Will Solar Flare Create Static?

Around 12:06 p.m EDT on Sept 10, 2017, NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory captured an image of the sun unleashing a massive solar flare from a recently active region. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however — when intense enough — they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel.  Per NASA,

NASAA series of rapid-fire solar flares is providing the first chance to test a new theory of why the sun releases its biggest outbursts when its activity is ramping down. Migrating bands of magnetism that meet at the sun’s equator may cause the biggest flares, even as the sun is going to sleep.

Global positioning system and radio transmissions may be degraded through Saturday as two solar eruptions strike Earth and affect its magnetic field. The U.S. Space Weather Prediction Centre is tracking two two coronal mass ejections, “huge expulsions of magnetic field and plasma” that shot out of an area near the centre of the sun’s disc.

WASHINGTON — A solar storm zapped Earth on Friday but caused few, if any, problems. It also allowed more people to see the colourful northern lights. Space Weather Prediction Center forecaster Chris Smith said the storm left the sun on Wednesday and first arrived on Earth at 9:55 a.m. EDT, and will continue disrupting the magnetic field through Saturday. It will likely only be noticed by specialized equipment. He said it was a strong hit for Earth — the biggest since June last year. But he said the strongest of the energized particles went just above Earth.

NASA

In 1859, an invisible wave crashed into the Earth. Electrons, swept up like so much detritus in the magnetic current, coursed along telegraph wires. When they met an obstacle, like the hand of a telegraph operator, they crashed through it — delivering a sharp shock.

NASA In 1859, an invisible wave crashed into the Earth.

NASA’s Orion spacecraft — launched earlier Friday morning on its maiden voyage into space — has come back to Earth, splashing down about 600 miles west of Baja California in the Pacific Ocean at 11:29 a.m. EST.