In May 2024 part of the sun exploded.
The sun is a huge ball of superheated gas called plasma. Because plasma is conductive, magnetic fields extend beyond the solar surface. Because different parts of the surface rotate at different speeds, the fields become entangled. After all, if rubber bands are too tight, they can break – and that's exactly what they did last year.
These titanic plasma explosions, also known as solar flareseach of which released the energy of a million hydrogen bombs. Parts of the Sun's magnetic field also broke free in the form of magnetic bubbles filled with billions of tons of plasma.
These bubbles, called coronal mass ejectionsor CME, crashed into space at a speed approximately 6,000 times the speed of a commercial jetliner. A few days later they crashed into magnetic field enveloping the Earth. The plasma in every CME was rushing towards us. creating bright auroras and powerful electric currents sweeping across the earth's crust.
You might not have noticed. Just as the opposite poles of refrigerator magnets must align for them to connect, the poles of the Earth's magnetic field and incoming CMEs must align exactly so that the plasma in the CME reaches Earth. This time this did not happen, and most of the plasma flew into deep space.
People weren't always so lucky. I environmental historian and author of the new book “Ripples on the ocean of space: an ecological history of our place in the solar system“
While writing the book, I learned that a number of technological breakthroughs—from telegraphs to satellites—have left modern societies untouched. increasingly vulnerable to influence solar stormswhich means flares and CMEs.
Since the 19th century, these storms have repeatedly upended life on Earth. Today there are hints that they threaten the very existence of civilization as we know it.
Telegraph: first warning
On the morning of September 1, 1859, two young astronomers Richard Carrington and Richard Hodgson, became the first people to see solar flare. To their surprise, it was so powerful that it eclipsed the rest of the Sun for two minutes.
About 18 hours later, bright, blood-red auroras flickered across the night sky all the way to the equator, and newly constructed telegraph lines went down throughout Europe and America.
The “Carrington event”, as it was later called, showed that The Sun's environment could change dramatically. He also suggested that new technologies such as electric telegraphbegan to connect modern life with the extraordinary power of the most explosive changes of the Sun.
For more than a century, these connections were little more than inconveniences such as periodic telegraph blackouts, in part because no solar storm could match the power of a solar storm. Carrington event. But another part of the reason was that the world's economies and militaries only gradually became more and more reliant on technologies that proved deeply vulnerable to changes in the Sun.
Meeting Armageddon
Then came May 1967.
Soviet and American warships collided American troops in the Sea of Japan moved to North Vietnam and the Middle East were teetering on the brink Six Day War.
Only a frightening combination of new technologies kept the United States and the Soviet Union from going to full-scale war; nuclear missiles Now they could destroy the country in a matter of minutes, but the radar could detect their approach in time and retaliate. Direct attack on any superpower it would be suicide.
Unexpectedly, May 23, episode strong solar flares occurred Earth with powerful radio waves, knocking out American radar stations in Alaska, Greenland and England.
Forecasters warned officers at the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) about the danger of a solar storm. But the scale of the radar shutdown was convincing Air Force officers said the Soviet Union was responsible. This is exactly what the USSR would have done before a nuclear attack.
American bombers equipped with nuclear weapons prepared for a retaliatory strike. Solar storm had this encrypted their wireless communication that it may have been impossible to call them back once they took off. In the nick of time, forecasters used solar observations to convince NORAD officers that a solar storm had jammed their radar. Perhaps we are alive today because they succeeded.
Power outages, transformers and collapse
In connection with nuclear war, solar storms have become a source of existential risk, which means a potential threat to the existence of humanity. However, the extent of this risk became known only in March 1989when 11 powerful flares preceded the appearance of successive coronal mass ejections.
For more than two decades, North American utility companies have built an extensive system of transmitting electricity from power plants to consumers. In 1989, this system was found to be vulnerable to the currents that coronal mass ejections passed through the Earth's crust.
In Quebec, crystalline bedrock It is not easy to conduct electricity under the city. Instead of flowing through rock, the streams rushed into the world's largest hydroelectric transmission system. It collapsed, leaving millions of people without power in sub-zero weather.
The repairs revealed something alarming: the currents damaged several transformers, which huge individual devices which transmit electricity between circuits.
Transformers replacement may take many months. If the 1989 storm had been as powerful as the Carrington event, hundreds of transformers could have been destroyed. It could take years to restore power in North America.
Solar storms: an existential risk
But was the Carrington event really the worst storm the Sun can produce?
Scientists assumed that this was the case until, in 2012, a group of Japanese scientists found evidence of an unusual explosion high energy particles in tree rings dating back to the eighth century AD. Main explanation: huge solar storms eclipsing the Carrington event. Now scientists have calculated that these “Miyake Eventshappen once every few centuries.
Astronomers have also discovered that every century, stars like the Sun may explode with superflares 10,000 times more powerful than the strongest solar flares ever observed. Because the Sun is older and rotates more slowly than many of these stars, its superflares can be much less oftenoccurring perhaps once every 3,000 years.
However, the consequences are alarming. Powerful solar storms once influenced humanity only creating brilliant auroras. Today, civilization depends on electrical networks that allow goods, information, and people to move around our world, from sewer systems to satellite constellations.
What would happen if these systems suddenly collapsed on a continental scale for months, even years? Will millions die? And can a single solar storm cause this?
Researchers are working to answer these questions. For now, one thing is certain: to protect these networks, scientists must follow the sun in real time. In this way, operators can reduce or redirect power flowing through networks as a CME approaches. A little preparation can prevent collapse.
Fortunately, satellites and telescopes on Earth today keep the Sun under constant observation. However, in the United States, recent efforts to cut NASA's science budget have called into question plans to replace aging solar observation satellites. Even Daniel K. Inouye Solar TelescopeThe world's largest solar observatory may soon malfunction.
These potential cuts are a reminder of our tendency to underestimate existential risks—until it's too late.
This article has been republished from Talka nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trusted analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. He was written by: Dagomar Degroot, Georgetown University
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Dagomar Degroot has received funding from NASA.
