Solar storms, what are they and what is their effect on Earth?

Along with the development of our knowledge, it turns out that there are more and more pitfalls waiting for our civilization and we do not have an effective antidote for many of them. As long as a cosmic stone can move us back in development or even sweep us off the surface of the planet, a "stupid" polarity reversal, which has happened many times in the history of our planet, has the potential to throw humanity into climatic chaos.

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One of the most common events that can cause considerable damage to us, in terms of civilization, are solar storms, or in fact it would be better to say geomagnetic. The scale of this threat is assessed in various ways, sensational articles describe it as if the Sun was about to return us to the Middle Ages, others play down the matter a bit, claiming that with today's level of technology, there is basically nothing to be afraid of.

What is a solar storm?

But let's start with what our geomagnetic storm is all about. Simply put, it is a very strong disturbance of the Earth's magnetic field by some external phenomenon. In practice, they come from the "vagaries" of our life-giving star. It can be triggered by a strong solar wind or a coronal mass ejection, otherwise known as CME. The first phenomenon is weaker and is caused, for example, by the action of a coronal hole or a flare. However, if the flare is particularly strong, it will most often occur in a duo with a coronal mass ejection. And we should be afraid of such a combo, or actually it is not so much to fear as to prepare for its impact.

Both phenomena arise as a result of a distortion of the Sun's magnetic field. When it suddenly aligns, some energy is thrown into space. If a large number of physical particles are simultaneously ejected in the form of a giant plasma cloud, then we are talking about CME.

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The greatest solar storms in human history

Of all the storms whose effects we sensed directly, the most famous is the "debut" one of 1859. It was the first storm where observations of the Sun and terrestrial effects made it possible to initially identify this phenomenon. The whole event started with the appearance of a large number of spots on the surface of the Sun. Then Richard Christopher Carrington, the amateur astronomer, was fortunate enough to observe the flare itself. Less than a day later, a massive cloud of particles struck the Earth, burning large parts of telegraph lines and other electrical devices in both the United States and Europe.

A spectacular example from more recent times are the storms of 1989 and 2003. The first caused a number of network failures and shutdowns in the Canadian province of Quebec, and disrupted the operation of American networks. The immediate effects of this event affected millions of people, and the blackouts themselves lasted several hours. A similar event in 2003, known as the Halloween Storm, affected Scandinavian countries, especially Sweden. In both cases, disruptions in the operation of a large part of the satellites were also noted.

A less known event is the superstorm of 1921, the strength of which was comparable to that of 1859 by new research methods. The electrical infrastructure was also heavily damaged then. Today we know that such events are not unusual for our sun. Flares and outbursts, even of the highest X class, are recorded quite often, fortunately only a small percentage of them are directed towards our planet. In 2012, we were also very lucky when one of the largest coronal outbursts literally missed our planet.

Does a solar storm threaten our safety?

Both the flare and the coronal ejection send a colossal amount of energy towards the earth. The latter phenomenon additionally shoots at us with a huge, though rarefied amount of matter. When they hit the Earth, if it occurs in an unfavorable polarization, it hits the upper atmosphere, causing a series of magnetic anomalies, causing, among others, radio wave interference. Induced electrical currents are also created that can damage Earth's networks and connected devices.

Such an event may, for example, quickly disrupt the entire logistics in a given area, if it manages to disrupt or even disable GPS systems for a longer period of time. Unshielded by the Earth's atmosphere and magnetosphere, devices in space must absorb even larger doses of energy and particles. Suffice it to mention that the solar wind from this type of discharge fried the computer controlling the MARIE spectrometer aboard the Mars Odyssey probe, and also devastated the Japanese space probe Nozomi, which destruction was one of the elements that determined the final failure of the mission.

As in any case, when we do not fully understand the mechanisms behind a given phenomenon, we cannot predict how dangerous they may become in the future. How large can a coronal discharge be? Is what was observed in 1859 and 1921 the maximum that can be expected from our star? It is also worth noting that for some time our planet's magnetic field has been weakening, and anomalies such as the one in the South Atlantic are appearing. We also do not understand the nature of this process and we do not know to what extent our natural shield will be effective in the near future.

The voices saying that today we do not have such primitive electrical networks as in the times of the telegraph, and that we do not have anything to fear, are too optimistic in my opinion. Electricity consumption on Earth is growing, which is definitely not followed by the expansion or modernization of the infrastructure. The networks are congested in many places, which makes them much more susceptible to this type of damage.

Let's also not forget that we live in a world of the primacy of accountants over engineers, companies forget that they use dead flash, save fractions of a cent on motherboard designs, condensing paths beyond measure. I suppose a well-aimed and powerful CME can do damage in many places where you would not expect it, hoping that it will be properly secured there.

All this can be overlapped with a domino effect, when the first failures will cause secondary overloads and intensify the storm effect. It is enough to see what happened on a small scale due to frosts in Sweden or Germany, with only an increase in demand and a simultaneous decrease in the efficiency of transmission lines. In the event of a storm, we will deal with breakdowns, of which, especially those concerning transformers, may be time-consuming to repair.

Of course, the catastrophic visions of going back to the Middle Ages are more of a fantasy genre, but in today's computerized and electrified world, the chaos caused by such an event could be much greater than in today's, caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Burze słoneczne, czym są i jakie jest ich oddziaływanie na Ziemię?

Does humanity influence solar storms and their consequences?

There is no point in deluding ourselves, we have no influence on the Sun and we will probably never have any influence on it. Flares and reproaches are something that we simply have to take into account in the development of our civilization. We already have the right tools for this, although, of course, consistent use of them will result in a significant increase in the costs of building and maintaining infrastructure.

Whether it is about the appropriate extension of the lines so as to provide them with a large reserve for unforeseen voltage peaks, or the appropriate shielding of the most key network elements or the creation of systems enabling the controlled reduction of the network load, each of these activities means huge expenses. Meanwhile, we live in a world where, despite the next electric revolution, we have problems with maintaining and maintaining the networks we currently have ...

Some institutions and research centers issued guidelines for the introduction of this type of security years ago, here you can see the British report, but no fundamental changes in the approach so far are visible. Even rich countries have adopted the tactic of "maybe it will work" when it comes to ground infrastructure.

Paradoxically, we are pretty well prepared for cosmic observations of the Sun itself. The Deep Space Climate Observatory and SOHO probes operate near the L1 libration point of the Earth-Sun system, in addition to them, the Sun is monitored by Solar Dynamics Observatory, STEREO, and Parker Solar Probe. In 2021, Solar Orbiter, a probe heading for orbit around the sun, will start research.

A year ago, the Inouye Solar Telescope, built in Hawaii, was also launched. Such a large amount of data that we are currently receiving from our "spies" gives us hope that we will be able to better understand the processes taking place on the surface of the sun and in its atmosphere, and learn to anticipate dangerous events well in advance.

Solar storms in mass culture

Geomagnetic storms did not really penetrate the world of cinema and mass culture. Perhaps this is due to the fact that the vision of this cataclysm is not very spectacular, and properly turned up does not give the heroes a chance to prove themselves. All in all, I think I can only recall the kitschy "Announcement" with Nicolas Cage, in which this super-flare finally destroyed our civilization, burning everything on the surface of the planet. Speaking in the language of teenagers: Meh ...

Anyway, even without the subject of geomagnetic storms, our Sun is rather unlucky to be the foreground hero. It is enough to mention Danny Boyl's "Towards the Sun" to say that somehow this subject does not suit our filmmakers at all. The truth is, the Sun performs best when it's just an excuse to justify climate change without going into scientific detail.

Summary

Along with the ever faster development and, at the same time, our dependence on technologies based on electricity in civilization, we must begin to take seriously the dangers of cosmic weather. Flares and coronal mass ejections can cause severe geomagnetic storms that can disrupt life on our planet for long periods of time. The sun will not burn us to the ground, it will not take us back to the Middle Ages, but the costs that such an event can generate can be really huge.

The upcoming revolution will force the expansion of infrastructure practically all over the world anyway. So we have the perfect opportunity to secure our networks against such an eventuality. Will it be possible? Will anyone, e.g. in Poland, treat this seemingly abstract matter seriously enough? I have big doubts, people usually start to act reasonably only when there is no other choice. And I feel something like that that we may soon have an opportunity to find out whether the pessimists or the optimists are right in this matter. The next cycle of solar activity began in 2020, and will peak in 4-5 years ...

Sources: NASA, ESA, SpaceWeatherc.com, Forbes