An international team of astronauts has discovered a space storm. They assess the danger as 'alarming' for the Earth. According to ProSieben, life on Earth could be set back by centuries.
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What kind of space storm are we talking about?
In concrete terms, you can imagine that life could revert to the Middle Ages. But how can the space storm wreak such havoc on life on Earth?
It is a solar storm, or more precisely, eruptions of the sun, scientifically called 'coronal mass ejection.'
Recently, an eruption of magnetic plasma gas was observed. This is said to be ten times larger than any before, according to international media, including Live Science.
What impact will this have on the Earth?
A study has looked into this because these could also have an impact on Earth. These high-energy, magnetic eruptions can interact with the Earth's atmosphere and cause geomagnetic storms.
As a result, satellites could be destroyed, power lines could fail, and this could also paralyse the internet. The solar storms, according to space.com, bring storms of high-energy particles to Earth, comparable to 300,000 X-rays at a time.
Study co-author Yuta Notsu, who is also an astrophysicist at the University of Colorado Boulder, explains in a news release about the recently published study:
Coronal mass ejections can have serious impacts on Earth and human society.
