[LINK] 2012 'a storm is coming'

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

Perhaps of interest .. 

'a storm is coming .. the next solar maximum should be a doozy ..'

NASA: <http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/10mar_stormwarning.htm>


* Solar Storm Warning *

March 10, 2006: It's official: Solar minimum has arrived. Sunspots have 
all but vanished. Solar flares are nonexistent. The sun is utterly quiet.

Like the quiet before a storm.

This week researchers announced that a storm is coming - the most intense 
solar maximum in fifty years. 

The prediction comes from a team led by Mausumi Dikpati, of the National 
Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). 

"The next sunspot cycle will be 30% to 50% stronger than the previous 
one," she says. 

If correct, the years ahead could produce a burst of solar activity 
second only to the historic 'Solar Max' of 1958.

That was a solar maximum. 

The Space Age was just beginning: Sputnik was launched in Oct. 1957 & 
Explorer 1 (the first US satellite) in Jan. 1958

In 1958 you couldn't tell that a solar storm was underway by looking at 
the bars on your cell phone; cell phones didn't exist. 

Even so, people knew something big was happening, when Northern Lights 
were sighted three times in Mexico. 

A similar maximum would now be noticed by its effect on cell phones, GPS, 
weather satellites, and many other modern technologies.

Dikpati's prediction is unprecedented. 

For nearly-two centuries since the 11-year sunspot cycle was discovered, 
scientists have struggled to predict the size of future maxima, and 
failed. 

Solar maxima can be intense, as in 1958, or barely detectable, as in 
1805, obeying no obvious pattern.

The key to the mystery, Dikpati realized years ago, is a conveyor belt on 
the sun.

We have something similar here on Earth—the Great Ocean Conveyor Belt, 
popularized in the sci-fi movie The Day After Tomorrow. It is a network 
of currents that carry water and heat from ocean to ocean.

The sun's conveyor belt is a current, not of water, but of electrically-
conducting gas. It flows in a loop from the sun's equator to the poles 
and back again. Just as the Great Ocean Conveyor Belt controls weather on 
Earth, this solar conveyor belt controls weather on the sun. 

Specifically, it controls the sunspot cycle.

Solar physicist David Hathaway of the National Space Science & Technology 
Center (NSSTC) explains: "First, remember what sunspots are--tangled 
knots of magnetism generated by the sun's inner dynamo. A typical sunspot 
exists for just a few weeks. Then it decays, leaving behind a 'corpse' of 
weak magnetic fields."

Enter the conveyor belt.

"The top of the conveyor belt skims the surface of the sun, sweeping up 
the magnetic fields of old sunspots. They're dragged down at the poles to 
a depth of 200,000 km where the sun's magnetic dynamo can amplify them. 
Once the corpses (magnetic knots) are reincarnated (amplified), they 
become buoyant and float back to the surface." Presto—new sunspots!

All this happens with massive slowness. "It takes about 40 years for the 
belt to complete one loop," says Hathaway. The speed varies "anywhere 
from a 50-year pace (slow) to a 30-year pace (fast)."

When the belt is turning "fast," it means that lots of magnetic fields 
are being swept up, and that a future sunspot cycle is going to be 
intense. 

This is a basis for forecasting: "The belt was turning fast in 1986-
1996," says Hathaway. 

"Old magnetic fields swept up then should re-appear as big sunspots in 
2010-2011."

Like most experts in the field, Hathaway has confidence in the conveyor 
belt model and agrees with Dikpati that the next solar maximum should be 
a doozy. 

But he disagrees with one point. 


 Dikpati's forecast puts Solar Max at 2012. 


Hathaway believes it will arrive sooner, in 2010 or 2011.

Who's right? Time will tell. 


 Either way, a storm is coming.


| Author: Dr. Tony Phillips 
| Production Editor: Dr. Tony Phillips 
| Credit: Science at NASA

<http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/10mar_stormwarning.htm>

--

Cheers :-)
Stephen