Space Weather Home || NOAA Home Page || Back to Story

• Space weather occurs in the area between the Earth and the Sun and refers to the disturbances and turbulent storms that streak through space, sometimes causing adverse effects on human activities. These disturbances are caused by storms on the sun that cause variations of electromagnetic fields and energetic particle fluxes.
  
• Solar Maximum is the time during the eleven year solar cycle when the sun is most active. That means an increase in the number and intensity of solar events, which can cause impacts on Earth such as electrical power outages, satellite failures, and radio and navigation problems.
  
• NOAA's Space Environment Center (SEC) located in Boulder, Colo., is the official space weather center for forecasting disturbances that can affect people and equipment working in the space environment. Their Space Weather Operations Center is jointly operated by NOAA and the U.S. Air Force, providing forecasts and warnings of solar and geomagnetic activity to users in government, industry, and the private sector. The SEC observes, assesses and predicts activity in the space environment to promote public safety and to mitigate economic loss that could result from disruption of satellite operations, communication and navigation systems, and electric power distribution grids.
  
• Much of what happens concerning space weather is dictated by the sun. Solar flares, Coronal Mass Ejections and other solar activities, cause the stormy weather of space.
  
• The launch of NASA's ACE satellite makes it possible for forecasters to get an advance warning (about one hour) of geomagnetic storms heading towards Earth. This enables SEC to issue alerts to users of space weather information with almost one hundred per cent accuracy.
  
• Predictions of solar and geomagnetic activity are important to many technological systems on Earth including the operations of low-orbiting satellites, electric power transmission grids, geophysical exploration, high-frequency communications and radars.
  
• At the present time, we are seeing a revolution in the use of satellite technology. More than 900 new satellites, valued at 30 billion dollars, will be launched by the year 2003.
  
• In space, astronauts face unique hazards when venturing outside the safety of the space shuttle and need to be alerted to the dangers of energetic particle emissions from the sun. This need will increase as teams of astronauts construct the International Space Station.
  
• Just like NOAA's National Weather Service, the Space Environment Center provides real-time monitoring and forecasting of space weather, and has done so for the last 35 years.