The world got a taster of the sun's explosive power last week with the strongest solar eruption in five years (white flash, centre) sent a torrent of charged plasma hurtling towards the world. Scientists believe we are overdue a ferocious solar storm
* Earth is overdue a solar storm as the sun enters its most active period
The world is overdue a ferocious 'space storm' that could knock out communications satellites, ground aircraft and trigger blackouts - causing hundreds of billions of pounds of damage, scientists say.
Astronomers today warned that mankind is now more vulnerable to a major solar storm than at any time in history - and that the planet should prepare for a global Katrina-style disaster.
A massive eruption of the sun would save waves of radiation and charged particles to Earth, damaging the satellite systems used for synchronising computers, airline navigation and phone networks.
If the storm is powerful enough it could even crash stock markets and cause power cuts that last weeks or months, experts told the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
The chances of a disruption from space are getting stronger because the sun is entering the most active period of its 11 to 12-year natural cycle.
The world got a taster of the sun's explosive power last week when the strongest solar eruption in five years sent a torrent of charged plasma hurtling towards the world at 580 miles per second.
Comment: Notice the fact that NASA issues this "dire warning" about the upcoming solar cycle causing a global "katrina-style" disaster but then cites the increase in the number of cell phones as the reason why this solar cycle would have such a terrible effect compared to the last solar cycle ten years ago. Clearly this is nonsense. Cell phone outage around the world would not constitute a "katrina-style disaster", but massive power outages around the world would. So the real question is, 'why is NASA expecting a much worse solar cycle this time?' What has changed about the sun?