An unusually strong solar storm headed toward Earth could produce northern lights in the U.S. this weekend and potentially disrupt power and communications.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a rare geomagnetic storm watch — the first in nearly 20 years. That was expected to become a warning Friday night, when the effects of the solar outburst were due to reach Earth. NOAA already has alerted operators of power plants and spacecraft in orbit to take precautions.
NOAA said the sun produced strong solar flares beginning Wednesday, resulting in five outbursts of plasma capable of disrupting satellites in orbit and power grids here on Earth. Each eruption — known as a coronal mass ejection — can contain billions of tons of plasma and magnetic field from the sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona.
The flares seem to be associated with a sunspot that’s 16 times the diameter of Earth, according to NOAA. An extreme geomagnetic storm in 2003 took out power in Sweden and damaged power transformers in South Africa.
The latest storm could produce northern lights as far south in the U.S. as Alabama and Northern California, according to NOAA.
How do you even prepare for something like this? Should I unplug my computer and put it in a foil lined box?
From my (limited) understanding you will probably be fine, bit if you want to be on the safer side unplug your pc, but it probs will not be a big deal. What I would do is try to see if you can see the lights!!!
use a surge protector
if you're feeling particularly paranoid, power down your computer and unplug it from everything. That's a bit drastic, though.
$200 cash in small bills, several large water bottles, and probably nothing happens.
The real answer is you prepare your power grid to handle fluctuations with dampers and remotely operated breakers that can quickly isolate sections of the grid as necessary. The real problem is the high voltage transmission lines which are basically miles-long antennae which will have electrical current induced in them by the electromagnetic fluctuations.
At your local/house level there isn't much you really need to worry about other than being generally prepared for brown/blackouts, and also expect that GPS signal may be unreliable for a day or two. Otherwise if you're far enough north, enjoy the aurora.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0E5dt0H_sI
A briefing from the NOAA an hour ago.
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/media-advisory-noaa-forecasts-severe-solar-storm-media-availability-scheduled-friday-may-10
Here's the NOAA's announcement.
Hot damn. The Wyoming-Colorado border is usually where it stops being visible during severe storms. I'm super curious to see if I can spot it tomorrow night around there.
I'm near there too, excited to see if I can catch anything.
Bonus: the ISS is passing overhead around 940
