National power grids could overheat and air travel severely disrupted while electronic items, navigation devices and major satellites could stop working after the Sun reaches its maximum power in a few years.
Senior space agency scientists believe the Earth will be hit with unprecedented levels of magnetic energy from solar flares after the Sun wakes “from a deep slumber” sometime around 2013, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.
In a new warning, Nasa said the super storm would hit like “a bolt of lightning” and could cause catastrophic consequences for the world’s health, emergency services and national security unless precautions are taken.
Scientists believe it could damage everything from emergency services’ systems, hospital equipment, banking systems and air traffic control devices, through to “everyday” items such as home computers, iPods and Sat Navs.
Due to humans’ heavy reliance on electronic devices, which are sensitive to magnetic energy, the storm could leave a multi-billion pound damage bill and “potentially devastating” problems for governments.
“We know it is coming but we don’t know how bad it is going to be,” Dr Richard Fisher, the director of Nasa’s Heliophysics division, said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph.
“It will disrupt communication devices such as satellites and car navigations, air travel, the banking system, our computers, everything that is electronic. It will cause major problems for the world.
“Large areas will be without electricity power and to repair that damage will be hard as that takes time.”
vukcevic says:
June 22, 2010 at 11:16 am
“Which one of your many different formulae did he use?”
Quote it here, now. Not the link. The formula.
Leif Svalgaard says:
And as everyone can immediately, it is an extremely poor fit.
Do you have something better to show?
Of course you have not.
Just remember my numbers come from astronomy, yours are conjured to fit the job for time being.
The old Hathaway would be now much happier man, if his SC24 forecast was modified in July of 2007 to mach my formula, when he ploted it.
What a nuisance, an astrologer and purveyor of pseudoscience to beat top NASA professional.
Something you should bear in mind for next dozen years.
On this note I am moving on, no time waisting with you any longer.
Довиђења or as you might say God ved
vukcevic says:
June 22, 2010 at 12:07 pm
On this note I am moving on, no time waisting with you any longer.
I can understand your reluctance to tell us which formula to use considering your inconsistencies. But it is good that you move on [good riddance] so we can get back to science.
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 9:03 am
Nobody cares what the sunspot number is.
That’s a keeper.
So, we go with the laymans count then, since the ‘expert’ has abdicated the post.
tallbloke says:
June 22, 2010 at 1:57 pm
“Nobody cares what the sunspot number is.”
That’s a keeper.
So, we go with the laymans count then, since the ‘expert’ has abdicated the post.
Extend the layman’s count to 1600 and redo your correlations…
What we care about is ‘solar activity’. We try to tease a meaningful number out of old data. This is hard and requires great care and extensive knowledge, and is not yet fully accomplished [but I believe it can be done]. We do not need misinformation, like [from the layman’s page] “The NOAA method departing from the Wolfer method by not adjusting the raw count (NOAA do not multiply by 0.6). The SIDC using the Wolfer formula but still counting specks that would not be seen 200 years ago or indeed by NOAA today.” and similar.
@Spector says:
June 22, 2010 at 7:10 am
” based on reported geologic evidence there have been typically two such events per millennium”
How is that done?
Events that have put 100`s of volts in telegraph/telephone lines have occurred an average of every 16yrs since 1859, with four last century;
http://www.solarstorms.org/SRefStorms.html
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:04 am
Getting the fact right is not hard. It just takes a willingness to do so.
Agree, but you did not comment on why the SIDC counted regions on the 21,22 & 26th May and NOAA did not. There is something not adding up here.
Geoff Sharp says:
June 22, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Leif Svalgaard says:
Agree, but you did not comment on why the SIDC counted regions on the 21,22 & 26th May and NOAA did not. There is something not adding up here.
Now and then such differences can occur because the observations take place at different times [as I have explained repeatedly]. But on the specific dates you mention, the counts were as follows”
NOAA SIDC YYYMMDD
15 9 20100521
20 13 20100522
23 14 20100523
17 12 20100524
16 15 20100525
11 10 20100526
There is such a thing as scientific integrity, you know. And that entails getting the facts rights [which is easy].
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:04 am
Apologies, I meant to say 21,22 & 25th April 2010 (it was late last night).
You will need to check GONG images for the 25th. How did the SIDC come up with a unadjusted value of around 20?
Leif Svalgaard says:
Now and then such differences can occur because the observations take place at different times [as I have explained repeatedly].
And here are some examples of those:
NOAA SIDC YYYMMDD
0 0 20100306
0 7 20100307
0 7 20100308
0 0 20100309
12 0 20100310
Note that these were all specks of small spots.
Finally both institutions go back every 6 months or so for a final quality check and sometimes that leads to minor adjustments. This is as it should be. One should not automatically assume that ‘something doesn’t add up’ or some hanky-panky is going on. On rare occasions, major errors are detected, but those are almost all caught eventually and corrected. Science is a human endeavor and suffers from but also benefits from the human condition.
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 2:34 pm
Nobody cares what the sunspot number is.
tallbloke says:
June 22, 2010 at 1:57 pm
That’s a keeper.
So, we go with the laymans count then, since the ‘expert’ has abdicated the post.
Extend the layman’s count to 1600 and redo your correlations…
Follow your own advice and stop misleading the public.
What we care about is ‘solar activity’.
In that case you should create yourself a “Solar activity index” and quit butchering 400 year old historical sunspot records.
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 6:50 pm
Note that these were all specks of small spots.
Of course, that is where the problem is. You may have missed my earlier post correcting my dates (your comments are approved quicker than mine) but we have counts getting confused by 1 pixel specks that come and go for a few hours, wrong counting on the 25th during a small window, the 1 pixel speck lasting at least from 9.41 on the 221st to 9.42 on the 22nd on SOHO which should be picked up by NOAA given the 24 hour window. All this potential for error is adding to the SIDC count, this would not have happened in Wolf’s day. As you say he got it right, Wolfer’s .6K factor is to blame along with modern technology.
It does add up, my observations are correct and the system is broken during times of high speck ratio.
Leif, tallbloke:
You guys are starting to sound like a couple of my old aunts who moved in together in their 80’s after their husbands died. They then spent a decade or so squabbling with each other all day, and carping and bitching about each other to anyone who would listen. One day I inadvertently said something mildly critical of one of them, and the other one almost took my head off. The slightly older one eventually died in her sleep, and the other followed a month later. Just wondering…..
/dr.bill
Geoff Sharp says:
June 22, 2010 at 6:41 pm
Apologies, I meant to say 21,22 & 25th April 2010 (it was late last night).
You will need to check GONG images for the 25th. How did the SIDC come up with a unadjusted value of around 20?
Here are the counts:
NOAA SIDC YYYMMDD
0 0 20100420
0 7 20100421
0 7 20100422
0 0 20100423
0 0 20100424
0 12 20100425
0 0 20100426
But if you look at MWO on 24th April, you have ftp://howard.astro.ucla.edu/pub/obs/drawings/dr100424.jpg .
A clear spot, while both NOAA and SIDC have no spots. This is a clear example of the ‘timing’ effect. Some spots are so short-lived [hours] that it can be hit or miss. This is just the way it is. But there is no ‘bias’ or ‘error’ or ‘not adding up’ going on. This is not a ‘problem’ or a defect. Here are the counts by Belgian amateurs on those days:
http://www.vds-sonne.de/gem/res/reslist.php?rf=provrel/rp0410.lst
| 20. | 0.0 | 0
| 21. | 0.1 | 1
| 22. | 0.2 | 3
| 23. | 0.0 | 0
| 24. | 0.0 | 0
| 25. | 0.4 | 4
| 26. | 0.0 | 0
The first number is the day of April, the second the number of groups seen, the third the number of spots seen. These numbers are the averages of ~15 observers each day. So clearly several people saw spots on the 25th of April. Nothing untoward or strange going on.
And this is the point: There can be small differences at any time, as spots are born and die while we are observing them. They are moving targets, so expect variation.
tallbloke says:
June 22, 2010 at 9:11 pm
Follow your own advice and stop misleading the public.
We are working hard to educate the public and devise a dataset that they can have confidence in. This can hardly be labeled ‘misleading the public’. There are people out there [are you one? I asked before – got no answer] that do not want a correct index, as it may not fit their pet ideas. These are the people misleading the public.
In that case you should create yourself a “Solar activity index”
We are, in fact doing just that.
and quit butchering 400 year old historical sunspot records.
The 400 year old record is the ‘raw’ data for the reconstruction of a ‘true and real’ solar activity record. We are aided in this by the detailed descriptions and specific records left us by Wolf and his successors, supplemented by our modern understanding of the physics and actual development of spots.
The 400 year record is worthless unless properly calibrated, so this is a task of great urgency and importance [which is, fortunately, underway].
Geoff Sharp says:
June 22, 2010 at 6:41 pm
How did the SIDC come up with a unadjusted value of around 20?
The observations at Locarno helped:
http://www.specola.ch/drawings/2010/loc-d20100425.JPG
Three groups with 4 spots give SSN = 34.
The question is, why did NOAA miss it? The answer is the 8 hour time difference during which the groups just died.
dr.bill says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:22 pm
One day I inadvertently said something mildly critical of one of them, and the other one almost took my head off.
say something critical about tallbloke. I’ll not rip your head off for that.
re Leif Svalgaard: June 22, 2010 at 11:17 pm
☺ ☺
/dr.bill
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:38 pm
There are people out there [are you one? I asked before – got no answer] …
I’ve given the answer several times on this thread alone, but you are set in your ways, and tend to misread what others say to suit your own prejudice.
For example:
tallbloke says:
June 21, 2010 at 11:06 pm
Hi Leif, thanks for these latest posts. It seems possible to me that the Earth climate and/or geomagnetic response to varying solar magnetism is non-linear anyway, so I’m happy for the chips to fall where they may. I just want a consistent dataset.
tallbloke says:
June 22, 2010 at 11:55 pm
I just want a consistent dataset.
This is what we are working hard to give you. And you call that ‘misleading the public’.
By the way Leif, how are the ‘secular’ changes in the Earth’s magnetism adjusted for in the aa and Ap records?
dr.bill says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:22 pm
Leif, tallbloke:
You guys are starting to sound like a couple of my old aunts
Is that where you learned to shake your head in dismay? 😉
re tallbloke: June 23, 2010 at 12:10 am
Nah, they weren’t serious about it. ☺ ☺
/dr.bill
[maybe I’m in a grumpy mood, but I want to put a stop to all this flaming ~ ctm]
Leif Svalgaard says:
June 22, 2010 at 10:10 am
[snip]
Hathaway’s comment:
Estimates of the possible gravitational forcing by Jupiter have shown that the effects are many orders of magnitude smaller than the buoyancy forcing in the Sun’s convection zone. Electro-magnetic effects from Jupiter are virtually impossible due to the flow of the solar wind which carried that information outward, away from the Sun.
____________________________________
Leif, have your opinions changed from the above bold viewpoint of Hathaway?
Is it possible that the upcoming heliocentric conjunctions or Neptune, Uranus, and Jupiter, will trigger a strong flare on the 21st or 22nd of September 2010, that will cause some North American power grid outages via surges in ground currents through inductive effects of the increased solar fields induced into the geomagnetic homopolar generator effects?
I would expect this to be the most probable time and cause of occurrence, of magnetic solar storm activity to effect the earth in this regard.