For two nights, dazzling auroras delighted observers in unexpected places, including the United States and south Florida. Cause: Double solar storms caused by the Sun reaching the Earth.
Severe storms were also initially forecast for Thursday, with the possibility of the northern US seeing auroras again in the evening. National Weather Service forecasters Space Weather Prediction Center I now believe that Wednesday night may have been the last opportunity for the most intense conditions.
In addition to creating auroras, geomagnetic storms can disrupt communications, power grids and satellites. The Space Weather Prediction Center said it had identified power grid and satellite operators in the U.S. so they could prepare.
The British Geological Survey initially believed that current solar activity could lead to a G5, or extreme geomagnetic storm – the highest level on the scale. The study also called Tuesday's event a “cannibal storm” that disrupted communications and the accuracy of GPS satellites.
“On Monday, two coronal mass ejections blasted off from the Sun within hours of each other,” explained a team of geomagnetists involved in the study. “The first one moved slower than the second one. … and so the second overtook the first, and by the time they reached the Earth they had become one. Hence the term “cannibalized,” since the second one consumed the first.”
Coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, are large clouds of ionized gas called plasma and magnetic fields that erupt from the sun's outer atmosphere. When these flares are directed toward Earth, they can cause severe disturbances in the Earth's magnetic field, leading to geomagnetic storms.
Forecasters at the Space Weather Prediction Center believe the first two of three expected coronal mass ejections triggered the appearance of auroras late Tuesday.
“One of them hit much harder than we could have originally imagined,” said Sean Dahl, a forecaster at the center.
When a storm reaches satellites 1 million miles from Earth, forecasters can measure its speed, magnetic field strength and magnetic orientation, he said.
“Is it facing opposite the Earth or is it facing the same as the Earth?” – said Dahl. “If it turns against Earth, then activity will increase very quickly and the level of the storm can increase dramatically very quickly. That's exactly what happened last night.”
The third solar storm arrived on Earth Wednesday afternoon at 2:17 pm ET with solar wind speeds of more than 2.1 million miles per hour (950 kilometers per second).
But Earth appears to have been hit by the storm's far flank, meaning most of the magnetic cloud likely missed our planet, according to the data. update from center.
The reddish hue of the northern lights can be seen over the town of Valtournenche, located in Italy's Aosta Valley, on Wednesday, November 12. – Matterhorn Ski Paradise And Feratel/Reuters
Solar Storm Disturbances
Among those feeling the effects of the hurricane is Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin. The company was launch expected NASA Escapade mission — The twin satellites will begin the long journey to Mars — aboard the New Glenn rocket on Wednesday. But increased solar activity blocked this launch attempt.
“NG-2 Update: New Glenn is ready for launch. However, due to high solar activity and its potential impact on the ESCAPADE spacecraft, NASA is postponing the launch until space weather conditions improve. We are currently assessing the launch capabilities of our next launch,” the statement said. Blue Origin message on social media platform X. On Wednesday evening, X confirmed that another launch attempt is now scheduled for Thursday.
The flurry of activity around our Sun has caused storms. This week the Sun experienced three X-class flares, the most intense type of solar flare, followed by a series of coronal mass ejections.
According to Ryan French, a solar physicist at the Laboratory of Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado Boulder, the recent uptick in activity is associated with an active sunspot region on the Sun called AR 14274.
“AR 14274 still has the potential to produce more X-class solar flares,” French said. “However, the region is now moving away from us, so any future eruptions will become increasingly less likely as time goes on.”
Tuesday's Class X flare produced a powerful storm of solar particles, the largest since 2005, according to the British Geological Survey. Tuesday's solar activity also created the largest measured geoelectric field since the survey began recording data in 2012.
Disturbances in the Earth's magnetic field can reach the ground, causing electricity to appear in rocks and essentially creating an electric field in the ground. “This voltage is usually small, on the order of 0.001 volts per kilometer, but during geomagnetic storms it can be much higher,” the research team noted.
On Tuesday, experts recorded a voltage reading of 3.5 volts per kilometer in the Shetland Islands off the coast of Scotland, an unusually high value that had not been “previously recorded,” according to the geological survey team.
Strong geoelectric fields can interfere with the operation of transformers and even cause them to shut down or overheat.
The northern lights danced in the sky over St Mary's Lighthouse on Whitley Bay on England's northeast coast on Wednesday. – Owen Humphreys/PA Images/Getty Images
Changing solar cycle
The sun has an 11-year cycle of waxing and waning activity. Heliophysicists believe that the peak, called solar maximumoccurred in October 2024.
“Although we are still in a period of increased solar activity, we are entering the decline phase of the solar cycle,” French said. “(Although) there are fewer sunspots and solar flares during this time, this is also when the strongest solar flares typically occur.”
Increased solar activity causes auroras that dance around the Earth's poles, known as the northern lights, or northern lights, and the southern lights, or aurora. When charged coronal mass ejection particles reach Earth's magnetic field, they interact with gases in the atmosphere, creating colorful lights in the sky.
Even if the colorful displays do not appear visible to the naked eye, the sensors of cameras and mobile phone cameras can pick them up.
Those in areas with clear, dark skies should keep an eye out for auroras that may descend over the United States. In the UK, skywatchers in Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland also had a good chance of seeing them, according to the survey.
The last G5 storm to hit Earth occurred in May 2024.
The storm was historic, but fortunately it did not reach the level of the 1859 Carrington event, which caused sparks and fires in telegraph stations and remains the most intense geomagnetic storm ever recorded.
During the May 2024 geomagnetic storm, tractor company John Deere reported that some customers using GPS for precision agriculture experienced service outages. But for the most part, power grid and satellite operators kept the satellites in order and correctly positioned in orbit and managed the buildup of intense geomagnetic currents in the grid systems.
Before May 2024, the last G5 storm to hit Earth was in 2003, causing power outages in Sweden and damaging power transformers in South Africa.
The recent surge in activity reminds French of the violent geomagnetic storm that reached Earth in October 2024. Tuesday night's storm was the third-strongest solar storm of the current solar cycle, French said.
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