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How To Predict Dangerous Solar Flares
BI - Scientific American ^ | 12-16-2014 | Monica Bobra

Posted on 12/16/2014 10:38:01 AM PST by blam

Monica Bobra, Scientific American
December 16, 2014

A couple of months ago, the sun sported the largest sunspot we've seen in the last 24 years.

This monstrous spot, visible to the naked eye (that is, without magnification, but with protective eyewear of course), launched more than 100 flares.

The number of the spots on the sun ebbs and flows cyclically, every 11 years. Right now, the sun is in the most active part of this cycle: we're expecting lots of spots and lots of flares in the coming months.

Usually, the media focuses on the destructive power of solar flares — the chance that, one day, a huge explosion on the sun will fling a ton of energetic particles our way and fry our communication satellites. But there's less coverage on how we forecast these things, like the weather, so that we can prevent any potential damage.

How do you forecast a solar flare, anyway?

(snip)

(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: faradaycages; flares; maunderminimum; solar; sun; sunspot; sunspots

1 posted on 12/16/2014 10:38:01 AM PST by blam
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To: blam
Right now, the sun is in the most active part of this cycle: we're expecting lots of spots and lots of flares in the coming months.

So she says. They've said that for several years now.

2 posted on 12/16/2014 10:56:32 AM PST by Balding_Eagle (The Gruber Revelations are proof that God is still smiling on America.)
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To: blam

10% chance of X-class solar flare TODAY.


3 posted on 12/16/2014 10:58:11 AM PST by UCANSEE2 (Lost my tagline on Flight MH370. Sorry for the inconvenience.)
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To: Balding_Eagle
It may very well be true, i.e. most active part of this relatively inactive cycle.

Would be nice if they gave us the whole picture, especially if this involves very difficult science such as predicting solar flares.

4 posted on 12/16/2014 11:00:04 AM PST by who_would_fardels_bear
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To: blam
Lots of fun stuff here - Suspicious0bservers.org
5 posted on 12/16/2014 11:00:41 AM PST by b4its2late (A Liberal is a person who will give away everything he doesn't own.)
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To: SunkenCiv

/mark


6 posted on 12/16/2014 11:00:46 AM PST by KoRn (Department of Homeland Security, Certified - "Right Wing Extremist")
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To: blam

The Carrington scaremongers trot this out at every solar cycle peak. Yes, a real Carrington event would likely screw our technological civilization badly. However, missing from every one of these articles is the point that this latest solar cycle is by far the weakest in a generation, and the next cycle promises to be weaker yet; the number of sunspots associated with this cycle is much lower than previous ones, and most of the ones we’ve had have been much smaller and weaker than in the past.

We are not at the threshold of some new, terribly active phase of the sun’s behavior. The sun is going to sleep, which is likely to wreak just as much if not more havok on civilization than sunspots. No sunspots means a weaker magnetic field, so more radiation hits the earth; it means degraded communications, and there’s good evidence that it means colder winters and poorer growing seasons. We can live without TV; we can’t live without food.


7 posted on 12/16/2014 11:04:43 AM PST by Little Pig
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To: Balding_Eagle

We are indeed at the peak of the present 11-year cycle.

What isn’t mentioned is that it is the smallest peak since the Dalton Minimum (1790-1830), when it was so cold that you could walk across Long Island sound. In 1816, there was the ‘year without a summer’ (when lakes and rivers in Pennsylvania had ice in July and August)


8 posted on 12/16/2014 11:05:43 AM PST by kidd (What we have now is the federal gruberment)
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To: blam
Scientific American pro global warming.

Accuracy Rating less than 20%

9 posted on 12/16/2014 11:18:51 AM PST by TYVets
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To: TYVets

I’m beginning to think the Hurricane Prediction people have gone over to the solar flare office.


10 posted on 12/16/2014 11:43:38 AM PST by ThePatriotsFlag ($$$$$ Don't Defund the Government...Defund Obama and his illegal policies $$$$$)
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To: blam

Our tax $ pays these nitwit PhD morons to try to predict flares and spots??? Are you kidding? That would be like creating a fractal equation to predict which hippo in which mud pond will create a fart mud bubble to pop and splash mud on a neighboring rhino in the same mud pond. To quote a Japanese businessman, “that would be very difficult”...that means, there ain’t no way that is gonna happen.


11 posted on 12/16/2014 1:37:35 PM PST by CincyRichieRich (In Times of Universal Deceit, Telling the Truth Becomes a Revolutionary Act.)
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To: KoRn; brytlea; cripplecreek; decimon; bigheadfred; Grammy; steelyourfaith; Mmogamer; dayglored; ...

Thanks KoRn, extra to APoD.


12 posted on 12/16/2014 2:02:43 PM PST by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/ _____________________ Celebrate the Polls, Ignore the Trolls)
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To: blam; SunkenCiv

The Sun is about to burp! Be afraid, be very afraid!

13 posted on 12/16/2014 4:42:29 PM PST by colorado tanker
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To: TYVets
"Scientific American pro global warming."

Yup.

I cancelled my subscription after a particularly galling GW article.

I said "drop me a line if you all decide to get back into science."

14 posted on 12/16/2014 9:59:38 PM PST by blam (Jeff Sessions For President)
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To: colorado tanker

:’)


15 posted on 12/17/2014 7:18:23 AM PST by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/ _____________________ Celebrate the Polls, Ignore the Trolls)
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To: blam
How to Predict Solar Flares (or, Why I Stopped Subscribing to Scientific American years ago). The article has modestly interesting graphics, seems to be written for a 5th-grader's vocabulary and imparts no really hard knowledge. I would have liked to know, since the alarmist press has been predicting solar flare effects that rival EMP for years now, why we have seen none of these predictions realized, nor does the article correlate the size of a given flare to any increase in EM radiation at the earth's surface. This article states that we are at the peak of the 11-year cycle, when I thought we passed the current peak a couple of years ago.
16 posted on 12/17/2014 8:43:17 AM PST by RhoTheta (US foreign policy under BO: 'Talk butchly and carry a small twig.' -- Mark Steyn)
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