Solar Flares Could Be Directed At Earth Over The Next Week

On Tuesday, I blogged about the recent surge in strong solar flares popping-up on the Sun. Luckily, those X-class flares were not Earth-directed. If they were, well, things could have gotten ugly on the “third rock from the Sun” if those flares had been accompanied by a coronal mass ejection, or CME. From an August 16, 2011, post:

The real danger comes when a solar storm ejects a chunk of the corona — the sun’s outermost layer — toward the Earth. It hurtles through space as a huge electrically charged cloud with its own magnetic field. Scientists call it a “coronal mass ejection.”

With an Earth-bound CME, magnetic storms here on Earth could cause electric surges that fry electrical systems and hardware.

Lights out.

Well, the Japanese are now warning about the potential for new solar flares to be directed at the Earth in the coming days. From Jay Alabaster on the PCWorld website Thursday morning:

A Japanese government institute has warned that satellite transmissions, GPS readings, and power lines could be affected over the next two weeks if a recent spate of solar flares continues.

Four large solar flares have been detected over the last few days, including one on Tuesday that was the largest of the year. The flares were judged to be “X-class” by NASA and other agencies, the highest in a linear scale based on X-ray measurements.

Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, or NICT, said the flares came from a group of sunspots that are pointed away from the Earth, but are due to rotate to face in the Earth’s direction over the next week. NICT said that if more major flares occur during that time, there could be problems for satellites and other equipment.

(Editor’s note: Italics added for emphasis)

Hopefully, no coronal mass ejections will be heading our way along with one of these flares. Or any other time, for that matter.

It’s been estimated that a severe solar storm could cause $1 trillion to $2 trillion in losses the first year, and take 4 to 10 years to fully recover from.

By Christopher E. Hill, Editor
Survival And Prosperity (www.survivalandprosperity.com)

Source:

Alabaster, Jay. “Japan warns solar flares could harm GPS, satellites, power lines.” PCWorld. 16 May 2013. (http://www.pcworld.com/article/2038887/japan-warns-solar-flares-could-harm-gps-satellites-power-lines.html). 17 May 2013.

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