NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) — a division of the National Weather Service — is monitoring the sun following a series of solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that began on May 8. Space weather forecasters have issued a Severe (G4) Geomagnetic Storm Watch for the evening of Friday, May 10. Additional solar eruptions could cause geomagnetic storm conditions to persist through the weekend.
A large sunspot cluster has produced several moderate to strong solar flares since Wednesday at 5:00 am ET. At least five flares were associated with CMEs that appear to be Earth-directed. SWPC forecasters will monitor NOAA and NASA’s space assets for the onset of a geomagnetic storm.
CMEs are explosions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun’s corona. They cause geomagnetic storms when they are directed at Earth. Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth’s surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations. SWPC has notified the operators of these systems so they can take protective action. Geomagnetic storms can also trigger spectacular displays of aurora on Earth. A severe geomagnetic storm includes the potential for aurora to be seen as far south as Alabama and Northern California.
ARE WE ABOUT TO EXPERIENCE A NEW CARRINGTON EVENT? No. AR3664 is indeed a ‘Carrington-class‘ sunspot, but the CMEs it hurled toward Earth over the past few days are not as potent as the monster CME of Sept. 1, 1859. NOAA says we might experience a severe geomagnetic storm when the CMEs arrive this weekend. If geomagnetic storms were hurricanes, ‘severe’ would be category 4. The Carrington Event was category 5 or greater. So this is no Carrington Event. Even so, category 4 is pretty intense–if it happens. Stay tuned for some great auroras! Aurora alerts: SMS Text
FIVE CMEs ARE HEADING FOR EARTH: Great sunspot AR3664 has hurled an astonishing five CMEs toward Earth. They’re all in this frenetic 2-day coronagraph movie from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO):
According to a NOAA forecast model, the first three CMEs could merge for form a “Cannibal CME.” Cannibal CMEs form when fast-moving CMEs overtake and gobble up slower CMEs in front of them. Internal shock waves created by such CME collisions do an good job sparking geomagnetic storms when they strike Earth’s magnetic field.
The Cannibal CME is expected to arrive on May 11th. It alone could spark a strong (G3) geomagnetic storm. With two more CMEs following close behind, storm levels could become extreme (G4), sparking auroras at mid- to low-latitudes across Europe and the USA.
Don’t miss the storm! Sign up for Space Weather Alerts to receive instant text messages when the CMEs arrive.
Coronal Nass Ejections and resulting Geomagnetic Storms are part of humans genetic evolution, and it appears to me that we need a genetic boost (opinion generated during watching CNN), so: BRING IT!
Lol. You may be right. Perhaps green heads will explode
I’ve been wondering if the recent increase in human girth may be attributable to the pending arrival of extraterrestrials, a la ‘To Serve Man’.
Interesting hypothesis. If so, we can definitely say that the aliens are NOT into organic food…
So, I can stop blaming global warming for my weight issues?
As a YEC, that is so wrong, but I’m going to steal it anyway. 😉
Curious minds want to know. Could these be focussed in some way on Meta data centers?
I can’t seem to find it again – what class was the Carrington CME estimated to be? (not the geomagnetic storm).
The highest number G5.[maybe a log scale?]
Apparently it was very fast moving from the sun, mostly take a few days for the charged particles to get here , Carrington took under 24 hours. Could be because a lower intensity storm preceded it and ‘cleared the way ‘
What a naughty little sunspot.
Well all’s well and God is in his place so far….
Like the man that jumped off the roof of a hundred story building. Every floor he passed he could be heard to say… “So far So good”
I will simply enter my nuclear bomb shelter which was built decades ago.
I just finished listening to the SWPC conference call and basically they will not know the strength of the event until 20-45 minutes before it strikes when it reaches L1 (about 1 million miles away). Their guestimate is around 8pm EST ish.
They said they will be posting their information and recorded call soon here> Homepage | NOAA / NWS Space Weather Prediction Center
BTW, some, all the way down into Alabama may be able to see the Aurora tonight from the Cannibal CME’s.
Long enough to throw your main breakers and pull your hot leads from your car batteries saving your electronics
Looks like we hit G4 early. Here is the recording of this morning’s conference call.
NOAA holds briefing about upcoming severe solar storm (youtube.com)
Bye-bye all . . . talk with you (hopefully) when the Internet recovers next Monday . . . or Tuesday . . . or next month . . . or whenever.
I don’t understand why the Federal Government won’t spend a measly few billion $$$ on protecting grid integrity and recovery from a Carrington Event. We spend untold billions on frivolous projects — Greem this and that, high speed trains to nowhere, but not on this. Why? A Carrington Even *will* happen again, and unlike in 1859 when electricity was a curiosity, today electricity is the foundation of our civilization. If were lose that and cannot reconstitute our power supplies, I have read some projections putting the death rate at 90% within one year.
What would a Carrington Event do to EV charging stations?
what would it do to all modern cars?
Nothing if they’re encased in grounded faraday cages
I was thinking mire along the lines of connectivity to the Internet for payment. Also what NASA says are “possible widespread voltage control problems” Rather than damage directly to the bit you plug into.
You need the charged particles to induce magnetic fields , mostly from longer distance power lines.
Where I live they are already shutting grid segments as their protection alarms have been triggered . I think the direction of the line matters
A steel body car is a fairly good Faraday cage already, though it’s ungrounded. I was driving a car some 30 years ago that was struck by lightning. The charge easily jumped to ground without either of us in the car feeling anything. This was in the early days of computer control, and the ECM went a little batty. It went into ‘limp home’ mode and a voice warning kept repeating “the parking brake is on”!
I didn’t want to stop on the roadside in a driving rainstorm, so I kept moving for 20 minutes, or so, until I came to a lit-up gas station. I stopped there and recycled the ECM (key off – then restart). It started just fine, and I drove the rest of the way home with no lingering issues.
As I understand it, an emp and a strong solar flare are very different, and require a far better Faraday cage.
Well, put that in terms of “a few trillion $$$ or more” and then we can talk.
The shielding and protection, vs replacement, and potential social collapse, is a bargain. A real cost estimate I would be helpful.
The last commission on EMP and the grid, which took place a couple of years ago, estimated it would cost about $3 billion to buy spares and do upgrades on the grid to mitigate a Carrington-type event.
Shielding is not an option for most of the highly vulnerable transformers. You can shield a standalone item – but you cannot shield a transformer whose vulnerability is hundreds to thousands of miles of electrical lines. It is these lines which are a problem – they act as antenna to aggregate electric charge arising from CME induced magnetic fields.
Sure, you can disconnect the transformer but then you also have no functioning grid. Disconnecting such line+transformer setups is non-trivial both due to scale and because these are high voltage lines. And yes, there is engineering capability to add some level of protection but of course these add cost and furthermore cannot be retrofitted to old/existing installs nor will they work for many “autotransformers” that are installed.
Great points. Plus my understanding is that one cannot implement a rapid, electronics-based circuit breaker to protect against EMP-type overloads due to the massive amount of electrical energy that is inductively-capacitively stored in long (multiple 60 Hz standing waves) associated with typical HV power transmission lines (as established by the VSWR in a given uninterrupted length of transmission line).
Very good points, yet the potential restoration or resupply of new transformers could be far ahead, as rapid restoration of the grid in such an event would be required to prevent a very deadly panic. With already weak supply chains, likely severely broken in such an event, and likely global sourcing required, not having back up capacity is a VERY foolish policy. (Somewhere in our trillion dollar debt every quarter, this cost would not even be noticable)
A few trillion is a Years worth of government waste for the current administration
Just so . . . the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act of August 2022”, estimated cost at $1.2 trillion USD . . . how’s that working out for everyone???
Inflation is obviously poised to drop, any day now…
… Any day now
… any day now
Not much more than has gone into the pockets of HRC, W,C., and Brandon.
The issue isn’t really money per se – it is supply. Specifically: the US imports something like 70% of large transformers installed, and even then this is under a largely undercapitalized replacement regime as evidenced by the ever increasing average age of the US transformer population.
Guess where most of the world’s supply of large transformers come from? It is that nation which the US is gearing up to “contain” in Asia…
I’ve discussed this with people who say that we have plenty of warning to be able to shut down the grid to avoid catastrophe. They also are certain that the grid operators would make the correct decision to do so.
I think it’s more likely that whatever bureaucrat and/or peon in charge of such a decision would be too afraid of the repercussions of it being “the wrong decision” that they wouldn’t act. We’ve seen that happen plenty of times before.
Not sure shutting down the grid would prevent the damaging jolts induced in long power lines. At any rate, there is no time to prepare for a nuclear emp, let alone the clean up one two weeks later. (Likely?, hope not, however “hope is not a strategy.”
Not sure shutting down the grid would prevent the damaging jolts induced in long power lines
I was talking about that at home yesterday. The longer the line, the greater the current induced – and shutting down the grid doesn’t physically disconnect the lines. You still have complete circuits with transformers on each end. At least there would be less voltage than if it were powered – so maybe it wouldn’t blow the transformers. But that’s getting significantly outside of my knowledge of such things.
Mr. Cunningham: Have you tried applying for a grant to show how CO2 causes Carrington event?? A few billion$$$ will come available. However, if you try to say that Carrington events come from a lab leak, forget about it.
Because there’s a lot more money to be made/appropriated/steal by repairing the damage.
Don’t forget Miyaki events that are 10 to 100 times as powerful as Carrington events. Perhaps five in the last 14,374 years: AD 993 and 775, and 5259, 7176, and ~12,250 BC. Named for Fusa Miyaki, the original discoverer. Vide Anton Petrov’s Our Sun Is Capable of Giant Superstorms 100x Carrington Event, New Study, from two years ago: https://youtu.be/EXstRq3vius?t=474
It isn’t really the power generation that is the problem – it is the transmission grid. Or more specifically, the big transformers that support the grid.
Two silly old biddies…
Just Stop Oil target Magna Carta: Fury as Anglican priest, 82, and retired teacher, 85, use hammer and chisel to try and smash glass protecting tome
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13403837/Fury-Anglican-priest-82-retired-teacher-85-use-hammer-chisel-smash-glass-protecting-Magna-Carta-Just-Stop-Oil-protest.html
The way to deter such actions is to throw the perpetrators in jail for a long time.
Bring back stocks or pillory, well supplied with very old tomatoes?
I don’t think those two old ducks have got much time left.
In the US not that long ago a similar incident occurred where The Constitution (maybe also The Declaration of Independence?) were attacked.
No surprise that these idiots attacked 3 of the most foundational documents promoting Freedom in the Western world.
What does this mean for little-ol-me? WiFi/Gps/phone interruption? Nothing?
Most likely nothing permanent as modern technology has protections built-in for these events, but it has happened in the recent past. The Halloween geomagnetic storm in Oct 2003 was a doozy.
https://spaceweatherarchive.com/2021/10/28/the-day-earth-lost-half-its-satellites-halloween-storms-2003/
So it’s possible satellite services could be flaky for a few days. Wifi should be fine, as long as you and your internet source have power, which could possibly be interrupted in locations susceptible to GIC power outages, and satellites may respond more slowly, but that’s just speculative for now.
It should be possible for many tonight to see the northern lights as skies are clear.
Thank you for your reply…it is appreciated.
It made the local radio news. G4 event about 8pm EST. Biggest in decades.
But the sun has nothing to do with climate change! (/sarc)
This is going to be interesting, as the first of up to six CMEs has hit in the last few minutes. Proton density went up today as well as solar wind speed, and Bz is strongly negative at this time.
My electric weather app image has ten minute data latency, and refreshes every five minutes.
Probably not the civilization-ending killshot … this time. According to Dan Davidson only a 12% chance … this time. He identified a 6th today.
According to Dan (Suspicious Observers) we get such an event every 12,000 years (and a lesser one on the 6000 yr half-cycles) and we humans have been around through more than 10 of them.
Not humanity-ending, just all electronic technology unable to be used for decades. Horsepower will be provided by horses.
Slightly OT.
I saw a story a week or two ago about a projected super nova coming up. (I couldn’t find the story again.)
It involved, if I remember correctly, a white dwarf orbiting a red giant. It draws mass from the red giant and explodes on a regular basis. (57 year intervals?)
They said it might be visible to the naked eye. (It will look like a star about as bright as Polaris in the constellation Hercules suddenly appeared.)
Projected to be any time between now and September 2024
Here you go, Gunga:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/this-nova-will-soon-erupt-as-a-once-in-a-lifetime-new-star-in-the-night-sky/
March 25, 2024
A Dead Star Will Soon Spark a Once-in-a-Lifetime Display in Earth’s Skies
A nova called T Coronae Borealis spectacularly erupts every 80 years. Your only chance to see it will come any day now
By Robin George Andrews
Thanks!
For one thing, I learned the difference between a nova and a supernova.
Here’s my prediction. Nobody will notice anything abnormal.
The Kp index shot up momentarily almost to 8. This is a strong geomagnetic storm.
I wouldn’t characterize the Carrington Event as a “monster CME”. In the year 774 an event about ten times as powerful took place; and because of how dependent we have allowed ourselves to become on electronics of all kinds, such an event today would be one of the most consequential in recorded history.
Maybe , but Carrington was a G5, The effects on the earths surface are the S scale for Solar Storms and thats a log scale
I just realized that this could be VERY interesting. I happened to think of those extremely large antenna arrays called “solar farms.”
PV cells have a very narrow frequency response interval. I doubt there will be much energy in the visual part of the spectrum.
Yes. I think the long high voltage transmission lines are the highest risk for induced currents playing havoc with the regulation equipment.
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
They upgraded to a G5 Extreme Geomagnetic Storm an hour ago, although its backed down to G3 at the moment.
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/g5-conditions-observed
Finally proof that the sun is allergic to CO2?
G4
Well, out north of Laramie away from city lights I can see that the predicted pattern from swpc.noaa. is right — covers about the northern 1/3 of the sky, but there is no interesting structure that I can detect. No rays or curtains. Just a greenish white streak across the sky.