Power companies in the U.S. and around the world are preparing to deal with potential power outages after three explosions happened on the sun's surface over the past few days. Read the full story for Reuters below for more info:
NEW YORK | Sat Aug 6, 2011 1:04pm EDT
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Three large explosions from the Sun over the past few days have prompted U.S. government scientists to caution users of satellite, telecommunications and electric equipment to prepare for possible disruptions over the next few days.
"The magnetic storm that is soon to develop probably will be in the moderate to strong level," said Joseph Kunches, a space weather scientist at the Space Weather Prediction Center, a division of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
He said solar storms this week could affect communications and global positioning system (GPS) satellites and might even produce an aurora visible as far south as Minnesota and Wisconsin.
An aurora, called aurora borealis or the northern lights in northern latitudes, is a natural light display in the sky in the Arctic and Antarctic regions caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere.
Major disruptions from solar activity are rare but have had serious impacts in the past.
In 1989, a solar storm took down the power grid in Quebec, Canada, leaving about six million people without power for several hours.
The largest solar storm ever recorded was in 1859 when communications infrastructure was limited to telegraphs.
The 1859 solar storm hit telegraph offices around the world and caused a giant aurora visible as far south as the Caribbean Islands.
Some telegraph operators reported electric shocks. Papers caught fire. And many telegraph systems continued to send and receive signals even after operators disconnected batteries, NOAA said on its website.
A storm of similar magnitude today could cause up to $2 trillion in damage globally, according to a 2008 report by the National Research Council.
"I don't think this week's solar storms will be anywhere near that. This will be a two or three out of five on the NOAA Space Weather Scale," said Kunches.
SOLAR SCALE
The NOAA Space Weather Scale measures the intensity of a solar storm from one being the lowest intensity to five being the highest, similar to scales that measure the severity of hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes.
The first of the three solar explosions from the sun this week already passed the Earth on Thursday with little impact, Kunches said, noting, the second was passing the Earth now and "seems to be stronger."
And the third, he said, "We'll have to see what happens over the next few days. It could exacerbate the disturbance in the Earth's magnetic field caused by the second (storm) or do nothing at all."
Power grid managers receive alerts from the Space Weather Prediction Center to tell them to prepare for solar events, which peak about every 12 years, Tom Bogdan, director of the center said.
He said the next peak, called a solar maximum, was expected in 2013.
"We're coming up to the next solar maximum, so we expect to see more of these storms coming from the sun over the next three to five years," Bogdan said.
Most of August has been fine for temps in the QCA...today though is a hot one! There's a HEAT ADVISORY in effect south of the Quad Cities, and our heat index numbers are above 100° in a lot of places! It won't last long though - Thursday promises some big relief!
We haven't had too many rainy days in the QC over the last few months...in fact, since the middle of June there have been only 6 days with more than 1/10th of an inch of rain! A nice soaker would do us well right now!
Tropical Storm Irene formed in the Atlantic Ocean on Saturday (Shown above).
After a dry start to our Friday we're starting to see a few showers pop up this afternoon! Right now the first showers are around Galena and pushing East...over the next few hours we'll see a few more scattered showers popping up! Overall we're looking at spotty showers through Saturday afternoon!
As we close in on mid-August we're also closing in on the busiest part of hurricane season in the Atlantic. Early to mid September is the time we're most likely to see hurricanes in the Atlantic basin and as we check things out tonight the NHC is watching a few areas for development! If you have vacation plans in the Caribbean anywhere from 5-14 days from now stay tuned...
Here's a graphic I just made up for my weather show. It provides a couple different ways to look at Friday night's rain...in some cases it's good news, in some cases it's not!
