By Maria Ortiz
May 11, 2024, 01:30 AM EDT
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) declared that Earth was experiencing a G5 or “extreme” geomagnetic storm on Friday. This is the first G5 storm to hit the planet since 2003.
The geomagnetic storm has the potential to severely damage the energy and electricity supply in different parts of the Earth, but it is also expected to leave unusual phenomena such as northern lights in areas as unusual for recording these auroras as southern Alabama or northern California.
AND The spectacle of the northern lights has already fascinated people in the United States and in other countries, and have been sharing the images on social networks.
A G5 geomagnetic storm can cause widespread voltage control problems on the power grid, damage transformers and even cause complete blackouts.
“Geomagnetic storms can affect infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on the Earth’s surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electrical power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations,” he had detailed shortly before. NOAA.
The agency also noted a moderate solar radiation storm that could expose people traveling by plane to “elevated radiation risk” and could cause rare problems in satellite operations.
However, the same phenomenon that causes these interruptionsIt is also responsible for allowing the northern lights to be glimpsed in places where they are not normally seen.
The last time an “extreme” G5 geomagnetic storm occurred was in October 2003, when it caused power outages in Sweden and damaged transformers in South Africa.
With information from EFE
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