Bastille Day solar storm

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Bastille Day solar storm
Aurora as seen by IMAGE.PNG
IMAGE ultraviolet image of the Aurora Borealis on 15 July 2000
TypeGeomagnetic storm
Formed14 July 2000 (2000-07-14)
Dissipated16 July 2000 (2000-07-16)
DamageMinor satellite and terrestrial power transformer damage
Areas affectedWorldwide

The Bastille Day solar storm was a powerful solar storm on 14-16 July 2000 during the solar maximum of solar cycle 23. The storm began on the national day of France, Bastille Day. It involved a solar flare, solar particle event, and coronal mass ejection which caused a severe geomagnetic storm.[1][2]

Overview[]

Solar flare and particle event[]

On 14 July 2000 from about 10:03 to 10:43 UTC, an X5.7-class (very strong) solar flare occurred in active region AR9077 with a peak intensity at around 10:24 UTC.[3] The flare was associated with an S3 (strong) solar particle event (SPE) on Earth starting at about 10:41 UTC.[4][1] This resulted in high energy protons penetrating and ionizing parts of the Earth's ionosphere and producing noise in various satellite imaging systems such as in the EIT and LASCO instruments. Although the flare was not extremely large, the associated SPE was the fourth largest since 1967.[5]

Geomagnetic storm[]

The detection of the flare was also followed by the detection of a halo, or Earth directed, coronal mass ejection (CME) at 10:54 UTC.[4] This resulted in a geomagnetic storm on 15-16 July which peaked at the extreme level, G5, in the late hours of 15 July and registered a peak Dst of −301 nT. This caused minor damage to power transformers and satellites.[6] The storm was also one of only two solar storms having registered 9+ at Kp max since 1989, the other being the Halloween solar storms of 2003.[7]

  • EIT and LASCO footage of the solar storm

  • The X5.7-class solar flare appears as a bright flash near the center of the solar disk in video captured by the Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (EIT). High energy particles from the SPE arrive shortly after, producing noise in the captured images.

  • The halo CME appears as a quickly expanding, bright ring around the Sun (represented by the white circle) in video captured by the Large Angle and Spectrometric Coronagraph (LASCO). High energy particles from the SPE appear to arrive at almost the same time, obscuring the CME with noise.[8]

Aftermath[]

Due to being the first major solar storm since the launch of various solar-monitoring satellites, the Bastille Day event proved important towards helping scientists piece together a general theory of how eruptions on the sun occur as well as protecting the Earth from a larger event, such as a Carrington-class event, some day in the future.[9]

Despite their great distance from the Sun, the Bastille Day event was observed by Voyager 1 and Voyager 2.[10]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ a b "Space Radiation Storm". NASA. 2004-07-14. Archived from the original on 2000-08-15. Retrieved 2007-03-09.
  2. ^ "NASA Says Solar Flare Caused Radio Blackouts". The New York Times. Associated Press. 2000-07-14. Retrieved 2007-03-09.
  3. ^ Reiner, M.J.; Kaiser, M.L.; Karlický, M.; Jiřička, K.; Bougeret, J.-L. (2001). "Bastille Day Event: A Radio Perspective". Solar Physics. 204: 121–137. doi:10.1023/A:1014225323289.
  4. ^ a b Andrews, M.D. (2001). "Lasco and eit Observations of the Bastille day 2000 Solar Storm". Solar Physics. 204: 179–196. doi:10.1023/A:1014215923912.
  5. ^ Watari, Shinichi; Kunitake, Manabu; Watanabe, Takashi (January 2001). "The Bastille Day (14 July 2000) event in historical large sun-earth connection events". Solar Physics. 204: 425–438. Bibcode:2001SoPh..204..425W. doi:10.1023/A:1014273227639. S2CID 117394988. Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  6. ^ "Minor Damage Reported from Geomagnetic Storm" (PDF). Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  7. ^ "Top 50 Geomagnetic Storms". Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  8. ^ "SOHO Hotshots". soho.nascom.nasa.gov. Retrieved 4 November 2021.
  9. ^ Moskowitz, Clara (14 July 2011). "Bastille Day Solar Storm: Anatomy of a Gargantuan Sun Tempest". Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  10. ^ [1] Webber, W. R., F. B. McDonald, J. A. Lockwood, and B. Heikkila (2002), The effect of the July 14, 2000 "Bastille Day" solar flare event on >70 MeV galactic cosmic rays observed at V1 and V2 in the distant heliosphere, Geophys. Res. Lett., 29, 10, 1377–1380, doi:10.1029/2002GL014729.

External links[]

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