A solar storm is expected to hit Earth on Thursday, which could cause some disruption to electronics and visible aurora up to the US border.
This type of event occurs after eruptions observed on the sun’s surface.
«[Il y a] Gas clouds, mainly charged particles, protons, electrons that are ejected from the sun’s surface, from the corona that surrounds the sun and go through the solar system and when the earth happens to land on the orbit and at that point we are of this stream unusually large particles,” explains Robert Lamontagne, coordinator at the Center for Research in Astrophysics of Quebec (CRAQ).
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Solar flares can then cause “a spate of events from the simplest, the Aurora Borealis, to the point of affecting all our electronic devices such as satellites in orbit around the Earth, telecommunications, weather, GPS or astronauts in international space station” .
Ground power distribution grids can also be affected by the solar storm.
“Especially ones that extend over long distances, especially in Quebec where we get our power from Baie-James or the Côte-Nord and bring it back south, so those very extensive and often north-south distribution grids , i.e. parallel to the earth’s magnetic field,” says Mr. Lamontagne.
The CRAQ coordinator states that the solar storm will be less powerful than initially expected.
“In the case of the one we’re interested in, we saw the eruption on March 28 and we’ve already downgraded it to a slightly lower level, so the type of impact it could have on Earth, particularly at the level of.” Aurora Borealis persistence,” he says.
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If electronic systems should be spared, according to Mr. Lamontagne, the Canadian skies will host a great spectacle.
“We should be able to see the Northern Lights across Canada for a few days […]. It should extend south, so to the Canada-United States border, and it could even reach more southern regions like Pennsylvania,” he mentions.
It remains to be seen if the weather will be good and the sky clear enough to see the very pretty phenomenon.