A new 11-year cycle of heightened solar activity, bringing with it increased risks for power grids, critical military, civilian and airline communications, GPS signals and even cell phones and ATM transactions, showed signs it was on its way when the cycle’s first sunspot appeared in the sun’s Northern Hemisphere, NOAA scientists said.
“This sunspot is like the first robin of spring,” said solar physicist Douglas Biesecker. “In this case, it’s an early omen of solar storms that will gradually increase over the next few years.”
A sunspot is an area of highly organized magnetic activity on the surface of the sun. The new 11-year cycle, called Solar Cycle 24, is expected to build gradually, with the number of sunspots and solar storms reaching a maximum by 2011 or 2012, though devastating storms can occur at any time.
How many more satellites and sensitive systems, how many more devices are we relying on compared to, say, a decade ago? Should be interesting.
And maybe we’ll end up looking like this?
Oh, c’mon! Last sunspot peak there was exactly this same hand-wringing over sats and power grids, etc. Nothing much came of it.
As an amateur radio operator and sometime DX’er, I’m really looking forward to this next peak!
#1
“As an amateur radio operator and sometime DX’er, I’m really looking forward to this next peak!”
Ditto!
Though I’ve long respected ARRL-types, it’s a chuckle to see a couple show up who simply don’t know squat. But, then, ain’t too many amateurs ever had to foot the bill for satellite damage or downtime.
#1 and #2: Right on!
And the last peak was not a decade ago… it was in 2001 and 2002.
All our electronic gadgets have survived many many cycles in the past, and they will continue to do so. Besides, if you are that worried about communications blackouts for emergency purposes you need to get your ham ticket.
#3: we have sats up.
My Senior year in high school was the International Geophysical Year (IGY.) One of my teachers required a written “report” on some current event & I read, week after week, during study hall, Science News Digest regarding the IGY.
I still remembered the 11 year sunspot cycle & its effects on the Earth.
I just didn’t know that these changes, when reported in the 21st Century, could win a person the Nobel Prize.
I am an extra class ham. It is amazing that 1/2 watt of rf can travel hundreds of miles.
Of course if they drill a hole to earth’s core or set off too many nuclear weapons that could damage earth’s magnetosphere and then a solar flare could strip off our atmosphere.
Better pray Israel doesn’t nuke Iran!
@Sam
You may be an extra class ham but you don’t have a clue when it comes to geophysics. It is true that if Earth lost it’s magnetic field it would eventually lose its atmosphere (like Mars) but this is unlikely to happen. To lose Earth’s magnetic field the core would have to stop spinning and as far as I know the Earth’s core still has lots of angular momentum.
#1 Duh,
Last time this happened there were no significant problems because precautions were taken. Some satellites were temporarily shut down. We did lose 1 satellite.
As an FCC class 1 license holder I know all about amateur radio. It is called amateur for good reason.
Must be a group of subversives took over the ARRL – because they’re publishing the same info:
http://tinyurl.com/yoceqm
Did anyone else read the 2006 New Scientist article about the total loss of GPS service during solar max?
“When solar activity peaks in 2011 and 2012, it could cause widespread disruption to aircraft navigation and emergency location systems that rely heavily on satellite navigation data.”
TinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/yqcqzg
Which is why I am definitely not flying anywhere during the next solar storm season.
Just me or does an awful lot of predictions, i.e. bad stuff will happen and will continue to happen until 2012, seem to be popping up everywhere?
End of the age?
@framitz: “As an FCC class 1 license holder I know all about amateur radio. It is called amateur for good reason.”
I don’t think you do. If you did, you would know that amateur has nothing to do with being unprofessional. It has everything to do with not accepting any compensation, be it monetary or otherwise, nor operating our stations in any manner that generates a profit for anyone.
Trust me, sir, we are anything but your definition of “amateur”.
The solar wind will push our magnetosphere back and allow more cosmic radiation which will cause global cooling.
ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Interestingly though, there seems to be a relationship between sunspot activity and the birth of child geniuses.
#3: I make one statement about one small item of history, and you conclude that I don’t know squat? Gee, tough crowd here.
I know a good deal about many things. I admit I didn’t realize (as #9 says) the losses were minimized by taking precautions, and there was one satellite lost last time (which wasn’t a decade ago, but 5-6 years ago, as #4 points out).
So my conclusion is: there was some hand-wringing last time, some precautions were taken, and losses were minimized as a result. Is there any reason to believe it will be different this time? In any case, nothing like the predicted cataclysm actually happened, and so I still call BS on the recycling of this “prediction.”
BTW: we’ve known for decades about the solar cycle. Why are we shooting up sats that are not hardened against the radiation? I know they are hardened (I worked for a time for an aerospace company), but #9: is it too economically prohibitive to put in adequate hardening in the electronics and/or adequate shielding? Considering the millions spent designing, building and launching these birds, it’s hard to believe that the loss of one is considered an acceptable risk to save the cost of better shielding. I am willing to have my ignorance instructed on these points, provided you don’t conclude I’m a “dumb amateur” who knows nothing.
To quote some of comments related to the 11/2003 extreme Solar flare:
“Solar scientists have confirmed that Tuesday’s explosion on the Sun was, by far, the biggest flare ever recorded, capping an energetic solar period.”
” Tuesday’s flare went off the scale; at the time researchers said it was “well above X20″. A precise description was difficult because some monitoring satellites were blinded by the scale of the event.”
Previous record have been made in 2001…
And don’t expect churchgoers of the Revren’ Al to change their belief when something even bigger hits us during this cycle.
I’m looking forward to the Northern Lights. Best free light show in town.
#18 you beat me to it. I remember that solar flare event of 2003, when I looked out the window and saw the landscape glowing green…if I hadn’t heard about the flares beforehand I probably would’ve thought the saucers were finally landing.
Okay, so we lose some vulnerable tech (hopefully such a thing will cause better precautions to be implemented in the future).
Electric fireworks.
The aurora is really something else. It’s prettiest with a clear sky, and that means down around -40F or lower. You can hear the static electricity crackling in the muskeg under your feet in time with the waves of light, hundreds of miles tall.
Awsome.
holy crap thats a huge sunsopot!@!!