● Current Conditions at 01:50 UTC on July 10
"STRONG SOLAR FLARES CAN CAUSE SIGNIFICANT GEOMAGNETIC PULSATIONS IN <1 HOUR! UPDATE: 6.8 M-flare was launched DIRECTLY after I wrote this, check out the video I made on ithttps://youtu.be/9Zw_QUT4XFI
Typically with space-weather reporting when a solar flare occurs, attention is drawn to how the solar plasma will propagate out into the interplanetary medium, and forecasts are made for whether the flare will hit Earth and when. Typical velocities for a flare are 500-800+ km/s, so an expected arrival of 1 to 2+ days is given, and then it still remains to be seen whether the space weather will couple to Earth's magnetosphere in a significant way and cause a geomagnetic storm. BUT solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and filament eruptions not only have a plasma component but also a light component! All photons travel at the same speed (300,000 km/s in a vacuum), no matter their frequency (radio to gamma/cosmic), and a spike in extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) and X-ray radiation is practically a given with a solar flare, it's actually how solar flares are given their class ratings (like M-class or the more powerful X-class).
What I am drawing your attention to here with this data is the 4.0 M-class solar flare on that occurred on July 7th, 2023 (top red arrow). It lasted for about 2.5 hours, and 30 minutes after it ended a significant 45 min long geomagnetic pulsation (bottom red arrow) was observed at the SOS ENATTOS mine in Sardinia, Italy, South Europe. Being shielded from most background electromagnetic disturbances, this 0.2 - 105 Hz magnetic field observation station is an ideal location for monitoring the Schumann resonances and PC1 (0.2-5 Hz) geomagnetic pulsations.
To summarize, what we are seeing here is
A) a large spike in EUV and X-ray radiation from the Sun, which
B) began to ionize Earth's ionosphere within ~8 minutes (150,000,000 km / 300,000 km/s), which
C) changed the electromagnetic potentials of the ionosphere, therefore
D) inducing new current flows in the ionosphere which then
E) created magnetic pulses at the same frequency of current pulsations.
To delve into the details even more specifically, a high-power stream of high-vibrational light photons from the Sun was absorbed into the charged ions of Earth's uppermost atmosphere known as the ionosphere (made up of electrons, protons, heavier ions), causing them to change their vibrational frequency and therefore flow more strongly on a global scale, and this newly stimulated movement of ionospheric ions then released extremely-low-frequency photons (<100 Hz) which this Schumann resonances monitoring station picked via their E-W magnetic field component vibrations.
In this way Earth's ionosphere is able to take high-frequency energy (like from a solar flare, or gamma ray burst from a distance supernova) and convert it into low-frequency energy that overlaps with human bioelectric rhythms (heart, brain, and autonomic nervous system rhythms) both in frequency (0-50+ Hz) and power (picotesla scales for magnetic and micovolts for electric).
And for everyone who read to this point, you'll also notice in the X-ray flux data the overall uptrend in x-ray energy from the Sun as measured at Earth over the past few days. With a possible geomagnetic storm forecasted for the next couple days (7.12-13.23) and with ionospheric potentials raised from all the x-ray radiation (the radiation belts are well-charged too!), it is likely we'll see some interesting activity in the Schumann resonances over the next few days!"
Weather of Arabia - Analysts from the US National Weather Service (NOAA) and NASA agreed to predict that the Earth's magnetic field would encounter coronal mass body energy (CME) between July 14 and 15. According to reports by SpaceWeather.com , the collision could lead to G1-class solar storms, with aurorae appearing in high-latitude regions. The particle cloud was launched into space on July 11 by a magnetic filament that exploded in the sun's southern hemisphere.
What is a magnetic thread?
In the context of heliophysics, the term "magnetic filament" or "filament" refers to a long, thin structure made of plasma (ionized gas) that appears as a dark or cool feature against the Sun's hotter background light. The filament is also known as a solar flare when viewed from a different angle. The filament is usually associated with magnetic fields and is usually found at the boundaries of active regions on the Sun's surface. The filaments can stretch thousands of kilometers and are held in place by magnetic forces within the sun's atmosphere. Sometimes, these filaments can become unstable and explode, releasing energy and particles into space. This is known as a magnetic filament implosion.
Continued
THE BASTILLE DAY EVENT: You know a solar flare is strong when even the Voyager spacecraft feel it. Twenty-three years ago today (July 14, 2000), the sun exploded with so much force it sent shockwaves to the edge of the solar system.
Above: SOHO images of the X5.7-class Bastille Day solar flare (left) and CME (right). Blinding "snow" in the images is a result of energetic protons hitting the spacecraft
At about 11 a.m. in western Europe, where Bastille Day celebrations were underway in France, Earth-orbiting satellites reported an X5.7-class solar flare. Within the hour, energetic particles accelerated by the flare reached our planet. Protons and electrons hit the atmosphere and created a cascade of radiation that reached all the way to the ground--a rare "GLE."
"People flying in commercial jets at high latitudes would have received double their usual radiation dose," says Clive Dyer of the University of Surrey Space Centre in Guildford UK, who studies extreme space weather. "It was quite an energetic event--one of the strongest of the past 20 years."
A day later the CME arrived. Its impact on July 15, 2000, sparked an extreme (Kp=9) geomagnetic storm. The sun had just set on the east coast of North America when the auroras appeared.
Red auroras over Troutman, North Carolina, on July 15, 2000. Credit: Ronnie Sherrill
"I was out in the yard doing chores and saw bright red auroras overhead," recalls Uwe Heine of Caswell County, North Carolina. "I called over to our neighbor, Carrie, who was also outside. I told her those were not sunset colors. It was an aurora, and super rare to see this far south!"
In New York, the sky exploded with light, recalls Lou Michael Moure. "I was living on Long Island at the time. A family member came running into my room, begging me to come outside to see 'the sky on fire.' Hues of white and green eventually gave way to reds that blanketed the heavens from horizon to horizon."
By the time the storm subsided on July 16, 2000, auroras had been reported as far south as Texas, Florida and Mexico.
The Bastille Day Event is special to researchers. It was the first major solar storm after the 1995 launch of SOHO, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory. Data from the young satellite taught researchers a lot, very quickly, about the physics of extreme flares.
Above: A modern MHD computer simulation of the Bastille Day explosion. Credit: Tibor Török et al., The Astrophysical Journal, 856:75 (22pp), 2018 March 2
Tibor Török of Predictive Science, Inc., is one of many researchers still studying the Bastille Day Event. He recently applied a modern magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) computer model to some of the data, and found that 1033 ergs of magnetic energy were released in the explosion--about the same as a thousand billion WWII atomic bombs.
No wonder the Voyagers felt it.
It took the Bastille Day CME months to reach the distant spacecraft--180 days to Voyager 2, and 245 days to Voyager 1. Being near the edge of the solar system, both spacecraft were normally bathed in high levels of cosmic rays. The CME swept aside that ambient radiation, creating a temporary reduction called a "Forbush Decrease." Conditions did not return to normal until 3 to 4 months later. Finally, the storm was over.
