What does a six tonne dead satellite, a neutrino detector and solar magnetic storms have in common? If you know what these things are, more than you may think.
Sometime during the early hours of September 24th, the The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, which had been in orbit since 1991, fell to it's demise. The satellite had been decommissioned in 2005 and was moved into a lower orbit for an eventual burn-up in the atmosphere. Something happened though to cause it to lose orbit and fall prematurely. Because of the satellite's mass, some of it's components would not be burnt up in our atmosphere and posed a possible risk of falling on inhabited areas.
Interestingly, a hoax has been perpetrated that the UARS fell in Okotokes, Alberta. NASA says that whatever was left of UARS likely fell into the pacific ocean, although nobody has been able to confirm this.
Researchers at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, have discovered that neutrinos (subatomic particles that are so small they can pass through the whole Earth without bumping into anything), blasted from on lab to another, arrive 60 nanoseconds earlier than a beam of light would have. Essentially, they went faster than the speed of light, which Albert Einstein claimed was impossible. Besides the feat of faster than light velocities, it is also theorized that neutrinos can travel backwards in time. Everything we know about physics may have to be re-written due to this discovery
The sun is now in the active phase of an 11 year sunspot cycle. Which means that there are plenty of surface magnetic anomalies such as sunspots and coronal holes. These solar storms cause radiation and plasma to fly out into space, sometimes in our direction. Sunspots, the most violent of these storms, can cause massive sheets of the sun's surface to be blasted out into space. These are called Coronal Mass Ejections, or CMEs. The more violent the storm, the stronger the possible CME. These flares are classified sort of like a tornado. X-class flares are the strongest of these. Currently sunspot 1302, which has already given off two X-class flares and is still crackling with X-class energy, is moving into position to point directly at the Earth.
So, what does a falling Satellite, neutrinos and sunspots all have in common? You have probably guessed already, it's the Sun.
UARS fell to Earth prematurely because expansion in the upper atmosphere dragged at the satellite degrading it's orbit. You see, it is not empty space between the Sun and the Earth. We actually reside within the Sun's atmosphere. The Sun and the Earth's magnetic field are also linked. More energetic activity on the sun cause the upper atmosphere of the earth to expand, or breathe. Neutrinos come from the sun. They race towards Earth and sometimes are detected with deep underground detectors. Whenever we are in the path of a coronal hole, we get more neutrinos.
All this activity. What does it mean for us on Earth? Not much really. Our atmosphere and geomagnetic field protects us from almost everything the sun throws at us. On rare occasions though, solar storms become so powerful that they effect us on the ground. It is these occasions that we need to be careful of. These storms can induce power in electricity grids causing them to overload. A massive blackout in Quebec back in 1989 was caused by such a storm. The electricity grid of North America is no more advanced than it was back in 1989, it is overtaxed and prone to failure. Remember the Eastern-blackout of 2003? Imagine now, what is sunspot 1302 suddenly blew up an X flare and it hit the Earth square-on.
We would see a spectacular light show in the sky as the aurora borealis would cover much of the northern hemisphere. We would see it very clearly because there would be no lights on the ground to drown it out. No lights, no power.
I lived through the ice-storm of 1998 in comfort. The farm where I grew up had a natural spring, wood furnace, wood stove and a huge generator we could run from a tractors engine. Almost everyone else did not fare as well. With no electricity there was no heat, no running water and no ability to cook food. Most had no power for days, some for weeks. Imagine, no power for Months.
Oh my.
.
0 comments:
Post a Comment