This week a mild Coronal Mass Ejection off the sun blasted past Earth. It was only a mild CME with solar winds at 500km per second, which is a medium kind of speed. The experts were all predicting a G1 class Geomagnetic storm, and were a bit astonished when we got much bigger G3 storm instead. (NOAA’s G scale runs from G1 up to G5).

This occurred near the minimum weak point of the solar cycle, and we’re going to get much bigger blasts as Cycle 25 ramps up. But if mild CMEs can rattle the Earth’s magnetic field this much, things might get much more exciting when moderate or strong CME’s shake the cage. Satellites and networks could be in trouble. “Grid’s Away”…

Is Earths magnetic field weaker or more vulnerable than we thought? How could we miss that?

As Cap Allon of Electroverse said:

“Nobody saw the KP Index hitting 7.

…when I say nobody, I mean nobody predicted this: not NASA, NOAA, ESA or IPS in Australia.”

It was not dense, and the filament released was hardly cause for concern.

“There is absolutely nothing in the history of […]