DoomsdaysCW on Nostr: via #SpaceWeather.com "THE GREAT SOLAR STORM OF MARCH 1940: This story is shocking. ...
via #SpaceWeather.com
"THE GREAT SOLAR STORM OF MARCH 1940: This story is shocking. On March 24, 1940, a solar storm hit Earth so hard it made copper wires in the United States crackle with 800 volts of electricity. A New York Times headline declared that a 'sunspot tornado' had arrived, playing havoc with any signal that had to travel through metal wires.
"What caused the high voltages? Love's team examined old magnetogram records from the date of the storm and found evidence that two coronal mass ejections #CMEs hit Earth only 1.82 hours apart. The double blow rattled Earth's magnetic field in a complicated way most single CMEs do not.
"This could be a harbinger of things to come," says Love. Modern studies show that as many as 5 CMEs leave the sun every day during Solar Maximum. With #solarcycle25 underway and intensifying, a double hit could definitely happen again.
"A similar storm today might not significantly impact communications; we live in the wireless age of cell phones. Electricity is another matter. Modern power systems depend on long wires to shuttle electricity across the country. A repeat of 1940 could interfere with their operations. Love notes that the 1940 voltages exceed NERC power-grid industry benchmarks for 100-year storms. As a result, some modern power grids might not be ready to handle the shock of another 1940 event."
Published at
2023-08-10 14:48:31Event JSON
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"content": "via #SpaceWeather.com\n\n\"THE GREAT SOLAR STORM OF MARCH 1940: This story is shocking. On March 24, 1940, a solar storm hit Earth so hard it made copper wires in the United States crackle with 800 volts of electricity. A New York Times headline declared that a 'sunspot tornado' had arrived, playing havoc with any signal that had to travel through metal wires. \n\n\"What caused the high voltages? Love's team examined old magnetogram records from the date of the storm and found evidence that two coronal mass ejections #CMEs hit Earth only 1.82 hours apart. The double blow rattled Earth's magnetic field in a complicated way most single CMEs do not.\n\n\"This could be a harbinger of things to come,\" says Love. Modern studies show that as many as 5 CMEs leave the sun every day during Solar Maximum. With #solarcycle25 underway and intensifying, a double hit could definitely happen again.\n\n\"A similar storm today might not significantly impact communications; we live in the wireless age of cell phones. Electricity is another matter. Modern power systems depend on long wires to shuttle electricity across the country. A repeat of 1940 could interfere with their operations. Love notes that the 1940 voltages exceed NERC power-grid industry benchmarks for 100-year storms. As a result, some modern power grids might not be ready to handle the shock of another 1940 event.\"\n\nhttps://spaceweather.com/images2023/09aug23/headline_strip.jpg",
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