Magnetic storms are expected in Crimea. And at the same time… northern lights

The Sun is now at its maximum activity, which changes with a period of about 11 years. Activity will be high for another two to three years, so magnetic storms and northern lights are quite expected phenomena. Then activity will begin to subside, the number of such events will decrease. This is completely normal behavior of the Sun. On the contrary, the absence of high activity would indicate some kind of anomalyand,” says the response to a TASS request, signed by Alexander Kutsenko, a senior researcher at the Solar Physics Laboratory.

It is noted that the current activity of the Sun is lower than it was previously.

It should be noted that, according to many studies, earlier — several thousand years ago — the Sun was on average significantly more active than it is now. Even 70 years ago, at the 1957 high, activity was significantly higher than it is now. Humanity has survived this era, and one should not expect that the current, not the highest activity in general will lead to any significant cataclysmssaid the scientist.

The Solar Laboratory, which uses several telescopes, also observes interesting phenomena that are not typical for Crimea. We are talking about the northern lights. They arise as a result of particles entering the Earth’s atmosphere, which are accelerated by the Sun’s magnetic field and ejected into the Solar System. If the Earth is in the path of this cloud of particles, there is a high probability of a geomagnetic storm, which may be accompanied by the northern lights.

Since April 2023, the northern lights have already been observed three times at the latitude of Crimea. Such events <…> are quite rare, and therefore attract the attention of the scientific communitynotes Kutsenko.

The northern lights, he explained, do not necessarily mean a strong magnetic storm. The Earth’s own magnetic field deflects accelerated particles, protecting the planet from their effects. Only a small part of them—fractions of a percent—enter directly into the Earth’s atmosphere, mainly in the region of the magnetic poles.

The observatory is located in the Bakhchisarai region of Crimea. Founded in 1945 as an institution of the USSR Academy of Sciences on the basis of the Simeiz branch of the Pulkovo Observatory, founded in 1908. It has 17 telescopes, including the second largest optical telescope in Russia — the telescope named after. Academician G. A. Shain, the first in Europe and so far the only operating second-generation gamma telescope. The Solar Physics Laboratory studies solar activity, flares, magnetic fields and their impact on space objects, including the Earth.

source: TASS