On 17/12/2020 14:22, Martin Brown wrote:


If it were to happen then it would be a big solar flare with a coronal
mass ejection in the direction of the Earth. There are satellites
watching for any such events.

1989 was the last one big enough to take down significant parts of
Canada's national grid. Smaller local events don't make the news.

https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/fe..._darkness.html

There has been nothing even close to the Carrington event in 1859 though.

https://www.raeng.org.uk/publication...er-full-report

As a crude rule of thumb if you can see a bright aurora in the southern
parts of the UK then it is getting close to being enough to cause trips
somewhere in North America. Magnetic north is much closer to them.

I was interested to see speculation a little while ago that the magnetic
north pole might be in Russian territory by now.