When you buy through our articles links, Future and its syndication partners can earn commissions.
The northern lights visible above the Icelandic homestead. | Credit: Redtea/Getty images
GPS satellite local signals were directed to Earth hundreds of feet during the Gannon Solar storm in May last year, and in some US regions, a new study revealed. Discontinuation has ruined the farming sector, which resulted in a reduction in more than $ 500 million.
In early May last year, powerful sun eruptions in a row caused the most powerful sun storm, which has caught the ground in 20 years. Later, named Jennifer Gannon, a scientist of the deceased cosmos, Solar Storm was caused by frightening Auror, visible to Mexico, Portugal and Spain. It also forced the GPS for a few days to go to Haywire.
The American Midwest farmers reported their GPS -operated tractors acting as “storm” at the time of the planting season during the peak planting season, according to reports. The new study now appreciated the big mistakes of those GPS not only at the height of the storm, but also after Aurora continued to spread GPS signals.
The Boston University research team used almost 100 high precision data, fixed GPS receivers scattered through the US, which make up a network of seismic research measuring tectonic plates. As it turns out, the network is also perfect for exploring space weather conditions in the Earth’s ionosphere, electric charged air layer found 30 miles (48 kilometers) above the ground. The effects of solar storms on the ionosphere can affect GPS receiver readings.
“GPS receivers work on assuming that the Jonah has a uniform plasma density,” Waqar Youn, a cosmic physics researcher at Boston University and main author of paper, told Space.com. “However, the sun’s storm causes irregularities of the ionosphere and, when the signal passes through the layers of the ionosphere, it grows errors.”
When the sun’s storm, the charged sun particles, which it brings, will bring when it warms and disrupts the ionosphere. As weak signals from the global positioning of satellites pass through this sudden restless region, they throw the course.
Since the fixed GPS receivers on the network of research is firmly attached to the ground, any changes in their positioning data can only be the result of the ionosphere unrest. Measurements of this scientific GPS network revealed the extent of these errors with great precision, and allowed the researchers to reconstruct what took place in the Jonosphere during the storm.
“By measuring a signal disorder, we can say the plasma structure in the upper atmosphere,” Toshi Nishimura, a professor of space physics and co-author of the new study, told spapce.com.
The northern lights fill the sky with green straps of electric charged particles above the barn and pasture Greaney’s Turkish farm in Mercer, Maine, 2024. May 11th. | Credit: Michael Seamans/Getty Images
Data analysis revealed that the storm had created a “Jonosphere Plasma Wall” extending throughout the North American continent. This border threw GPS signals up to 230 feet (70 meters) in the central US states, and in the southwestern parts of the country there were smaller errors up to 65 feet (20 m).
The biggest disorder lasted about six hours in 2024. On May 10, but everything remained unlimited for up to two days, the investigation showed. After the shocked Jonosphere began to calm down, the storm -induced aurral bulbs caused further GPS disorders, as the recharged particles from the space covered through the atmosphere along the impaired magnetic field lines. The GPS receiver net showed errors up to 30 feet (10 m) for the duration of these aurors.
According to Terry Griffin, a professor at Kansas State University, Terry Griffin, a Kans State University, the behavior of GPS -owned farming cars caused by GPS -controlled Midwest in the Central West of the US cost more than $ 500 million.
“Gannon Storm was delayed by planting corn because our planters were mostly inactive,” Griffin told Space.com. “Currently, about 70% of planted acres in the US are based on equipment that uses GPS automatic recommendations to make straight parallel lines through the field. We no longer have physical road markers, and the equipment is getting bigger to no longer operate when GPS is removed.”
However, agriculture was not the only victim of GPS chaos caused by cosmic weather. The aircraft are based on GPS not only on their ways, but also, especially knowing their purposeful height during landing. According to Nishimura, up to four meters of errors can be compensated. However, the disorder was “far behind that tolerance window,” said Nishimura.
Related stories:
– Powerful sun storms are a nightmare for farmers. “Our tractors behaved the way the demon had
– One year has passed since the most intensive storm of the Sun has developed Auror worldwide for decades. What did we learn?
– 2024. May
Gannon Solar Storm could have been the strongest in two decades. But it only gave me a weak taste of what the sun can. The worst case scenario is often discussed is the so-called Carrington event-Audra, which in 1859. Damaged the land by knocking down telegraph services all over the world. The storm of that strength today will certainly have broad consequences around the world.
“During the Gannon storm, we saw the most intense effect in the central US regions,” Nishimura said. “However, due to the size of the Carrington size, we would see disturbances throughout the continent and mistakes, so big that the signal would be unused.”
Waqar says that in the future, to predict the ionosphere disorders paired with GPS signal lesions in the future, could help correct errors when the storm progresses.
The study was published in JGR-SPACE in physics on June 9th.