By Dr. Tony Phillips
99 years ago this week, people around the world woke up to some unusual headlines.
“Telegraph Service Prostrated, Comet Not to Blame” — declared the Los Angeles Times on May 15, 1921. “Electrical Disturbance is ‘Worst Ever Known’” — reported the Chicago Daily Tribune. “Sunspot credited with Rail Tie-up” — deadpanned the New York Times.
They didn’t know it at the time, but the newspapers were covering the biggest solar storm of the 20th Century. Nothing quite like it has happened since.
It began on May 12, 1921 when giant sunspot AR1842, crossing the sun during the declining phase of Solar Cycle 15, began to flare. One explosion after another hurled coronal mass ejections (CMEs) directly toward Earth. For the next 3 days, CMEs rocked Earth’s magnetic field. Scientists around the world were surprised when their magnetometers suddenly went offscale, pens in strip chart recorders pegged uselessly to the top of the paper.
Then the fires began. Around 02:00 GMT on May 15th, a telegraph exchange in Sweden burst into flames. About an hour later, the same thing happened across the Atlantic in the village of Brewster, New York. Flames engulfed the switch-board at the Brewster station of the Central New England Railroad and quickly spread to destroy the whole building. That fire, along with another one about the same time in a railroad control tower near New York City’s Grand Central Station, is why the event is sometimes referred to as the “New York Railroad Superstorm.”
What caused the fires? Electrical currents induced by geomagnetic activity surged through telephone and telegraph lines, heating them to the point of combustion. Strong currents disrupted telegraph systems in Australia, Brazil, Denmark, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the UK and USA. The Ottawa Journal reported that many long-distance telephone lines in New Brunswick were burned out by the storm. On some telegraph lines in the USA voltages spiked as high as 1000 V.
Above: Sunspot AR1842 on May 13, 1921. [more]
During the storm’s peak on May 15th, southern cities like Los Angeles and Atlanta felt like Fairbanks, with Northern Lights dancing overhead while telegraph lines crackled with geomagnetic currents. Auroras were seen in the USA as far south as Texas while, in the Pacific, red auroras were sighted from Samoa and Tonga and ships at sea crossing the equator.
What would happen if such a storm occurred today?
Researchers have long grappled with that question–most recently in a pair of in-depth papers published in the journal Space Weather: “The Great Storm of May 1921: An Exemplar of a Dangerous Space Weather Event” by Mike Hapgood (Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK) and “Intensity and Impact of the New York Railroad Superstorm of May 1921” by Jeffrey Love (US Geological Survey) and colleagues.
The summary, above, is largely a result of Hapgood’s work. He painstakingly searched historical records including scientific journals, newspaper clippings, and other reports to create a moment-by-moment timeline of the storm. Such timelines are invaluable to emergency planners, who can use them to prepare for future storms.
Above: Aurora sightings in May 1921. The leftmost red circle marks Apia, Samoa.
Jeffrey Love and colleagues also looked into the past and–jackpot!–they found some old magnetic chart recordings that did not go offscale when the May 1921 CMEs hit. Using the data, they calculated “Dst” (disturbance storm time index), a measure of geomagnetic activity favored by many space weather researchers.
“The storm attained an estimated maximum −Dst on 15 May of 907 ± 132 nT, an intensity comparable to that of the Carrington Event of 1859,” they wrote in their paper.
This dry-sounding result upends conventional wisdom. Students of space weather have long been taught that the Carrington Event (-Dst = 900 nT) was the strongest solar storm in recorded history. Now we know that the May 1921 storm was about equally intense.
If the May 1921 storm hit today, “I’d expect it to lead to most, if not all, of the impacts outlined in the 2013 Royal Academy of Engineering report led by Paul Cannon,” says Hapgood. “This could include regional power outages, profound changes to satellite orbits, and loss of radio-based technologies such as GPS. The disruption of GPS could significantly impact logistics and emergency services.”
It’s something to think about on the 99th anniversary of a 100-year storm….
An expanded and sharable version of this story is available here.
Addendum by Anthony:
In a story by the New York Post titled: “The sun has entered a ‘lockdown’ period, which could cause freezing weather, famine” Dr. Phillips says:
Experts believe we are about to enter the deepest period of sunshine “recession” ever recorded as sunspots have virtually disappeared.
Astronomer Dr. Tony Phillips said:
“Solar Minimum is underway and it’s a deep one.”
“Sunspot counts suggest it is one of the deepest of the past century. The sun’s magnetic field has become weak, allowing extra cosmic rays into the solar system.”
“Excess cosmic rays pose a health hazard to astronauts and polar air travelers, affect the electro-chemistry of Earth’s upper atmosphere and may help trigger lightning.”
I’d like to point out the headline “The sun has entered a ‘lockdown’ period, which could cause freezing weather, famine“
That headline is an NY Post extrapolation of low sunspot numbers. The scientist, Phillips, didn’t say that.
The cold Maunder Minimum, where this claim originates, was also accompanied by huge amounts of high altitude aerosols from the eruption of Mt. Tambora in 1815. It is likely the cause of the “year without a summer” not the lack of sunspots.
We must be true to the science, even if it does not support the claims we
think are true. However, the [increased] number of cosmic rays will be a good test of Svensmark’s theory that the sun’s magnetic field modulates galactic cosmic rays, and more cosmic rays create more atmospheric clod seeds in Earths atmosphere, thus increasing cloud cover and cooling the planet.
Of course with adjustments de jour being the current mission of climate scientists that are the gatekeepers of the surface data, we may never know for sure.
Well, I have experience of electrical problems. McGill bought these phones that we used to connect to the mainframe and all other connections. In my building, the phones kept burning out. And I kept losing hard disks on those old PC’s. The honcho said they would not continue to replace them. I said my contract included such services and forced that issue. However, I got a techy friend to monitor the power. There were over 400V very short spikes on the line. It was hypothesised that they were from electrocautery in the hospital on whose circut we were. To protect computer equipment, I had to spend good grant money on heavy duty surge suppressors.
Now with solid state stuff controlling everything from the stove to the washing machine, I suspect that a Carrington sort of storm would destroy most of the domestic equipment across the world. Is this a rational fear?
Maybe of more interest would be to watch the windmills and solar panels that have thickly littered the countryside of all those Western nations when a solar storm is in progress.
Virtual signallers firework display of extreme beauty! 🙂
P.S. I wounder what would happen to all those connected batteries when under such stress.
This Sun thingy seems damned dangerous to me. Can’t we put a Faraday cage or some sort of shielding around it?
RoHa
Would you settle for a Dyson Sphere?
Why couldn’t you just unplug or turn everything off in your home to save your electrical stuff?
From what I’ve read, unplugging (isolation of devices) would be safe for the device but just ‘turn everything off in your home’ would probably not be a very good strategy. With ‘turn everything off in your home’ approach your equipment is connected to the neutral return wiring and the domestic ground system – both of which can have very large current traveling through them during a CME induced Geomagnetic disturbances (GMDs) (often called geomagnetic storms, and geomagnetically induced currents (GICs)).
If the CME is large enough induction from atmospheric effects and ground currents could easily wreck house wiring with arcing at switches and breakers, burned wiring, and everything still connected to it would be similarly affected .
The BIG problem is trying to predict what level and frequency of induced current will impact all of your home’s wiring at your location.
The site https://electricenergyonline.com/energy/magazine/966/article/Geomagnetic-Storms-and-Geomagnetically-Induced-Currents.htm says much on the subject.
The summary …
Also of note is the Solar Shield project outlined at https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/26oct_solarshield/ but take-up on the project is(was?) poor …
Governments are absolutely awful and insufferable at effectively dealing with crises as the WUhan flu global economic shutdown clearly shows—the “cure” is much worse than the disease..
Regarding the US government’s preventative measures to prepare for the next inevitable Carrington Event, it would “only” cost US taxpayers $3.8 billion (just 8 hours of federal hourly spending) to harden the electrical grid sufficiently to quickly recover from EMP event, but, of course, the government does nothing:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13705-019-0199-y
The US government would rather suffer $10’s of trillions in economic loses, and perhaps millions(?) of lives rather than spending $3.8 billion to harden the grid…
“Never let a good crisis go to waste”…
Governments are completely insane…
SAMURAI
No, the problem is that the elected politicians are irrational — just like the rest of us.
These CME and x-class flares come almost exclusively (at better than 95%) from what are termed beta-gamma-delta (bgd) characterized sunspot active regions. bgd spots have a large compact area of wrapped-around, mixed polarity regions. This twisting of opposite polarity regions are begging… just waiting for reconnection events to happen which then release huge bursts of unrestrained magnetic energy into the coronasphere, which results in the CME and xray burst.
The real question is “What earlier instabilities causes this twisting of magnetic flux lines deep in the convective zone (CZ)?” How did these magnetic flux tubes evolve, so that when they reached the solar surface on their magnetic buoyant journey upwards thru the CZ did they begin to differentially rise and then under alpha effect begin to twist?
Crucially, What disturbance caused the initial buoyancy disturbance in the thin magnetic tubes to begin to twist?
MHD simulations can reasonably and faithfully model the twisted polarity fields we actually observe in bgd regions. The modelers do this by artificially inducing in the rising flux tube a “kinking” set of buoyancy kicks in the rising flux. But that begs the question, “What then would actually cause that to happen in the Real Sun, and not artificially induced in a computer model?”
My strong Gravitational Wave hypothesis says it is the passage of strong GW that initiates a small harmonic standing points point several hundred kilometers apart in a deep CZ, horizontally aligned thin flux tube (near the tachocline) that then evolves as it rises to the alpha-twisting instability that ultimately results (14-17 days later) in a bgd active region at the photosphere (the AR and the flares and maybe CMEs). This is the delayed phase response because GW arrival angle polarization of space stretching and contracting would only drive strain in deeper horizontal tubes. Meanwhile, if the sun was already in a magnetically active state, then near surface magnetic structures in the limb are horizontally oriented and thuis subject to GW strain inducing distortions. These near solar limb magnetic structures (realtive to the GW arrival angle) are oriented vertically and would respond to very strong GW in an early phase of increasesd polarity twisting and thus flaring (days 1-8 after GW passage).
The AR’s (and X-class flares and CME) of early September 2017 correspond to the arrival of several documented strong GW events in mid August 2017. Similarly in the initial GW wave detection in 2015 by the LIGO consortium and subsequent AR-solar flares.
Strong GW events could this be the driver events that initiate the deep magnetic flux tube twisting that rise and subsequently become bgd active regions, but it also requires the sun to be in a magnetically active phase of its solar cycle to be sensitive to these GW passages.
Additionally, this hypothesis posits that other stars may behave similarly to GW passage. Thus well-known flare stars like Proxima Centuri (4.24 ly, our nearest neighbor) are also reacting to GWs passing thoguh their CZ and initiating magnetic disturbances that result in flaring.
GW170817, the famous first Binary Neutron Star inspiral GW detected by LIGO, passed though the sun on 17 Aug 2017, and then solar AR’s arose 14-17 days. Those bgd active regions then drove the geomagnetic storms (from flares and CMEs) from 2-10 September 2017.
That August 2017 BNS GW passed though Proxima Centauri about 18 months before it arrived into our solar system, about mid March 2016 (15 March 2016). If the GW170817 did disturb PC’s magnetic CZ structures, then the 4.244 Ly light travel time would put the prediction of observable flares to be 8 June 2020, adding in about 3-8 days flux tube rise time in the smaller Red Dwarf of PC, then predicts flaring starting on PC as observed from Earth to begin just after 8 June 2020 and continuing to (or beginning 11-16 June 2020 (factoring in the light year distance uncertainties between PC and Earth).
If the strong GW-AR hypothesis is correct, then the result could be epic super-flaring from Proxima Centauri by Southern Hemisphere astronomers by mid-June (next month).
My understanding of GWs is that their only effect is inertial. Their passage creates a gravitational gradient, essentially a tidal force, that induces displacements (“strain”) within matter. AFAIK GWs do not interact directly with EM fields, but only the masses which carry these fields.
So how do these GW ‘tides’ differ from those induced by the planets rotating around the Sun? Does your theory distinguish the different origin of GW forces?
Nope. GWs have no inertial effects. An accelerometer would measure no change (in a measured acceleration force) to one’s passing.
GWs passage (based on Einstein’s predicted polarization) shorten and lengthen the space path length between the laser mirrors and the test masses suspended at the ends of each arm that bounce the laser beam back and forth. That is without any effects of inertial acceleration.
“GWs have no inertial effects”
GW is all about inertia. Mass is the physical analog of electric charge, in the same sense that GW radiation (GWR) is analogous to electromagnetic radiation (EMR).
EMR is generated when electric charges are accelerated, which transports energy which can be recovered by the receiver when charges in the antenna are moved creating a current, which in turn can generate heat energy due to electrical resistance in the receiver circuits.
Analogously, GWR is generated when masses are accelerated, which transports energy which can be recovered by a GW detector (“receiver”) when mass “charges” in the receiver are moved. This also can generate heat energy due to friction, like “sticky beads” sliding on a rod.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sticky_bead_argument
But EMR effects are very, very strong and comprise most of the events that we can observe in the Universe. GWR effects are very, very weak (unless you are standing on a huge mass) so GWs are barely observable.
So I am still wondering what kind of GWs do you suppose will have an effect on solar activity? They will less effect, I think, than planetary tidal effects, which are somewhat controversial.
You simply do not have a theoretical grasp on GWs, their GR-predicted (and now observed) polarization. I can’t help you if you want to insist on applying classical physics ideas to general relativity.
The mirrored test masses at the ends of the 4 km LIGO arms do not “feel” an acceleration when the GW passes through them. The path length (space contrction and elongtion) changes though as the oscillating GW from the BBH/BNS inspiral waveform moves through them. This moves the laser beam aligned phases from the orthogonal arms in and out of phase to create the interference patten that the real-time analysis algorithm’s deconvolve to determine frequency content and amplitudes. In that regard it is just a classic Michelson Interferometer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson_interferometer#Gravitational_wave_detection
“You simply do not have a theoretical grasp on GWs, their GR-predicted (and now observed) polarization. I can’t help you if you want to insist on applying classical physics ideas to general relativity.”
Actually, I am wondering if _you_ understand the fundamentals of GW detection? [But I do read your comments all the time and know that you are very competent and knowledgeable. So we are not communicating, somehow. 😐
How could classical physics even apply here? The concept of ‘gravity as waves’ does not exist there.
And how can you say GWs have no inertial effects? Inertia (“mass”) is absolutely crucial for generation and detection of GWs. (Analogous to ‘charge’ for EMR).
“The mirrored test masses at the ends of the 4 km LIGO arms do not “feel” an acceleration when the GW passes through them.”
Einstein’s Principle of Equivalence, stating that gravity forces cannot be distinguished from acceleration forces does not really apply here because the GWs generate _gradient_ fields which can be distinguished (“detected”).
Also, if gravitational radiation is real, it must transport energy. If GWs apply measurable strain on the LIGO mirrors, then the mirrors “felt” that strain, in the sense that energy was transferred to those objects, as Feymann suggested in 1957 with his “sticky beads” argument.
There was a recent LIGO paper which also shows that the LIGO mirrors must absorb infinitesimal but real energy from the GWs (unless “ideal” approximations are assumed).
https://dcc.ligo.org/public/0099/P1200180/002/Proceed-24.pdf
Also, I still would like you to explain the nature of GWs which can have an effect on solar activity, assuming that GWs do not directly interact with electromagnetism, and that any transfer of energy or momentum would be infinitesimal. (Hard enough to prove that Jupiter or Saturn have any effect on solar activity gravitationally)
Maybe I do not understand what “strong GW” is.
@me
“… assuming that GWs do not directly interact with electromagnetism, and that any transfer of energy or momentum would be infinitesimal. …”
Answering my own question, I did a little research on this and found that Einstein’s field equations for GR include a formulation for Maxwell’s EMR equations, involving a separate stress-momentum tensor for EMR, describing gravitational interaction with EMR. But it is a traceless tensor, so no stretching or compression, just cross-dimensional terms, which provides a means to compute curved ‘geodesics’ for light beams near massive objects (slightly abusing the term ‘geodesic’ to denote the shortest path between points in curved spacetime)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell%27s_equations_in_curved_spacetime
But the strain felt by LIGO detectors from collisions of distant black-holes, and such, is on the order of 10-21, equivalent to a displacement smaller than an atom. I still do not see how that can have any observable effect on solar activity.
Scandalously off topic, but if you enjoy sci-fi about people-popping may I suggest Richard Elliott’s 1984 novel The Sword Of Allah with a plot where perp designs a superweapon to trigger a brief solar flare and make people pop like Marshmallow Peeps in a microwave oven. The writing is pedestrian but I enjoyed its perky people popping premise.
If you prefer your people to pop from tidal forces — David Brin’s 1990 novel Earth is the best read. It is a veritable people-popalooza! as villains use singularities loosed from the lab to focus gravity like light with people popping precision.
Updating my post of 10May2020:
Planting was ~one month across the Great Plains of North America for the past two years 2018 and 2019. In 2018 the growing season was warm and the crop recovered, but in 2019 there was a huge crop failure across the Great Plains; however the harvest was good in the USA East and South. In 2019 fully 30% of the huge USA corn crop was never planted because of wet ground. Much of the grain crop across the Great Plains was not harvested because of early cold and snow in the Fall. Read the paper by Joe D’Aleo and me.
THE REAL CLIMATE CRISIS IS NOT GLOBAL WARMING, IT IS COOLING, AND IT MAY HAVE ALREADY STARTED
By Allan M.R. MacRae and Joseph D’Aleo, October 27, 2019. Published on wattsup.
Hope we have a good grain crop this year, but don’t bet on it. Here is why:
The Nino 34 SST Anomaly has crashed from almost +0.7 on April 18th down to below MINUS 0.2 today (May 16th). a decline of ~0.9C. in one month (H/T Walter Dnes).
5. UAH LT Global Temperatures can be predicted ~4 months in the future with just two parameters:
UAHLT (+4 months) = 0.2*Nino34Anomaly + 0.15 – 5*SatoGlobalAerosolOpticalDepth (Figs. 5a and 5b)
CO2, GLOBAL WARMING, CLIMATE AND ENERGY
by Allan M.R. MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng., June 15, 2019. Published on wattsup c/w spreadsheet of all data and calculations.
Four months from this rapid cooling of Nino34 SST’s is mid-August to mid-September 2020 – harvest time.
No volcanoes needed – depending on future Nino34 SST’s, cooling may already be locked in.
___________________________________________________
Allan-san:
Yep. The coming La Niña will very likely be the strongest since 2010, and will finally offset the lingering warming effects of the 2015~16 Super El Niño event.
BTW, there is a gigantic 4.5 million KM^2 blob of very cold Gulf Stream water stretching east from New York that will also have a substantial global cooling effect.
My guess is it’s a precursor to the start of the 30-year AMO cool cycle— I’ve never seen anything like this.
Hi Samurai.
SST Anomaly – I’ve been watching the Nino34 area for a while – strong -0.9C cooling for the past month.
SST’s – Re your comment, I see the cold channel approx at the location of the Gulf Stream – new to me – thank you. I will inquire further and advise.
Thanks, Allan-san. I look forward to hearing what could possibly be causing such extreme cold anomalies in the North Atlantic.
There are sections of this North Atlantic Cold Blob where SST cold anomalies exceed -5.0C. It’s like an Atlantic Super La Niña event….
There is something very strange happening.
Hi Samurai,
First response is storms on the East Coast of the USA (~ off the Carolina’s) are stirring up the water – remember we are looking at SST’s – very shallow water temperatures.
Will advise if I get more info.
Samurai:
Second verse – same as the first:
“the result of finally getting some NW flow to mix up the SST.”
From two of the top meteorologists on this blue planet. 🙂
Allan-san:
I don’t think this cold Atlantic Blob is just limited to the surface, but rather is originating from cold and deep Atlantic water being pumped to the surface.
I’d love to see the Argo data of this 4.5 million KM^2 Atlantic cold blob.
Cheers!
You are correct Samurai – the colder deeper water is mixing with the warmer surface, cooling the SST.
The German PIK and their Climate Clowns are aware of a coming El Niño
Early warning: Physicists from Giessen, Potsdam and Tel Aviv forecast “El Niño” for 2020
😀
Told you so – 18 years ago.
The ability to predict is probably the best objective measure of scientific and technical competence. Note that every very-scary prediction of runaway global warming and climate chaos made by the climate alarmists (“warmists”) has failed to materialize. Nobody should believe them – about anything.*
Following are my/our three major statements made in 2002 – the first two statements are correct-to-date, for anyone who understands climate and energy. The warmists, with their “100% wrong predictive track record”, will dispute them. *See note above. 🙂
The third statement is looking more and more probable of occurring as predicted – but I’d rather be wrong about that one – I’m getting old and hate the cold.
Regards, Allan MacRae
__________________________________
OUR THREE MAJOR STATEMENTS MADE IN 2002
In 2002 co-authors Dr Sallie Baliunas, Astrophysicist, Harvard-Smithsonian, Dr Tim Patterson, Paleoclimatologist, Carleton, Ottawa and Allan MacRae wrote:
1. “Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
2. “The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
Allan MacRae published in the Calgary Herald on September 1, 2002, based on a conversation with Dr. Tim Patterson:
3. “If [as we believe] solar activity is the main driver of surface temperature rather than CO2, we should begin the next cooling period by 2020 to 2030.”
Allan MacRae modified his global cooling prediction in 2013:
3a. “I suggest global cooling starts by 2020 or sooner. Bundle up.”
For links to the above three statements, see: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/11/28/climate-claim-more-blockbuster-snowstorms-less-snow/#comment-2857912
In Europe in 1315, slap bang in the middle of the Wolf minimum, manorial and monastic records show that a panzootic killed a large number of sheep and cattle. This coincided with heavy precipitation across Europe from 1314-1317 leading to grain shortages and famine.
Ref: A cattle panzootic A cattle panzootic in early fourteenth-century Europe
by Timothy P. Newfield
The ‘telegraph cables’ of today are satellites. They would probably be wiped out by a Carrington event.
I can see that if an 1859 or 1921 type event occurred today we would lose communications and entertainment, but what happens to our houses? They are full of electrical wiring. Does the house shield them sufficiently to prevent their burning up with a massive electro-magnetic surge?
Chauncy
I live in the midwest and I have lost the garage door opener, modems, UPS, and other random electronic devices during electrical storms. All of our utilities are underground locally. From my experience I would guess that one can’t predict which appliances would fail, but one can be certain that there would be some losses.
When I was a young lad some fifty odd years ago,it was my misfortune to see what high voltage can do.
Working night shift I was asleep during daytime and awoken by a huge explosion every light fitting and power points were blown of the walls and ceilings in the entire house.
A tree had fallen on to the 20,000 V line and dropped it on to the 240v line, rolled out of bed to the floor thinking the house was under fire.
During the Cold War Electromagnetic Pulse was all about nukes designed for that purpose. and of course they work but you have to be directly under them and pretty close for your electronics to fry. … but lately there has been a “surge” of interest in the Carrington Events and its 1921 cousin. and to the great disappointment of those who ask I say it’s no big deal.
A lot has changed since 1859, 1921. In those decades our long-haul communication systems used straight runs of copper wire, perfect long wire antennas such as the telegraph wires along the railroads to gather the solar storm effects and present them at the telegraph office. Without those long wire runs what would they have observed? Nothing. During the Carrington Event there was a notable lack of other phenomena — such as, people experiencing shocks from railings or even discomfort from wearing metal jewelry — that would indicate the presence of the juice to fry stand-alone modern electronics.
Then since, comm systems turned to microwave towers and since the 1980s fiber, telephone copper runs have been retired between central office and neighborhood, cables with hundreds of copper pairs replaced with fiber to small remotes. What copper that remains is very short and pairs have more tight twists to them then the old Bell Telephone specs required (to reject common mode noise and better carry high speed digital signals like DSL). So, gone are the old ‘perfect’ long wire antennas.
The other point of vulnerability is the power grids. But they are specifically designed to withstand lightning surges and transformer failures. I do see disruption happening as a very few transformers that are on the edge of failure today would fail and arcs from them (not the Event itself) trip other circuits, perhaps starting a cascade that could disconnect the grid. But it could be reconnected and restarted after.
On 99 year anniversary of huge disruptive solar storm, we are about to enter the deepest period of solar “recession” ever recorded
Well…….. The sun operates on much longer timescales as us humans. 99 years is trivially short for it. 😉
Svensmark’s hypothetical impact is unlikely to be noticeable in large scale global cloud cover datasets. Where the impacts would likely be seen is in clouds in areas where CCN are the limiting factor on cloud formation, but where there are sulfate aerosols and abundant moisture. In those areas, we should see a measurable response that could be matched to changes in GCR, but how it is seen might be different depending on latitude and how energetic the particles are. From there, the cooling caused by the changes in cloud cover would take time to distribute widely enough to affect “global” temperature estimates, particularly if the clouds are forming over open ocean where the temperature changes are happening in water moreso than air. So it is unlikely that you would see a direct measurable temperature change that would be easily matched up to a measured increase in GCRs. The impact would be more likely to show up in cumulative data smoothed over a period of years and would likely still show some lag depending on where on the planet the cloud changes were taking place.
I posted a link on facebook to an article about solar activity leading to global cooling:
https://nypost.com/2020/05/14/the-sun-has-entered-a-lockdown-period-which-could-cause-freezing-weather-famine/?fbclid=IwAR0wevCekzf9ySSfLvKA7A-XBnzuXjzVkUsBIrWZsMZng-4qZXJHRyqpVBs
Facebook informed me it was :false information” and over-tagged it with a link to this:
https://climatefeedback.org/claimreview/low-solar-activity-has-little-effect-on-earths-climate-contrary-to-claim-in-the-sun/?fbclid=IwAR0MWWbJvMFxQRMXd5a3MOQnpHI0VcuKE1KxIyo5Gw4W56V483M5IbKelug
Based on the articles here, the science is unsettled in this area so it seems as if Facebook “fact Checkers” are censoring scientific debate that doesn’t support a particular narrative.
That will be an interesting backdrop when this solar minimum in 2020-21 repeats the cool summer of 2009’s solar minimum (see UAH global temp graph). Only this time around we will not have an El Nino to mask it and AMO temps will also be much lower this time past the long cycle peak. This will surprise even WUWT regulars and UAH experts.
Too bad we don’t have up-to-date solar data charts here at WUWT.
Maybe it’s a ‘green’ conspiracy: Move along…. nothing to see here…
No, nothing historic going on…nothing at all.