Being a scientist = Naming your discoveries whatever the f*!k you want
Artistic visualisation of the swirling ions (orange) and the aurora below (green). Image credit: Qing-He Zhang, Shandong University.
In a turn of events that further demonstrates that we are quite clearly living in a simulation written by lazy, hyper-dimensional Hollywood-esque writers, scientists discovered something called a ‘Space Hurricane’. At first glance, the only plausible explanation that I could conjure for the existence of such an absurd phenomenon with as gaudy a name as ‘Space Hurricane’ was that the writers of our Universe also moonlight as actual Hollywood writers who were looking for a way to legitimise an upcoming movie plot where Gerard Butler saves the world (but really it’s all about his daughter) with the skills of an ex-soldier and the beard of a man with a really good beard. But, once I stopped thinking about how I would hate that movie but definitely watch it and then hate myself for watching it, I did some reading. Turns out, it’s fascinating and complicated in equal parts. And, from what I have consumed so far, I understand a little bit of a small part of how they work. So now I’m going to try and explain it to you. If that sounds like the making of an ineffective and possibly dangerous teacher-learner relationship, I’d say you’re probably right and welcome to the internet.
The stage where a space hurricane can be found doing its rapid and dizzying dance is the ionosphere. The ionosphere begins at around 50 km above the Earth’s surface and extends way up to 1,000 km. This 950 km region that smudges the boundary between the atmosphere and the yawning jaws of outer space is made up of ions (the ionosphere was named back when scientists weren’t trying REALLY HARD to get published) and also free-floating electrons. Ions are just atoms that have had one (or more) of their outer-shell electrons smashed out of their grasp by high-energy UV light from the sun. This process also explains where the free electrons in the ionosphere come from. This puffed-up envelope of ionized gas that surrounds our planet satisfies the definition of a plasma.
Plasmas display behaviours that are distinct from the regular, boring gas that keeps us alive from moment to moment. But just like the troposphere that we breathe, the plasma-filled ionosphere does experience weather, except it is not controlled by the transport of heat through the atmosphere but instead by the combination of a stream of plasma continually flying off the sun and the fluctuations of Earth’s magnetic field. This is the so-called solar weather.
If the fact that the sun is almost constantly flinging high-energy plasma at us is news to you then I encourage you to take a breath, grab a tea, and read the next sentence. It’s pretty much always fine. Earth, and by extension humans, are shielded from this atomic ammunition by the Earth’s magnetic field. However, the shape of the magnetic field indicates that it does take quite a punishment in the process. Observe how it is stretched out by the solar bombardment in the video below (white lines). This battering also affects the ionosphere (orange envelope) by dusting away layers and layers of the ions, particularly when there is increased solar activity. This space hurricane occurred in August of 2014 when the solar wind was exceptionally quiet. The sun’s diminishment allowed the Earth’s magnetic field to recoup and the ionosphere to swell. As the stretched-out magnetic field lines snapped back and reconnected, it formed a sort of Scalextric race track that propelled ions towards the North Pole – where the hurricane raged for around 8 hours.
Video Courtesy of NASA
With the solar wind at bay, an unusually large reservoir of ions was allowed to build up. The acceleration of ions along the magnetic field lines is what provided the energy for this geomagnetic storm. This is opposed to the rising columns of air over patches of warm water which is what causes the hurricanes that those living west of the Atlantic have to contend with. The reason these two phenomena are bungled together is because they share a similar morphology (meaning structure).
They are both huge – 1000 km wide in the case of the space hurricane
They both have a strong circular rotation – thousands of kilometres per hour in the swirl of a space version
They both have spiral arms
They both cause a great deal of rain – the rain is electrons instead of water with the space hurricane (might be starting to live up to its name after all)
And they both have a central eye where all is calm and still
A key difference between the two is that no one died from the space hurricane, and it’s very unlikely that anyone will, in the event of another. The only perceptible incursion on human life would be a dazzling circular aurora (fancy word for the Northern Lights) around the eye of the ion storm. Though it could affect us indirectly, as the melee of electrons might disrupt the orbits of satellites and space debris, leading to potential collisions and Sandra Bullock winning a Bafta.
Despite this, the overriding feeling about this discovery is excitement. Scientists love this kind of crap, astronomers especially. Astronomy is mostly about inferring the state of one thing from the behaviour of another. This storm occurred when the solar wind was low, and that may well be a prerequisite for the formation of a space hurricane. We might now be able to take this knowledge and turn our cosmos-peering instruments to search for signs of space hurricanes on exoplanets, inferring the electromagnetic conditions of far-away star systems in the process. It’s not hard to imagine considering scientists have already done something similar observing the ‘Northern Lights’ of Jupiter.
The discovery of space hurricanes may prove to be an inconsequential one for most people, but I think it’s cool and I hope you do too. If you don’t then I’m confused about how you made it this far. But one person who will surely benefit from this discovery is Gerard Butler when he inevitably gets that sweet Netflix deal for saving his daughter from a space hurricane. I can’t wait to love hating it.
