[HN Gopher] SWPC issues first G4 geomagnetic storm watch since 2005
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SWPC issues first G4 geomagnetic storm watch since 2005
Author : jwjohnson314
Score : 75 points
Date : 2024-05-10 12:52 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.swpc.noaa.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.swpc.noaa.gov)
| jwjohnson314 wrote:
| If you have a pair of eclipse glasses you may be able to see the
| sunspot cluster causing all the action with them, it's enormous.
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| I just went a took a look, seems like I could see sunspots
| around the 3oclock position.
| uticus wrote:
| Just verified I can see also, Central US. Wow that's huge to
| be visible from earth with no magnification.
| krasotkin wrote:
| I just stepped out and can offer another anecdotal
| verification here. This is about as prominent as a transit
| of Venus. It's really something!
| sukhavati wrote:
| I'm quite worried as I'm on a transatlantic flight during this
| event, and there have been 6 solar eruptions with at least 4 CMEs
| (NOAA not up to date with the enlil spiral just yet). Here are a
| couple useful links I'm using to keep track of this event: NOAA
| Space Weather Prediction Center dashboards [1], FlightAware
| Flight Delays and Cancellations [2] and NOAA Global Positioning
| System Community Dashboard [3], Prof. Mathew Owens post [4]
|
| [1] https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/aviation-community-
| das... [2] https://www.flightaware.com/live/cancelled/today [3]
| https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/global-positioning-sys...
| [4] https://x.com/mathewjowens/status/1788655731471696372
| DoctorOetker wrote:
| in link [4], what timezone is displayed? trying to figure out
| if I will be at the day or night side
| sukhavati wrote:
| all of them are UTC I believe, Prof. Mat answer to a question
| about the tz on the post replies
| atonse wrote:
| I came here to say the same. I will also be on a transatlantic
| flight on the 12th. Is there anything to be worried about with
| airplane electronics systems in flight, or is it more
| potentially on the side of "there might be flight delays"?
| sukhavati wrote:
| I was trying to find stuff around Oct 2003 when the last
| event of this magnitude took place, but I wasn't able to find
| anything comparable. From what I can tell the forecast is
| more mild on the 12th UTC, so I wouldn't worry that much
| about that. I was worried in my case because my flight leaves
| pretty much at the apex of the geomagnetic storm.
|
| I think we can expect delays, GPS being unresponsive, radio
| issues, and some control tower congestion & issues. Can't
| really comment with any more detail.
| skywal_l wrote:
| Looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cycle_25
| there's already been a G4 in march and it didn't seem to
| have caused any issues (AFAIK).
| sukhavati wrote:
| The March G4 was unexpected. I wouldn't be surprised if
| this one turns out to be much stronger than is modeled
| today as well.
| mikewarot wrote:
| >Is there anything to be worried about with airplane
| electronics systems in flight, or is it more potentially on
| the side of "there might be flight delays"?
|
| An airplane is a big closed conductive tube, not connected to
| the ground. _There 's nothing to worry about._ I'd happily
| fly on those days.
|
| As for why we worry about the storms on the ground - the main
| effects of Geomagnetic storms on the ground involve DC
| currents generated in power grids that span hundreds of
| miles, at the ends of those transmission lines, are
| transformers engineered to most efficiently use the
| transformer steel by _almost_ pushing it to saturation, at
| which it rapidly loses the ability to contain more lines of
| flux. This saturation can then allow almost unlimited amounts
| of current to flow, turning the transformer into a space
| heater, connected to gigawatts of power. Things can then very
| rapidly get out of hand, circuits fault, opening lines,
| causing power to be diverted elsewhere, until the entire grid
| goes down.
|
| No such issues can happen in an airframe.
| atonse wrote:
| Thanks for this explanation, this is exactly why I love
| Hacker News :D
| idontwantthis wrote:
| Are you worried enough to not fly?
| op00to wrote:
| Why are you worried? Not saying you're wrong to be worried, but
| I'm interested to know what the actual concern is.
| afruitpie wrote:
| My concern comes from my own naivete. I don't know enough
| about flying to know how concerned I should be.
|
| Hearing there's a storm that affects navigation is an
| eyebrow-raiser, especially when sitting at an airport gate
| like I am.
| op00to wrote:
| Totally makes sense - if we don't understand what's going
| on, our minds immediately go to a worst case scenario. I
| hope you have a safe and enjoyable flight - at this point
| you're putting your trust in the hands of air travel
| regulators, and they have a pretty solid track record of
| safety.
|
| There can be interruptions to radio communications and GPS,
| but there's multiple ways that airplanes track where they
| were and where they're headed. In addition to GPS,
| airliners have Inertial Reference Units which the aircraft
| can use to figure out where they are.
|
| The big impact to humans from storms like these are the
| miles-long antennas (also known as power lines) that can
| pick up a charge from the energized particles streaming
| from the sun and cause damage to transformers and other
| equipment.
|
| So, your flight will be fine, but worst case scenario maybe
| you will land at a place that won't have power.
| jwjohnson314 wrote:
| In addition to the points others have made, flights that
| pass near the poles are often rerouted to lower latitudes.
| sva_ wrote:
| This site is also pretty good:
|
| https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/
|
| Looks promising so far.
|
| Edit: damn those values are crazy. Gonna climb the mountain
| tonight. Fingers crossed for a clear sky
| FL410 wrote:
| I am confused by the slide, which mentions in the first bullet
| point that this is the first "G4" since 2005, but in the last
| bullet point says there was one in March.
| Shank wrote:
| It's the first G4 watch, but not the first G4 event. In other
| words, the prior G4 event was not predicted. It can happen that
| an event is more significant when it arrives than what was
| predicted, which is what happened here.
| webdoodle wrote:
| It also resulted in Aurora visible in Mexico.
| uticus wrote:
| it's a typo, Mar 2024 was a G3, not G4. ref
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39796973 and link in
| comments there.
|
| [edit] i stand corrected, there was a G4 in march. sibling
| comment is correct. ref
| https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/severe-g4-geomagnetic-storms-...
| webdoodle wrote:
| Tony Philips with NASA runs Spaceweather.com. Yesterday he posted
| a pic, with an overlay from the 1859 Carrington Event sunspot.
| They are the same size. Let that sink in.
|
| https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=09&month=05&...
| sukhavati wrote:
| the solar spot is comparable in size but the CME were
| significantly (100x) less energetic than is estimated for
| Carrington. With that said, the Earth's magnetic field has
| weakened by ~15% since the 1800s so there's that...
| briantakita wrote:
| There are 6 X-class flares. Solar Flares can cannibalize each
| other. If the different flares travel at different
| velocities. Leading to a larger impact. Obviously, we were
| not able to measure how many solar flares came from the
| Carrington Event or if this cannibalization occurred.
| ablation wrote:
| > Studies suggest that Carrington-class storms occur once every
| 40 to 60 years, so we're overdue. Don't worry, though. The four
| CMEs currently en route to Earth--even combined--are probably
| no match for the monster CME of 1859. The Carrington Event
| won't happen again this weekend.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| [dupe]
|
| More discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40315394
| mikewarot wrote:
| One of these days I'll see the Northern Lights.... somehow I
| don't think this will be it. 8(
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