NOAA holds briefing about severe solar storm

Officials from NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) held an hour-long media briefing on Friday to discuss the severe solar storm, which began to reach Earth on Friday afternoon.

NOAA has issued a Severe (G4) Geomagnetic Storm Watch, the first one since 2005, after a series of moderate to strong solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs).

Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth’s surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations.

There’s no threat to human health and officials say there’s no need to take special precautions.