posted on Mar, 17 2013 @ 05:28 PM
Originally posted by poet1b
If CMEs usually create mild to moderate effects, will this effect increase consideray with a direct hit?
Yes. The effect of a CME on the earth falls into two categories - there's an energetic effect where you have charged particles (hydrogen plasma)
moving at a high rate of speed hit the magnetic field of the Earth. This causes a shock wave, the ionosphere and magnetosphere will oscillate back and
forth sort of like when you put your hand out the window of a moving car. The effect of this on US is that it induces what we call 'geomagnetic
heave'. The effect of heave is to induce a pseudo-DC offset current into long power lines. Enough of that, and you get saturation of transformers,
followed by a loud, bright, multicolored 'bang'.
The other effect is to put trapped high speed particles into loops in the inner magnetosphere/upper ionosphere, where they'll loop around and around
for weeks, smacking into satellites in LEO. That's a problem, because they cause damage to solar panels, and when they hit metal they convert the
energy into x-rays which damage electronics. If it gets to be ENOUGH of a problem, we'll fire up some devices that'll divert the particles into the
ionosphere, you'll get some pretty lights and the problem will end.
Do CMEs shooting out no where near us create mild to moderate effects? And if so, what can we expect from a direct hit?
No. If it's a miss, no effect. The bigger the CME, the more particle issues, the faster the CME, the more power line issues.
edit on 17-3-2013
by Bedlam because: (no reason given)