Borrowing wholesale from Spaceweather.com:
EXTREME GEOMAGNETIC STORM--NOW! The biggest geomagnetic storm in almost 20 years is underway now. It has reached category G5--an extreme event. Sky watchers with dark skies may be able to see and photograph auroras even at low latitudes. Get away from city lights and look at the sky! Aurora alerts: SMS Text
CME STRIKE SPARKS WIDESPREAD AURORAS: The first of six CMEs hurled toward Earth by giant sunspot AR3664 hit our planet's magnetic field today. The impact on May 10th at 1645 UT jolted magnetometers around the world and sparked a geomagnetic storm, which is now extreme. More CMEs are following close behind and their arrival could extend the storm into the weekend. Sign up for Space Weather Alerts to receive instant text messages when the CMEs arrive.
If you're anywhere in the US north of the Gulf of Mexico, it's worth trying to get to a dark location a couple of hours after sunset to see if you can see auroras. They'll be pushing very far south. How far? In most cases, the K-index has to get to 9 or higher to see them as far south as the Carolinas to Arkansas or so.
HOWEVER, there's more to it. The first is that the value you see on charts like this are 3 hour averages. Geomagnetic storms also have gusts and peaks that can give shorter term visibility farther south. Next is the direction of Earth's magnetic field, denoted by Bz. South pointing geomagnetic fields produce auroras farther south, into the gulf coast, Texas and even Florida. This site has a plot of Bz, toward the top right of the page, the second row under a place for a video that's always there. (Bz is currently staying pointing south).
This was the first hit of several CMEs that are coming and there are
predictions later impacts will become the so-called cannibal CMEs, in which
later, faster Coronal Mass Ejections catch up with and merge with earlier
CMEs, giving them a bigger, higher impact. In this view you can see the
monster-sized sunspot group 3664. It's the one that has thrown the group of
CMEs in the Earth's direction.
Image from Spaceweather.com
As a sidenote, a ham radio group I read regularly had a plot from the same place that had 3664 next to what I think is Carrington's drawing of the spots that gave the famous, all-time world record CME named after him. The implication is that since the group is the same size, the CME could be as bad as the Carrington event. The size of the group is actually relatively low importance in this; what's more important is the magnetic configuration. For example, the caption to that sun picture says, "Giant sunspot AR3664 has a 'beta-gamma-delta' magnetic field that harbors energy for X-class solar flares." I've ranted before about how tired I am of continuous predictions that we're going to have another Carrington event. Something that has happened once in all of human history of observing the sky is suddenly supposed to happen routinely according to these folks. I know "doom sells" but it's kind of ridiculous out there.
Here's hoping we can see it here in SLC?
ReplyDeleteCurrently overcast, dang it!
By the current forecast, I'd think you'll see it. The darker the skies the better, like up in hills outside SLC. Kp went up to 9 in the last update. Looking good.
Deletehttps://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/aurora-30-minute-forecast
Wait.. You get clouds in SLC? ;-) Only been there once for a few days back in '10. I think.
Posting from the future. It was a G5, Florida, Texas, and Puerto Rico saw it. The only way you wouldn't see it is clouds or if you were Ray Charles. ;)
DeleteIn that future, did those entire states see it, or just small parts? Everything I can read tells me the nearest spot in Florida that saw auroras was about 550 miles NW of me. Thanks to commenter Malatrope for mailing this site to me.
DeleteHow do we get that exact future, future man? Can you go back and change the timeline so we all get to see auroras?
Man...I wish I had the power to make it happen again. I'm up in Washington. It was spectacular. And I have friends in Oklahoma and they said it was pretty hard to miss.
DeleteI mean...you probably know better than I do with these things that your mileage may vary. But dang...I've been waiting for a show like this since I was a kid. The last big one was October 2003, but as is typical for Washington State...it was overcast. This is my first view of the northern lights other than seeing them from a plane in the distance or in a YouTube video. It was worth waiting 40 years to see it.
I've been telling myself for at least 10 years, maybe 20, to do a trip to Iceland in the spring to try to see the auroras. To see pictures out of Florida from Friday night and not seeing the display myself is somewhat depressing.
DeleteWeird. I have a friend in Florida, one in Oklahoma, and several in Texas who all saw it. I seem to recall one of the Nordic countries had some winter event where they would build a "winter hotel" entirely out of ice and you could stay in it. That sounds about perfect.
DeleteGreat discussion about how the magnetic polarity affects the magnitude of the event. Would you mind if I reference you in a Skype meeting with my friends on the Iowa?
ReplyDeleteHad the radio on all day listening on 10M~20M. Had some great QSO's on 17M, and talked to my buddy back in SoCal for an hour. 20 folded up about 1800 local, so I went down to 40. Very low band noise (S0!?!) and all the signals were fluttery like you hear on VHF during a large active Aurora. 40 just went casters-up at 2215 local. and as I type this at 2230 local, 75 and 160 are dead, too.
"Something that has happened once in all of human history of observing the sky is suddenly supposed to happen routinely according to these folks" - it's not the only one. it's just the largest event that's happened since we had technology which would be impacted by solar storms. There are tons of events, likely solar in nature, which can be found in isotope anomalies within the biosphere and ice cores.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_solar_storms
I've done posts on that topic before, (for example) so I'm aware of it. It's a fine line between saying it's the only one that has been observed directly instead of being deduced by things like Carbon 14 concentrations or some other indirect means.
DeleteMy wording could have been better, but it doesn't change things much to say it has happened a few times in the planet's history when my point is that they aren't happening all the time. This is a weaker than average solar cycle, and we still get reports all the time that another Carrington Event is coming. It doesn't make sense to me.
The strongest flare observed in the space age occurred back in November of 2003. It could have damaged an entire continent's power grid but didn't because it wasn't pointed at Earth. You don't need simply a massive flare, it has to be pointed at Earth. Remember, the strongest solar cycle on record was cycle 19 back in the late '50s, before monitoring satellites existed, but the sun was under constant observation by optical telescopes. A flare big enough to damage Earth wasn't recorded then, and this cycle is nowhere near that strong.
The probability of independent events like that of a big flare happening and it being positioned to hit us are multiplied. It seems nobody knows what the probability of such an event is. Do some rough numbers. We can't really say the odds of a flare the size of Carrington's are 1 in 165 years of observation, or 2 in 1085 years, to use that big flare calculated to have been in 774 AD. Then it has to be positioned for the CME to get us. Is that 5 degrees longitude? That gives it a (2/1085) * (5/360) = 12.8*10^-6 chance of one happening in any given year.
The two events you use here did hit earth, so the probability already includes both that of the flare and its direction, no?
DeleteDiffer
Yes. Two events separated by 1085 years (1859 and 774) had the magnitude and direction. I think there's no reason to think that there's a cycle going on, so there's no periodicity to it. Picking they years of Carrington's flare and the "red crucifix in the sky" that researchers thought was another CME of similar strength kind of implies a periodicity.
DeleteMight a been a string event summer before last. Something arced out the manual switches and mechanical relay contacts in my stand aline off grid solar system. Had to replace the relay and one switch they arced out so bad. The voltage controller required reprogramming too. Only thing that made sense is a solar flare. There wasn't a lightning strike that i was aware of prior to the system damage, never know, could have slept thru that. The only thing makes any sense is the solar panels acted as an antenna, collected a surge, which arced out the contacts and scrambled the battery controller. Would the battery act as a big sump sucking up the extra energy?
ReplyDeleteThe system is 12vdc, so its made with all high amp constant duty components, which provides built in extra amp capacity beyond what the panels and wind turbine are capable of producing. But something causing severe arcing across mechanical contacts was enough to weld one of the mechanical contact actuated contact faces together. Anyone have an idea on that? It sure stumped me. Systems been operational for 11 years in its present form without issue, till this hapoened.
By what mechanism can a solar flare damage a solar power system? Were there any flares documented then? I gather you're not grid-tied which means it wasn't conducted in over powerlines and I don't think such a small system could do that.
DeleteNot sure about flares at that precise time frame, but my wife keeps up with that space weather, she mentioned there was heavy solar activity couple days prior. Actually my wife noticed the system was doing weird things. The mechanical relay the voltage controller runs was making buzzing noises, along with the digital voltage meter showing erratic spikes, i was out and didn't get to see it happen, the voltage controller screen ended up freezing at 13.2 vdc reading on no matter what voltage flowed thru it. Replaced the screen, and did a control reset. Still works okeedokee. Have back-ups if everything JIC. The 12vdc to 120vac inverters still work fine. Its only the input side which is pure dc from the panels, and wild bridge rectified 3 phase into 12vdc, got 2 1000amp bridge rectifiers on big heat sinks, they rectify a double PMA on single shaft wind turbine.
DeleteIt seems where high current went thru choke points before the battery where only effected components, switch contacts and the silver faced contacts on a 440 amp dc solenoid, which either feeds the battery, and does double duty as a dump load diverter to a domestic hot water supply pre-heat tank, that feeds a tankless hot water system, only digital component is the voltage controller, its supposedly hvy duty with polarity protection, it see's no load, only a sensor wire off the battery posts feeds that.
Its a mystery to me, other than something of high amps had to be the cause of arcing out 400+ amp continuous duty mechanical activated contacts.
Its inexplicable to me. Your like the Wizard to me electronic wise, why I asked you if any of it made sense. Oh and yes, the system is totally air-gapped from the standard public utility mains system. The inverters supply totally isolated ac wall plugs, feeding a variety of products, mostly LED lighting, a computer, sat modem, fridge and such. None of that seemed effected. To change to public mains requires manually unplugging from off grid to on grid.
Only sources of such a surge come to my mind, my wife's also is either a lightning strike, which we are 99% certain did not happen, as my wife visually witnessed at least part of what happened on a clear blue sky day, or a solar flare. Or, i have to mention it, somebody, used directed energy which hit our solar panels and wind turbine? Not beyond the realm of possibles these days, we are not allowed to have nice things, am I wearing my tin foil hat here, nope don't think so?
Anyways thanks appreciate you!
Sorry, but I'm too mechanistic about electrical things. You seem to be saying the only possibility is a solar flare, in the summer of '22. I assume you really mean a Coronal Mass Ejection because flares themselves don't do much.
DeleteWe can call the start of cycle 25 to be January of 2020 (these things don't really happen in one day) for convenience instead of the actual mid-December date. That means the summer of '22 was 2-1/2 years or 30-33 months after the start of 25. One day over the whole summer had a K index that might qualify as a geomagnetic storm (around K=6 to 7) and not one X-class flare in that month or a couple of months either side of it.
I can't prove it wasn't a CME but the sun was quite a bit less active then than now. Don't forget electronic components fail all by themselves for no apparent reason, too.
Anonymous, being somewhat schooled in high-EMP environments (think: nuclear yield Real Close), grounding is a must. Now, if nothing else even close to your setup got fried, I would say it's not EMP because EMP is like Honey Badger and it doesn't care. It'll reach out and try to fry everything in sight. You for sure got a surge in your system, cause unknown.
DeleteFirst thing it'd do, however, is ground and bond EVERYthing you possibly can to eliminate eddy currents caused by not grounding when a magnetic, static, or plasma surge visits you.
And don't use paltry wire either - straps that are good for a few thousand amps, wire that's 6GA or better - whatever you can afford.
Hmmm! looks like a case of recurrent acne
ReplyDeleteQuestion: is this all internal or is the sun gettng hit by space debris, pieces of comet?
I'll go with essentially 100% chance of it being entirely internal processes. We're pretty much at the peak of the solar cycle and this is the kind of thing that happens. The sun also eats the pieces of ice (comets) that get too close to it all the time and I've never heard of this happening.
DeleteLocal weatherman showed the Northern Lights over Charlotte Motor Speedway last night. I wish I'd known about it. It would have been worth getting up at 2AM.
ReplyDeleteK was highest for my location at 0709Z. Just over 9. Sky clear but too many lights and I didn't feel like driving to possibly view a potential maybe.
ReplyDelete0009 local time.
DeleteI know people who saw it in Ohio and West Virginia, but here in Nevada the skies were clear and I saw nothing.
ReplyDeleteJ
Saw it here in Idaho, and have family who saw it in Utah (a ways south of SLC).
ReplyDelete