Official News page 7

REAL LIFE NEWS: THE SPACE WEATHER

by Hazed

"Here is the space weather forecast. A major solar storm will hit Earth later today, causing widespread disruption to communications all over the planet..."

That's what we could be hearing in the future, because for the first time we now have a space weather service to forecast radiation storms and solar flares. This is important because they can have a devastating effect on communications and satellites, and they would pose a severe hazard to astronauts who in the future might travel beyond low Earth orbit.

Scientists working at the US National Weather Center and the Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling reported the new service had gone live at a conference in Seattle last week. The forecasters believe they will be able to provide between one and four days advance warning of major space weather events, such as coronal mass ejections fired out from the Sun towards Earth.

Let's hope they are better at forecasting the space weather than terrestrial meteorologists are at telling us if it's going to snow!

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