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The UK is ready for a rise in Northern Lights sightings over the approaching weeks and months, the Met Office has forecast, as we enter a interval of extreme space weather.
The Northern Lights, or the aurora borealis, happen when exercise on the floor of the Sun causes solar radiation to collide with the Earth’s ambiance.
Forecasters on the Met Office Space Weather Operations Centre warned {that a} peak within the Sun’s 11-year exercise cycle, recognized as a solar maximum, will trigger a rise of coronal mass ejections from the star’s floor.
“While the solar cycle doesn’t help determine specific space weather events, what it does is help our forecasters understand the context of their forecasts,” stated Met Office space weather supervisor Simon Machin.
“In its simplest terms, the solar cycle is linked to the number and intensity of sunspots that are visible on the surface of the Sun. This affects the likelihood of space weather events impacting the Earth.”
The coronal mass ejection occasions might doubtlessly show damaging to terrestrial infrastructure, with the ensuing geomagnetic storms inflicting each a rise in aurora borealis occurences, as nicely as disruption to satellites, electrical energy grids and telecommunications methods.
The Met Office stated the danger of blackouts might improve as auroras stretch to extra southern latitudes, nonetheless predicting when they’ll happen has proved notoriously tough.
An illustration of solar storms
(Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Certain exercise on the floor of the Sun can point out when the solar maximum may happen, although space consultants warn it isn’t attainable to forecast the precise date.
“One of the curious things about the solar maximum is that it’s not possible to declare it has occurred until after it has happened and when you observe that reduction in sunspot activity,” stated Mr Machin.
“We know that the solar maximum increases the chances of space weather events impacting the Earth, but even as you move away from it through 2024 into 2025 and beyond, the Sun will continue to emit solar flares and geomagnetic storms. This means that further auroral displays are likely, as well as an ongoing chance of potentially impactful space weather events.”
Other space weather prediction centres have estimated that the solar maximum will happen sooner or later between February and September 2024, with researchers on the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research publishing their forecast final month within the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters.
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