Solar storm may bombard Earth on Friday the 13th
Posted by: Jon Ben-Mayor on 06/12/2014 08:11 AM
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The sun is ramping up activity and over the past several days has produced 3 X class flares; the after effects of these flares may possibly bombard the Earth with a huge cloud of charged particles.
Everybody panic and proceed directly to Walmart for provisions!!!!
According to LiveScience, CMEs can trigger geomagnetic storms and knock out communications and power grids on Earth. So far, scientists have not observed a CME associated with this morning's flare, but yesterday's flares produced a CME that could hit Earth on Friday — Friday the 13th.
The second video images (blue, wider angle), according to Space Weather shows a faint CME associated with the first X-flare emerging around 1200 UT. A second, brighter CME from the second X-flare quickly overtakes it, forming a "cannibal CME." Computer models run yesterday by NOAA analysts suggest the merged storm cloud will reach Earth mid-day on June 13th. The glancing blow could spark polar geomagnetic storms.
The Daily Mail notes that the last major CME happened before the planet was dependent on electronics for our day-to-day lives, little is known about what the real impact would be.
But it is likely that large electronics would be badly affected, causing weeks or months of disruptions to power supplies, phone networks and the internet which could cost billions to repair.
Small electronics, such as mobile phones and computers, would likely be unaffected, but would be rendered almost useless with large networks knocked out.
So there you have it; a full moon, a CME and Friday the 13th all rolled together certainly promises to be an interesting day! At least the full moon will keep things lit up at night when the grid goes down.
Everybody panic and proceed directly to Walmart for provisions!!!!
According to LiveScience, CMEs can trigger geomagnetic storms and knock out communications and power grids on Earth. So far, scientists have not observed a CME associated with this morning's flare, but yesterday's flares produced a CME that could hit Earth on Friday — Friday the 13th.
The second video images (blue, wider angle), according to Space Weather shows a faint CME associated with the first X-flare emerging around 1200 UT. A second, brighter CME from the second X-flare quickly overtakes it, forming a "cannibal CME." Computer models run yesterday by NOAA analysts suggest the merged storm cloud will reach Earth mid-day on June 13th. The glancing blow could spark polar geomagnetic storms.
The Daily Mail notes that the last major CME happened before the planet was dependent on electronics for our day-to-day lives, little is known about what the real impact would be.
But it is likely that large electronics would be badly affected, causing weeks or months of disruptions to power supplies, phone networks and the internet which could cost billions to repair.
Small electronics, such as mobile phones and computers, would likely be unaffected, but would be rendered almost useless with large networks knocked out.
So there you have it; a full moon, a CME and Friday the 13th all rolled together certainly promises to be an interesting day! At least the full moon will keep things lit up at night when the grid goes down.
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