles of wire whether you have DC, AC, or no power on the wires.

Also, while a utility transformer doesn't have a direct DC connection between the primary and secondary, that doesn't necessarily mean that everything downstream of the transformer (your house) is safe. A high voltage spike on the primary side could easily break down insulation and arc to the secondary, subjecting the house wiring to the voltage spike.

So what does this mean to the average homeowner?

[CaptBrainFreeze]

I dunno but if my moon pies melt I'm gonna be pissed.

[NoAm]

I dunno but if my moon pies melt I'm gonna be pissed.

Or Klondike Bars

[Bunsen]

Any large conductor (like miles of wire) will have a high DC voltage induced on it by a strong CME. This high voltage has the potential to break down insulation (if any), arc to ground (or anything at a different voltage), and generate large amounts of heat ultimately melting, burning, or otherwise damaging anything nearby. This will happen to your miles of wire whether you have DC, AC, or no power on the wires.

Also, while a utility transformer doesn't have a direct DC connection between the primary and secondary, that doesn't necessarily mean that everything downstream of the transformer (your house) is safe. A high voltage spike on the primary side could easily break down insulation and arc to the secondary, subjecting the house wiring to the voltage spike.

You're right that I had oversimplified, and that there is a small risk of upstream failures causing voltage spikes down the line. The average thunderstorm creates a greater risk of such spikes, so the idea that you might want sensitive devices on surge suppressors isn't specific to this.

But be careful about the cause of the failures, and their probability of occurrence. CME-induced voltages are quite small, even on very large objects. For example, the highest estimates of the rate of change in the geomagnetic field during the Carrington event run a bit shy of 5 microtesla per minute. More mundane geomagnetic storms (like the March 1989 storm) produce about a tenth of that. Taking the huge value (5 µT/min) and assuming the worst possible direction, a 100-mile long power line sitting 100 feet above ground will see a voltage of 0.4 V. Four tenths of a volt per hundred miles, from the worst storm ever witnessed.

That doesn't do much to insulation by itself. What it does do is drive DC current through transformer windings that are only meant to carry AC, and cause the iron core to saturate. When the core saturates, it stops efficiently transforming the AC power it's carrying and begins converting more of it to heat, and overheated insulation breaks down under the AC voltage. The initial failures only happen in transformers that are directly connected to the really long spans, and in active service during the storm. There are a lot of shorter segments between your service drop and those long-haul lines, and those short segments don't pick up enough induced current to mess with the intermediate transformers.

So getting a damaging voltage spike to your wall outlet would require a decent sequence of cascading failures. There's another huge factor that reduces the risk: We can now see the CMEs coming, and shut down the most vulnerable parts of the grid in advance. Those big transformers are very expensive to replace and the downtime from a blown transformer would probably cost a lot more than the hardware itself, so there's a big economic incentive to protect them from ever blowing out in the first place.

That March 1989 event caused the last major consequence of a geomagnetic storm -- a 9-hour outage for Quebec's electric grid. It was caused by a cascade of protection systems tripping to prevent damage to the infrastructure. The systems worked, which is why it only took 9 hours to restore power.

So what does this mean to the average homeowner?

That preps for any other situation that causes power outages (which generally have the same risk of voltage spikes at the moment of failure) carry over to geomagnetic storm situations. Surge protectors and an off-grid power source are things you should have anyway.

The special thing about the geomagnetic super-storm scenario is that the worst case gets really worst, with the remote possibility of months or longer without a fully functional grid. It would require a very special combination of equipment failures and willful stupidity, on top of a once-in-500-years kick in the teeth from the sun, but it's technically possible.

[ei8htx]

Was hoping for a good thread.

but please refrain from cruelly calling everyone idiots. Similarly, please refrain from calling everyone who is not in agreement with you about the severity of a given storm, names.

[NoAm]

Interesting Articles posted today on several sites. I guess there was a doozy of a blast that occurred last night.
I know this has been a great source of debate here, still nothing I am ready to totally discount.
If nothing else, enjoy the pretty pictures.

ALMOST-X FLARE AND CME (UPDATED): This morning, Jan. 23rd around 0359 UT, big sunspot 1402 erupted, producing a long-duration M9-class solar flare. The explosion's M9-ranking puts it on the threshold of being an X-flare, the most powerful kind. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured the flare's extreme ultraviolet flash:
http://spaceweather.com/ This is just a link to the site. I couldn't get a link to the article, so the info might change when you go to it.

A massive burst of solar wind that erupted from the sun Tuesday is expected to deliver only a "glancing blow" to the Earth's vulnerable magnetic field, NASA officials said yesterday. But it will preview what some experts call a potentially existential threat to the power grids of the United States and other nations, and the populations that depend on them.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=solar-flare-this-week-illluminated-power-grid-vulnerability#comment-01


Scientists call these electromagnetic bursts "coronal mass ejections" (CMEs), and they are closely studied because they can produce potentially harmful geomagnetic storms when the charged particles rain down Earth's magnetic field lines.
In addition to generating stronger than normal displays of Earth's auroras (also known as the northern and southern lights), geomagnetic storms aimed directly at our planet can also disrupt satellites in orbit, cause widespread communications interference and damage other electronic infrastructures.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/01/ ... z1kJN77l12
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/01/23/strongest-radiation-storm-in-7-years/?intcmp=features

Early this morning (0359 GMT Jan. 23, which corresponds to late Sunday, Jan. 22 at 10:59 p.m. EST), NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory caught an extreme ultraviolet flash from a huge eruption on the sun , according to the skywatching website Spaceweather.com.
http://www.space.com/14319-huge-solar-eruption-sparks-radiation-storm.html

[wee drop o' bush]

This news article documents Aurora Borealis in Co. Donegal yesterday.
http://www.donegaldaily.com/2012/01/22/ ... r-donegal/

Also
http://spaceweather.com/aurora/gallery_ ... _page2.htm

[TC]

Thought some of you may be interested to know that this subject along with nuclear weapon induced EMPs have been raised by a British Parliamentary committee:

MPs warn over nuclear space bombs and solar flares

The government must take more seriously the threat of a nuclear weapon being exploded in space by a rogue state, MPs have warned.

The Defence Select Committee said the resulting radiation pulse could disrupt power and water supplies, UK defence and satellite navigation systems.

Its chairman, Tory MP James Arbuthnot, said an attack was "quite likely".

The committee is urging ministers to invest in more "hardened" technology to cope with such an event.

It looked at the threat to the UK's technological infrastructure from "electro-magnetic pulse" (EMP) events in space, which could also include the eruption of solar flares...(continued at link)

[sjshack]

X-5 class flare and CME last night around midnight GMT.
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/alerts/warnings_timeline.html

[Bunsen]

Yep, that's a respectable-looking CME. The Space Weather Prediction Center has a nice presentation of a forecast model, which is putting the impact around 05:00 EST Thursday, plus or minus a couple hours. The latest SIDC report mentions "At least a strong (K = 7) geomagnetic storm will be possible." NOAA classifies that as a G3 geomagnetic storm, which shouldn't have much consequence except maybe some aurora visible down to Oregon and northern Illinois (map for North America), though there's a chance of some small hiccups in the power grid. If it goes up to K=8 (a G4 storm), there's a good chance of somebody losing power for a few minutes (probably Canadians, though, so who cares? ), but that's still well short of anything that could cause permanent damage.

So if you're in part of the northern US that's still going to have dark skies then, hope for a clear night, get up early, and see if there's a cool light show going on. If you're a ham, try some aurora contacts. Anybody else, don't worry too much.

[Dawgboy]

A good friend is head of IT for Earthkam, a teaching project for kids that has a camera on the International Space Station. They are shut down at this point and he is fervently hoping nothing "up there" actually fries...

[CryHavoc]

The power went on and off a bunch of times around 5am. According to this article, that's when the solar storm hit. I'm in the Central Time Zone.

http://news.yahoo.com/biggest-solar-sto ... 42753.html

I live in the country so we don't have the most consistent power out here. We lose power just about every time a big thunderstorm goes through.

But other than having to turn my printer off because it kept printing test pages every time the power came back on, no damage to equipment, as far as I can tell.

[TacAir]

LOL

Out watching the pretty lights in the sky just a bit ago.

No power problems, and Ak is a lot closer to the storm...

[azrael99]

my friend lost his internet multiple times

he was disconnected and he reconnected at least 12 times in a row

[Bunsen]

Might have been, but it's iffy. The geomagnetic effects of this CME have been surprisingly small, so it's doubtful that Illinois would have been affected, but some protection systems might have gotten confused. Azrael99's in a much more likely location to be affected, but internet service, whether cable, DSL, or dialup, should be pretty resistant to geomagnetic effects. Personally, I get dropped and reconnected several times in a row every few weeks when my cable modem just decides to be a dipshit.

TacAir: Enjoy my jealousy. I can forecast the arrival of the good auroras just by looking at when my skies will be cloudy. I've lived in the northern US forever, and haven't seen an aurora since the 90s. I always get clouds for the good meteor showers, too.

[phil_in_cs]

[merged above into the main solar flare thread]