The Strongest Solar Storm in 20 Years Was Mostly Harmless, but We May Not Be So Lucky Next Time (2024)

May 16, 2024

6 min read

The Strongest Solar Storm in 20 Years Did Little Damage, but Worse Space Weather Is Coming

Years of careful planning helped safeguard against last weekend’s severe space weather, but we still don’t know how we’d cope with a monster event

By Jonathan O'Callaghan & Lee Billings

The Strongest Solar Storm in 20 Years Was Mostly Harmless, but We May Not Be So Lucky Next Time (1)

For years, we have been warned about impending doom from the sun. If pointed in our direction, powerful eruptions of radiation and plasma from our star can strike our planet to supercharge Earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field, effectively hitting a global “reset” button on much of our modern technology. A sufficiently intense bombardment could raise a geomagnetic storm that would push satellites out of orbit, short out submarine cables that suture together the Internet and plunge the world into darkness with massive blackouts from collapsed power grids. Yet this past weekend, when one of the strongest solar outbursts in 20 years blasted our planet, we managed to emerge unscathed thanks to years of careful public and private planning. The storm has ebbed, although the solar region that sparked it has since spat out additional monstrous flares—fortunately no longer targeted at Earth because of the sun’s spin. But while we’ve passed our biggest test yet, experts say now is not the time to let down our guard: the question of more cataclysmic solar activity isn’t a matter of “if” but “when.”

“This is a success story,” says Shawn Dahl, a space weather forecaster at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) in Boulder, Colo., but the weekend’s storm was “nowhere close” to the strength of more powerful known historical events. Is it time to put our feet up? “Heck no,” he says.

On May 8, after ground- and space-based telescopes detected multiple explosive outbursts from the sun headed for Earth, the SWPC issued a warning of an imminent severe space weather event. At least seven of these outbursts, known as coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, walloped our planet with billions of tons of solar plasma—an interplanetary punch that left Earth’s magnetic field ringing and made the upper atmosphere swell, almost as if bruised. The resulting geomagnetic storm was the most severe since 2003. It posed potentially grave dangers to global infrastructure while also bathing much of the world in achingly beautiful auroral displays.

On supporting science journalism

If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.

At present, it’s difficult to say just how close we came to catastrophe because many companies—from grid controllers to satellite operators—do not like to reveal information on how a geomagnetic storm affected them, says Daniel Welling, a climate and space scientist at the University of Michigan. “They don’t want to look like they’re vulnerable,” he says. “Satellite operators have to insure their spacecraft, and that can be very expensive.” Yet various scattered reports are already offering some insight into the storm’s disruptive effects. Flight trackers showed airlines rerouting planes to avoid Earth’s poles, where crews and passengers would have been exposed to worrisome spikes in cosmic radiation from the storm. Transpower, New Zealand’s state-owned enterprise running that nation’s electric power, said in a statement that it had preemptively “switched off some circuits across the country on Saturday [May 11],” and as a result, there was “no impact on New Zealand’s electricity supply.” In Minnesota, the firm Minnesota Power opened capacitor banks to deal with possible effects from the storm. Similar precautions were likely taken at other power grids around the world, too, although the lack of information makes it “tremendously” difficult to know how effective those measures were, Welling says.

Geomagnetic storms can also play havoc with signals from GPS satellites, and multiple farmers reported issues with GPS-guided farming equipment over the weekend. In South Dakota, one farmer’s tractor started driving in circles during the storm, and multiple farmers reported outages on social media. “Our GPS on both the planter and the strip tiller were absolutely bonkers today,” one commenter wrote on Reddit. “I saw this post and looked ... no GPS,” said another. LandMark Implement, a John Deere dealership based in Nebraska and Kansas, texted its customers an advisory to “turn off” GPS devices on their farming equipment. “The base stations were sending out corrections that have been affected by the geomagnetic storm and were causing drastic shifts in the field,” the company noted in an online post. LandMark declined to comment further when contacted.

The storm posed hazards in space as well. Seven astronauts on the International Space Station were mostly safe from the storm’s effects, NASA said, but did have to take some precautions. “The crew was told to avoid lower-shielded areas of the space station out of an abundance of caution,” says Sandra Jones, a spokesperson for NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “Certain areas provide less protection from radiation, such as the air lock, while other areas, such as crew quarters, provide enhanced protection. The crew was never in any danger, and the energy levels have since decreased.” Other satellite operators experienced greater difficulties. One company in the U.K., Sen, which streams 4K video from a satellite in low-Earth orbit, chose to power down its spacecraft for four days to prevent any damage from the storm, such as fried circuit boards or electronic failures. “It was in an idle mode,” says Marcin Bujar, spacecraft operations lead at Sen. “We just kept the bare minimum on—the flight computer and radio receiver.” This prevented the satellite from carrying out some tasks, including planned observations of flooding in South America and wildfires in Canada. “It definitely had an impact,” Bujar says.

Larger groups of satellites, such as SpaceX’s 6,000-strong Starlink mega constellation that beams the Internet to Earth from low-Earth orbit, were affected too, although the full impact is unknown. “It’s always a scary time for satellite operators when there’s a big storm,” says Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. Elon Musk, SpaceX’s CEO, merely noted on X that the satellites were “under a lot of pressure” but “holding up so far.” In February 2022 the company lost 38 freshly launched Starlink satellites after those spacecraft prematurely reentered Earth’s suddenly swollen atmosphere because of excess drag from a geomagnetic storm, but such issues seem to have been avoided this time: another Starlink launch proceeded as planned over the weekend, successfully deploying 23 satellites into a higher orbit less susceptible to such effects. Sangeetha Jyothi, a computer scientist at the University of California, Irvine, says the geomagnetic storm does seem to have increased delays in Starlink satellites communicating with the ground, though. “We can see some impact, but it was not disastrous,” she says. For ground-based Internet infrastructure supplied through submarine cables, the storm was “not strong enough” to cause any issues, she adds.

Atmospheric swelling caused by the solar storm proved especially notable on the Hubble Space Telescope, which despite orbiting hundreds of kilometers above our planet still descends slowly earthward because of drag. The storm doubled Hubble’s rate of orbital decay to “about 80 meters a day instead of 40 meters a day,” McDowell says. Claire Andreoli, a spokesperson at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, told Scientific American that Hubble is currently estimated to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere “in the mid-2030s.” Without boosts from other spacecraft, however, further bouts of solar activity could make Hubble’s swan song come years earlier, lessening the amount of time that astronomers have with one of the most advanced telescopes ever built. “It’s kind of unfortunate to be at the whims of the sun,” says JJ Hermes, an astronomer at Boston University.

Overall, however, our planet seems to have mostly survived its latest solar tirade—society, and civilization as a whole, have not come to a premature end. “I was a bit surprised how much of a nothing-burger it was,” McDowell says. But don’t pop the champagne just yet. While big, this storm is not the extent of what we can expect to face in the coming decades—or perhaps much sooner as the sun heads toward the peak of its 11-year activity cycle in 2025. Measuring the strength of any given geomagnetic storm is difficult because there are many factors at play on Earth and in space, but a crude number can be given. Geomagnetic storm strengths can be expressed in nanoteslas (nT) based on measurements of Earth’s magnetic field, which has a baseline of –20 nT. The most powerful recorded geomagnetic storms in history, the Carrington Event of 1859 and the New York Railroad Storm of 1921, both registered at around –900 nT, although the former was potentially as high as –1,750 nT. Last weekend’s storm came in at a more sedate –412 nT, Dahl says. “Even though this was historic, it was nowhere close to the level of 1921 and 1859,” he says.

Over the past decade, much has been made of the potential threat of solar storms, thanks to work by the SWPC and other organizations. In 2020 the U.S. government passed the Promoting Research and Observations of Space Weather to Improve the Forecasting of Tomorrow (PROSWIFT) Act to “develop formal mechanisms to transition space weather research models and capabilities to operations,” NOAA said in a 2023 news release. That has been hugely beneficial, Dahl says, to “make sure that space weather is treated much more respectfully. We are much more prepared than we were 10 years ago.” The outcome, in the U.S. and abroad, has bolstered our space weather forecasts, giving us our best warnings yet on the impending danger from a solar barrage. Last weekend’s solar storm shows that this diligent preparatory work has not been in vain. This time around, everything went according to plan. But when a much stronger Carrington-esque storm hits, will we be ready? “The sun is a powerful enemy,” McDowell says. “We haven’t seen the worst it can do.”

The Strongest Solar Storm in 20 Years Was Mostly Harmless, but We May Not Be So Lucky Next Time (2024)

FAQs

What was the strongest solar storm in history? ›

The most significant known solar storm, across the most parameters, occurred in September 1859 and is known as the "Carrington event".

Will the solar storm hit the Earth? ›

When will a solar storm hit Earth next? The Sun follows an 11-year cycle of solar activity, with the next peak expected in July 2025. During this period, up to 115 sunspots, which are often sites of solar flares and coronal mass ejections, are anticipated.

Will a solar storm hit Earth in 2024? ›

The Strongest Solar Storm in 20 Years Did Little Damage, but Worse Space Weather Is Coming. Dazzling auroras—like this one over northwestern England—were the most noticeable effects of a powerful geomagnetic storm that struck Earth on May 10, 2024.

What would happen if a Carrington Event happened today? ›

If a Carrington storm occurred today, it would have significant consequences for our digital, hyper-connected society. An extreme solar event could lead to global air traffic restrictions because of heightened radiation doses at altitude.

Will a solar storm hit Earth in 2025? ›

With the current period of high activity, scientists predict “at least a few more G4 events between now and 2025,” Bettwy said. But the elevated risk of solar storms could last into 2026, because some evidence suggests CMEs may become more common on the back side of the peak in solar activity.

Can geomagnetic storms hurt humans? ›

While the sun can produce solar flares that can damage machinery and technology, there's little evidence to suggest solar flares have dangerous effects on humans. Read on to learn more.

What is the NASA warning for 2024? ›

The new, rapidly approaching asteroid has been termed as 2024 JV33, which belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids in outer space. Is JV33 in the asteroid group in space? Yes, JV33 is a major asteroid project, seen typically near the Earth, which is now approaching our planet extremely fast.

Why does the Sun look weird today in 2024? ›

The Sun has been active all of 2024, spewing out flares and coronal mass ejections, which are clouds of charged particles. Things got extra hectic when a huge and complicated cluster of sunspots unleashed several solar flares.

Can a solar storm burn the earth? ›

While electromagnetic fluctuations from solar flares can disrupt satellites, interrupt power grids, or jam communication equipment, "there simply isn't enough energy in the sun to send a killer fireball 93 million miles to destroy Earth," says NASA.

What will happen to the Sun in 2028? ›

A total solar eclipse will occur at the Moon's descending node of orbit on Saturday, July 22, 2028, with a magnitude of 1.056. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby totally or partly obscuring the image of the Sun for a viewer on Earth.

What is the Sun going to do in 2025? ›

Leading up to this event, there is a period of increased solar activity — from sunspots and solar flares to spectacular northern and southern lights. The current solar cycle began in 2019 and scientists predict it will peak sometime in 2024 or 2025 before the Sun returns to a lower level of activity in the early 2030s.

How to survive a solar storm? ›

Follow the Emergency Alert System instructions carefully. Restrict phone usage to emergency situations only to keep lines open for emergency personnel and improve thier response time. Avoid using elevators. Review evacuation plans, supply lists such as medications, and family contact lists.

What was the worst solar storm in history? ›

In 1859, British astronomer Richard Carrington saw a blast of white light on the surface of the sun. This was the Carrington Event, as scientists now call it, and it is the largest recorded solar storm ever recorded.

Will the solar storm cause a blackout? ›

When a solar coronal mass ejection (CME) hits earth's magnetosphere, the CME generates voltage that is superimposed on the electric energy grid. Coronal mass ejection voltage can create currents on the grid that can lead to transformer failures and blackouts.

How likely is another Carrington Event? ›

A study published in 2019 found the chance of a Carrington-like event occurring before 2029 is less than 1.9 percent. “A Carrington Event is one of those kinds of things that you kind of want to have happen,” Halford says, “because we think we can weather it.”

What is the highest level solar storm? ›

Solar Radiation Storms
ScaleDescriptionAverage Frequency (1 cycle = 11 years)
S 5ExtremeFewer than 1 per cycle
S 4Severe3 per cycle
S 3Strong10 per cycle
S 2Moderate25 per cycle
1 more row

Has there ever been a G5 geomagnetic storm? ›

Traveling at speeds up to 3 million mph, the CMEs bunched up in waves that reached Earth starting May 10, creating a long-lasting geomagnetic storm that reached a rating of G5 — the highest level on the geomagnetic storm scale, and one that hasn't been seen since 2003.

What is the strongest storm in the solar system? ›

The largest storm in the solar system, a 10,000-mile-wide anticyclone called the Great Red Spot, has decorated Jupiter's surface for hundreds of years.

How strong was the 1989 solar storm? ›

The transit time and speed of the first (second) interplanetary CME shock are 54.5 hr (31.5 hr) and 760 km/s (1,320 km/s). Empirical relations are used to estimate solar wind speed and southward interplanetary magnetic field, Bs, and give values of v = 980 km/s, Bs = 40 to 60 nT at the peak of the storm.

References

Top Articles
Latest Posts
Recommended Articles
Article information

Author: Barbera Armstrong

Last Updated:

Views: 5743

Rating: 4.9 / 5 (59 voted)

Reviews: 82% of readers found this page helpful

Author information

Name: Barbera Armstrong

Birthday: 1992-09-12

Address: Suite 993 99852 Daugherty Causeway, Ritchiehaven, VT 49630

Phone: +5026838435397

Job: National Engineer

Hobby: Listening to music, Board games, Photography, Ice skating, LARPing, Kite flying, Rugby

Introduction: My name is Barbera Armstrong, I am a lovely, delightful, cooperative, funny, enchanting, vivacious, tender person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.