Space weather is not something that most of us typically think about on a daily basis. But the Sun’s charged particles and magnetic field are constantly sweeping through space and colliding with the Earth’s own magnetic field. Occasionally, the auroras fill the sky with light dancing along these field lines. The most extreme space weather, however, happens when the Sun blasts billions of tons of energized particles directly towards the Earth at speeds up to 3,000 kilometers per second.
These explosions, known as coronal mass ejections (CMEs), lift off from the Sun’s outer atmosphere — the corona, and can cause intense geomagnetic storms, and negatively affect astronauts, satellites, and spacecraft.
CMEs and Geomagnetic Storms
Geomagnetic storms happen when the Earth’s magnetic field is disturbed. The most extreme geomagnetic storms are driven by CMEs.
