For those of us familiar with it, the 1859 Carrington event was a harbinger of what is possible from the sun. For those not familiar look here
Imagine if one will in today's culture what such an event might cause. In 1859 there were no satellite constellations, no national power grid, no radios or computers with delicate circuitry. The telegraph system was pretty much brute force. Today our comms depend on a lot of vulnerable equipment. A Carrington event is arguably worse than an thermonuclear exchange in the possible wide spread destruction wreaked on power grids and infrastructure. I say arguably because we do not have empirical knowledge of a thermonuclear exchange (although we do have some information from single weapon testing detonations) and we have very limited knowledge of the 1859 event. Either way my purpose here is not to argue which is worse. BOTH have similar effects. My objective in this thread is for us to consider the effects of a Carrington event, CME or thermonuclear exchange would have on what our objective in this sub section of DEFCON is about- communicating by radio. The sun and nuclear detonations directly affect how successfully we do or dont communicate. We have been through several solar cycles of comparative quiet. New ops may not remember earlier more severe solar cycles because they either were not ops at that time or they are too young. Depending on which forecast(s) you have read---and each op that contemplates doing Health and Human Services comms or any type of comms during disaster is well served to become familiar with different predictions and consider- and discuss with other ops in the various groups and networks one is involved with, how different possibilities might effect the ability of the group to communicate ----particularly when comms that may be vital for survival on any scale are involved. As an op participating in disaster communications it is well to remember that you will hold the lives of other people in your hands.
Today may well be a case in point. As of my writing this at 0136Z 5/22, looking at the SWPC site
the GOES X Ray Flux page here
shows that we have had, since 1930 Z on 5/21, 5 C Class events and 2 low M class events. So what one might wonder. These are LOW intensity events. On the Radio dashboard
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/radio-communications
look at D Region absorption. Play the movie in the pane on the left hand side of the page. This updates fairly frequently and you will see the maximum attenuation OBSERVED with each event. Note that these are observations NOT predictions.....the minor M Class event on 5/22 at 2140Z caused a 12 dB attenuation at 5 MHz, 8 dB on 40 M(7MHz) 4 dB at 10MHz...... consider if you were an op working a 75 M traffic net, what it would be like to experience this.......suddenly a 25 dB signal loss for everyone on the network.
Today has been an active day at comparatively low levels but at higher levels than many ops have experienced. Going back to forecasts, one article recently from NatGeo
and a prediction released in October of last year is here
again consider and discuss what might be the eventualities and how one might deal with them.
SWPC is excellent, stable site, lots of information.
The Solar Dynamics observatory
has occasional stability problems. For part of the day today when I wanted to look at what the sun was doing here
the site was down. Browser timeouts. Did not respond to pings or traceroutes. So be advised.
Additionally the STEREO site
was having trouble providing images. Stereo is important in that the two satellites involved in their way of looking at the sun will show whether an X Ray event causes a Coronal Mass Ejection and whether it is earth directed.
What I have done here is to scrape the surface of a somewhat involved and (to me) fascinating subject that affects how successfully we are able to communicate. Those of us that are experienced ops will already be familiar with most of what I have posted. For those of you that are newer to the hobby, this is only an introduction. Anything I am able to do to help anyone understand this please feel free to ask.
There is also this site
with good information and background on what I have mentioned here.
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Carrington Event - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
A Perfect Solar Superstorm: The 1859 Carrington Event | HISTORY
In 1859 a massive solar flare spewed electrified gas and subatomic particles toward Earth, wreaking havoc on telegraph networks.
www.history.com
Today may well be a case in point. As of my writing this at 0136Z 5/22, looking at the SWPC site
Observations | NOAA / NWS Space Weather Prediction Center
www.swpc.noaa.gov
GOES X-ray Flux | NOAA / NWS Space Weather Prediction Center
www.swpc.noaa.gov
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/communities/radio-communications
look at D Region absorption. Play the movie in the pane on the left hand side of the page. This updates fairly frequently and you will see the maximum attenuation OBSERVED with each event. Note that these are observations NOT predictions.....the minor M Class event on 5/22 at 2140Z caused a 12 dB attenuation at 5 MHz, 8 dB on 40 M(7MHz) 4 dB at 10MHz...... consider if you were an op working a 75 M traffic net, what it would be like to experience this.......suddenly a 25 dB signal loss for everyone on the network.
Today has been an active day at comparatively low levels but at higher levels than many ops have experienced. Going back to forecasts, one article recently from NatGeo
The sun is getting stormier, and it’ll peak just in time for a total solar eclipse
The next solar cycle is ramping up, offering spacecraft an unprecedented chance to unravel the sun’s mysteries while giving people on Earth a stunning show.
www.nationalgeographic.com
again consider and discuss what might be the eventualities and how one might deal with them.
SWPC is excellent, stable site, lots of information.
The Solar Dynamics observatory
SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory
SDO is designed to help us understand the Sun's influence on Earth and Near-Earth space by studying the solar atmosphere on small scales of space and time and in many wavelengths simultaneously.
sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov
SDO | Dashboard
SDO is designed to help us understand the Sun's influence on Earth and Near-Earth space by studying the solar atmosphere on small scales of space and time and in many wavelengths simultaneously.
sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov
Additionally the STEREO site
What I have done here is to scrape the surface of a somewhat involved and (to me) fascinating subject that affects how successfully we are able to communicate. Those of us that are experienced ops will already be familiar with most of what I have posted. For those of you that are newer to the hobby, this is only an introduction. Anything I am able to do to help anyone understand this please feel free to ask.
There is also this site
Space Weather News
spaceweathernews.com
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