The History of Space Weather: From Babylon to the 21st century - Paperback

by Sten Odenwald (Author)

This book covers the history and science behind solar storms and space weather and how it has impacted human technology and thinking since the time of the ancient Babylonians. Using newspaper accounts and historical records, the many ways that space weather have impacted humans is explored from first-hand accounts. Also, the science behind space weather is explored starting with the birth of our sun, through modern supercomputer modeling of the Space Age.

Space weather begins below the surface of our sun and through solar flares, coronal mass ejections and the solar wind, washes ashore many diverse phenomena on our planet. Solar storms cause electrical power outages, satellite failures, shortwave radio interference and enhanced radiation doses to passengers on jets as well as astronauts working in space.

This book begins with ancient reports of gods batteling in the skies, and advances to telegraph interruptions in the 1800's described my numerous newspaper reports. Then in the 20th century we see radio broadcast interference, incidents during World War II and the Vietnam War, as well as a growing list of satellite malfunctions during the space age. Meanwhile, scientific knowledge grows by leaps and bounds as astronmers discover the sunspot cycle, and powerful telescopes begin to monitor the sun on the ground and in space to stay ahead of the sun's stormy weather.

Today, the news media carry routine reports of impending storms and enterprising social media broadcasters give us up-to-the-minute detailed scientific reports of what to expect. Science continues to advance as powerful physics-based models are being run on supercomputers to anticipate the shape of the next sunspot cycle and how storm clouds spotted on the sun, may travel to Earth in the ensuing days to rock-and-roll our technology and even our psyches!

Among its 370 pages, the book includes 296 B/W and full-color illustrations, hundreds of newspaper headlines, and extensive scientific background information describing all aspects of the human impacts of space weather. Also included is a chapter on DIY space weather forecasting in which you can download apps to your smartphone to monitor space weather, build your own magnetic storm detectors, or join citizen science groups where thousands of enthusiasts help scientists understand space weather even better.