Scientists have confirmed that solar maximum, a phenomenon that occurs every 11 years and sees our sun firing bursts of energy earthward, has arrived, with research suggesting severe solar storms could wreak havoc on the internet.
These events are a godsend for aurora hunters, causing the eye-catching Northern Light displays that have lit up skies around the world in recent months.
NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the Solar Cycle Prediction Panel confirmed during a teleconference that the sun as in now in its solar maximum period which could last for a year.
Jamie Favors, director the Space Weather Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington said: “During solar maximum, the number of sunspots, and therefore, the amount of solar activity, increases.
“This increase in activity provides an exciting opportunity to learn about our closest star, but also causes real effects at Earth and throughout our solar system,” he added.
The sun is an electrically-charged hot gas which generates a magnetic field that stretches from pole to pole. This is known among experts as the dipole field.
But every 11 years or so, the north and south poles switch places and in the middle of the flip, the solar maximum, there is a peak number of sunspots – producing the more extreme space weather.
A 2021, Sangeetha Abdu Jyothi a computer science expert at the University of California Irvine published a study which found vulnerabilities in the undersea communications cables which power the web could see the internet crippled for weeks in the event of a severe solar storm, MailOnline reports.
The study estimated that a failure on that scale could cost the U.S. economy as much as $7 billion (£5.3bn) per day, USA Today reports.
Though the electromagnetic fluctuations spewed out by solar storms don’t cause direct damage to the fibre optic cables that enable web connectivity across the globe, it’s feared they could take out signal boosters placed along submarine cables neccessary to maintain long-distance connections, as per The Mail.
Though it’s not certain solar storms could cause mass outages, the research predicted a 1.6–12 per cent chance that catastrophic disruption could occur in the next decade.
The exact peak of this solar maximum period may not be determinable for months as scientists can only identify it by observing consistent decline in solar activity following the peak.
Though the solar events aren’t a risk to humans they can affect satellites orbiting earth as well as domestic power grids.
Dr Dibyendu Nandi, a physicist at the IISER Kolkata Center of Excellence in Space Sciences in India, told MailOnline the chances of these solar storms rises “when the number of sunspots are high”.
“The most intense storms can sometimes result in catastrophic orbital decay of low Earth orbiting satellites and disrupt satellite based services such as communications and navigational networks,” he added.
“They can also induce strong disturbances in the geomagnetic field tripping electric power grids located in high latitude regions. Of course, they also create beautiful auroras so we can expect 2024 to be a good year for aurora hunters.”
