See also: Solar cycle update – Ulysses visits pole

A rather hysterical press release from the US warns us that a sunspot heralds a new solar cycle that could “bring down power grids, disrupt critical communications … threaten astronauts with harmful radiation … knock out commercial communications satellites and swamp Global Positioning System signals”. Run for the hills!

The US Space Weather Prediction Center says the 11 year cycle of solar activity will reach a maximum by 2011 or 2012 with accompanying sunspots and solar storms. Not that this gives us time for complacency: “devastating storms can occur at any time”, says the press release. In addition, “Routine activities such as talking on a cell phone or getting money from an ATM machine could suddenly halt over a large part of the globe.”

Last year the centre, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the cycle was likely to start in March this year. The intensity of a solar cycle is measured by the maximum number of sunspots, so the first sunspot gives us the first reading of this cycle .

“This sunspot is like the first robin of spring. In this case, it’s an early omen of solar storms that will gradually increase over the next few years,” says the centre’s Douglas Biesecker (press release).

Further reading

New Scientist has more detail on all this.

Solar cycle intensity data from NOAA can be found here.

NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center

Nature news feature from 2006 on solar storms

Image top: solar cycle montage / NOAA

Image bottom: first official sunspot of new Solar Cycle 24 / NOAA