{"id":67734,"date":"2024-04-29T09:38:12","date_gmt":"2024-04-29T14:38:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=67734"},"modified":"2024-04-29T09:38:12","modified_gmt":"2024-04-29T14:38:12","slug":"the-threat-of-a-solar-superstorm-is-growing-and-were-not-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=67734","title":{"rendered":"The Threat of a Solar Superstorm Is Growing\u2014And We\u2019re Not Ready"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"article__header-a5-f7\">\n<h3><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/the-threat-of-a-solar-superstorm-is-growing-and-were-not-ready\/\">The Threat of a Solar Superstorm Is Growing\u2014And We\u2019re Not Ready<\/a><\/h3>\n<div class=\"article_dek-VydJj\">\n<p><strong>Someday an unlucky outburst from our sun could strike Earth and fry most of our electronics\u2014and we\u2019ve already had some too-close-for-comfort near misses<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<figure class=\"lead_image-3nDcx\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"lead_image__img-e3fpf\" src=\"https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=600\" sizes=\"(min-width: 900px) 900px, (min-resolution: 2dppx) 75vw, (min-resolution: 2.1dppx) 50vw, 100vw\" srcset=\"https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=600 600w, https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=900 900w, https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=1000 1000w, https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=1200 1200w, https:\/\/static.scientificamerican.com\/dam\/m\/344ab156d2c11f85\/original\/m7-3-flare-rotated_lead.jpg?w=1350 1350w\" alt=\"A solar flare, as seen by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory\" \/><figcaption class=\"lead_image__figcaption-Y9Y9T\">\n<div class=\"lead_image__caption-18F8P\">\n<p>Powerful outbursts from the sun\u2014like this bright, flashing solar flare and the adjacent eruption of hot glowing gas\u2014can wreak havoc with Earth&#8217;s power grids, computers and telecommunications<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><button class=\"eyebrow_dropdown_button-ET-CU\" type=\"button\"><\/button><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__content-24wun\">\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">The sun is ramping up for a big year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">In one sense it already had a big year, thanks to the April 8 solar eclipse. But that was a terrestrial phenomenon. What we\u2019re gearing up for is a decidedly solar one\u2014our star is nearing the peak of its magnetic activity cycle, which means more sunspots, more storms and, potentially, more danger to Earth.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">The sun\u2019s magnetic field is generated in its interior, where conditions are so hot that electrons are stripped from their host atoms, forming an ionized gas. A basic law of physics states that moving electric charges generate a magnetic field, and it\u2019s this ionized-gas-induced magnetism that so profoundly affects the sun\u2019s behavior.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">Unlike Earth, which has a fairly strong and well-organized magnetic field similar to that of a single gigantic bar magnet, the sun is dominated by countless locally generated fields. Each one shapes its own parcel of the solar interior. The actual dynamics of this magnetism are fiercely complex, but to simplify, you can think of our star\u2019s overall magnetic field strength as\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/the-suns-magnetic-poles-are-vanishing\/\">waxing and waning over a period of about 11 years<\/a>\u2014what we call the solar magnetic cycle.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">Hot material inside the sun rises to the surface and, once cooled, sinks again in a process called thermal convection, in a very similar way to water in a boiling teakettle&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__block-KZIY9\" data-block=\"sciam\/paragraph\">&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Threat of a Solar Superstorm Is Growing\u2014And We\u2019re Not Ready Someday an unlucky outburst from our sun could strike Earth and fry most of our electronics\u2014and we\u2019ve already had some too-close-for-comfort near misses Powerful outbursts from the sun\u2014like this bright, flashing solar flare and the adjacent eruption of hot glowing gas\u2014can wreak havoc with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[1915,1191,1914,34425,32237,739,786],"class_list":["post-67734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","category-survival-2","tag-electromagnetic-pulse","tag-electronics","tag-emp","tag-phil-plait","tag-scientific-american","tag-solar-flare","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67734"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67734\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67735,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67734\/revisions\/67735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}