The Space Weather Prediction Center has just issued a global warning message. Throughout the weekend, the planet will be hit by a gigantic solar storm, one of the most significant in the last 20 years. Many infrastructures risk being damaged and services cut.
From a general point of view, the Sun is rather our friend. In addition to lighting us up, the star keeps us warm, just enough for life to continue on our planet and even has the luxury of offering us pretty shows with the Moon. And if we regret the occasional sunburn and the few areas of the planet to which it is not advisable to go, it is difficult to do without our star. Which doesn’t mean that the Sun doesn’t have its bad sides.
Solar storms were part of it. Concretely, a solar storm is a phenomenon during which the Sun exhibits very strong activity. For a star, this means ejecting large numbers of high-speed, electromagnetically charged particles. These particles can reach our Earth in just 3 days and cause a lot of damage, more or less significant. They are also responsible for the Northern Lights.
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A serious solar storm will hit us this weekend
However, the next solar storm promises to be very severe. And it will fall on us this weekend. You will have understood, there will be no question here of seeing our sky turn red before everything explodes around us. On the other hand, these particles ejected by the Sun risk causing damage to certain infrastructures, or even jamming certain networked systems, such as GPS. If this does not seem so serious at first glance, the experts are far from taking the matter lightly.
This storm was classified as level G4, which means it is particularly severe. For comparison, we have to go back to January 2005 for a similar alert to be launched. This is because the Sun goes through cycles, where its activity becomes more and more intense over time. These cycles last on average 11, and this current one started in 2019. So we are only halfway through.