On Jan. 6 a satellite called SOHO took a picture of the sun that showed the edge of a huge eruption on the sun called a coronal mass ejection. Four days later, the disturbance was recorded as it sped by another satellite called WIND that is designed to monitor the solar wind just upstream from Earth. Within hours, a satellite called POLAR and several Los Alamos instruments positioned in high orbits recorded the effects on energetic particles in Earth's radiation belts. The intensity of the radiation belts increased more than 100 times over their previous levels on Jan. 10 and continued to increase over the next several days.
"We compiled the most complete data available on conditions in the magnetosphere during the event," said Geoff Reeves, project leader for POLAR's energetic particle instrument at Los Alamos. "Combined with information from the other satellites, now we can better understand why and how these solar events sometimes produce big effects."
On Jan. 11, AT&T's Telestar 401 satellite suddenly stopped sending signals to Earth. The satellite, launched in 1993, broadcast television shows from national networks to local affiliates nationwide. Although it is not known exactly what happened to the satellite, it is probable that the spacecraft malfunctioned as a result of the intense radiation produced by the solar eruption.
Coincidentally, at the time of the solar event scientists and satellite operators from across the country were meeting in Boulder, Colo., to discuss ways to better forecast the "weather" in space that affects satellites.
"Over phone lines, fax machines and the World Wide Web, scientists with space weather data frantically downloaded the information onto their laptops," said Reeves. "We got a preliminary but remarkably complete picture of what happened on the sun, how the disturbance traveled to Earth, what it did to the magnetosphere when it got here and how that might have killed a $200 million satellite."
Images compiled at Los Alamos from the POLAR data collected at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center show the space storm as it intensifies around Earth. Recent images may be found on the World Wide Web at: http://WWW-istp.GSFC.NASA.gov/istp/cloud_jan97/event.html.
SOHO, WIND, and POLAR are part of the International Solar-Terrestrial Physics program, a collaboration of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Japanese Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science. From ground observatories, satellites, spacecraft and computer simulations and models, ISTP is building a comprehensive picture of Earth's magnetosphere and how it interacts with the sun.
Information about the Los Alamos contributions to the POLAR spacecraft, generally referred to by their acronyms CAMMICE, CEPPAD and TIDE/PSI, and related projects is available on the World Wide Web at: http://leadbelly.lanl.gov/ccr/CCR.html.
Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, The Babcock & Wilcox Company, and Washington Group International for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.
Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns.