Magnetic Pole Shift? - Satellites Showing Radiation Damage

[indigobusiness]

Something weird is going on...


Satellites in low-Earth orbit over Southern Africa are already showing signs of radiation damage

BONNY SCHOONAKKER


SOUTHERN Africa is experiencing weird vibes, according to scientists studying one of the more profound upheavals awaiting planet Earth.
This forthcoming revolution is a reversal in the Earth's magnetic field, an event that occurs every 500 000 years or so.
Signs that the reversal is about to happen again are nowhere more apparent than over Southern Africa, according to Dr Pieter Kotze, head of the geomagnetism group at the Hermanus Magnetic Observatory in the southern Cape.


Satellites in low-Earth orbit over Southern Africa are already showing signs of radiation damage suffered as a result of the Earth's magnetic field weakening above our part of the planet. The field forms the magneto sphere, which, like the Earth's ozone layer, protects the planet from the sun's harmful radiation.


Other symptoms destined to become apparent in the years ahead include the aurora australis, or southern lights. Usually seen only over the South Pole, these will become visible closer to the equator as the Earth's magnetic field weakens and disappears. Eventually, on past form, the field will reappear but with magnetic north and south pole changing places, as they have done for billions of years.


According to an article in the New York Times this week, the change will be devastating for migratory animals such as loggerhead turtles, which use the Earth's magnetic field to migrate 8 000km around the Atlantic. Bees, swallows, cranes, salmon, homing pigeons, frogs and eagles may also lose their way between breeding and feeding grounds.
Humans will suffer, too. The (temporary) disappearance of the magnetic field ahead of its reversal will lead to increased occurrences of radiation-induced cancer, Kotze said.


http://www.sundaytimes.co.za/2004/07/18/news/news14.asp

[Massacure]

1. It's bad but not fatal to us.

I feel bad for the animals that use the magnatic field though.

[indigobusiness]

2. Who will pollenate the crops when the bee population

goes bonkers?

The ramifications are serious.

Xrays reaching the Earth's surface, from a recent solar storm, were off the charts...due to a magnetic field anomaly.

[Dogmudgeon]

16. The Bees are already checking out

A combination of over-ambitious in-breeding, pesticide accumulation, and the emergence of lethal parasites has reduced the honeybee population dramatically.

It's one of those stories flying under the radar that has potential earth-changing effects.

I hope that somewhere, some group of scientists and bee-lovers have a well-thought-out Plan B for Apis mellifera.

The wasps and hornets (Polistes, Vespidae and Vespa seem to be doing just fine, think you. But they don't care about flowers one little bit.

--bkl

[indigobusiness]

18. The mites that are disrupting the honeybees

represent a truly dire dilemma. This is far more serious that most people realize. Apis mellifera? Is that them?

[hatrack]

19. Haven't seen wild honeybees in years

Still some bumblebees around. Funny, though - you'd think the disappearance of a major pollinator species would make the news somewhere at some time.

But not in Shiny New America, it seems.

[PVnRT]

3. A magnetic pole shift

even with the effects of humans, would still take millions of years. It's not that we shouldn't study it, but it's nothing worth starting panicking about, either.

[indigobusiness]

4. We are 10 - 20 % into the shift.

We are already feelng the effects.

You have some catching up to do.

[snowFLAKE]

5. Doesn't the shift happen every 26,000 years or so?

I really have no idea, and am Too Lazy to look it up (I'm pointing that out just in Case somebody made the sensible suggestion that Google could possibly provide the Needed Information).

Anyhow, about the bees and migratory animals, did they all have to re-evolve since the last shift, a mere 26,000 Years Ago (according to my memory).

Or did God just Create Everything 6,000 years ago, thereby nicely avoiding any Major Problem of this type?

[phantom power]

6. it's more like every 800,000 years

But that's quite frequent, over geologic time. What's interesting is that these events do not appear to correspond to any large extinction events, which implies (to me) that animals and plants must be able to adapt to these changes more readily than we might assume.

[Salviati]

8. Or that there are few enough speices that take advantage of it

that the disruption of those species caused by the flipping of the magnetic field is not detectable in the fossil record...

[phantom power]

10. True, although species known to use the field are much older than

800K years. I think they found that Dolphins use the field, and they've been around a long time.

I bet that the confusion is temporary, and animals are able to re-calibrate their behavior. The whole "inflexible instinct" conception of animals is proving to be pretty inaccurate.

[Salviati]

11. This is more likely the case...

I would imagine that since the change in fields is relatively slow in human/animal terms, that as the field weakens, these animals learn to compensate via other cues, and when the field returns to normal strength in the opposite polarity, there are of course no animals around that remember it being any different...

[indigobusiness]

12. But it is detectable in the Geological record

here are some links that might be helpful

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/12/12/magnetic.poles.ap/index.html

Magnetic field strength has waned 10 to 15 percent over the past 150 years, the article says, and the deterioration has accelerated. “The fact that it (magnetic field strength) is dropping so rapidly gives you pause,” says Dr. John A. Tarduno, professor of geophysics at the University of Rochester. The odds of a reversal are “more likely than not,” says Tarduno. (New York Times, July 13, 2004, by William J. Broad) http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/13/science/13magn.html



The article goes on to say that the last magnetic reversal occurred some 780,000 years ago; that there is no correlation between magnetic reversals and extinctions; and that magnetic reversals occur slowly, over a couple thousand years.



I disagree with all three of those contentions. I have evidence that there have been at least eleven magnetic reversals in the past 780,000 years - probably many more. I have evidence that extinctions and reversals do in fact go hand-in-hand. And I have evidence (from Steens Mountain in Oregon) that magnetic reversals can take place in a mere 30 days.




http://www.iceagenow.com/Magnetic_Reversal_Chart.htm

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

22. What the hell are you babbling about?

There's no evidence on your page whatsoever. Saying "we have proof" doesn't make it so.

[snowFLAKE]

9. Whoa, don't know what I was thinking

(Maybe it takes 26,000 years for the process to happen - the number is really stuck in My Head for some reason).

Anyhow, I suppose that we should all consider ourselves to be Greatly Privileged to be around for a once-in-a-million (years) event! Even if it will Kill Us All.

[happyslug]

13. The average is every 200,000 years

NASA is saying once every 200,000 uyears see:
http://image.gsfc.nasa.gov/poetry/venus/RevScience.html

http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/reversals.html#2

[phantom power]

14. How about that. I thought the period was much more regular

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. A fluid dynamo ought to be a chaotic system.

[Dogmudgeon]

17. It depends on how big the "reversal" is

It is a chaotic system, but several periodicities have been noticed, again, just like most chaotic systems display.

The last complete reversal was about 700,000 years ago, but significant changes happen more often. Of interest, one set of such changes has been observed to presage the onset of ice ages. It's also coupled with an greater-than-normal influx of rare spaceborne isotopic metals, like Beryllium 13.

Which is exactly what we're seeing now.

Bundle up!

--bkl

[indigobusiness]

7. Radio show addresses ill effects from solar bombardment..

http://www.jmccanneyscience.com/sh07-29-04-7megfile-bestsound.rm

[indigobusiness]

15. Why should this concern us?

Several reasons:

One: We appear to be headed for another magnetic reversal right now. During the past 2000 years, magnetic field strength has fallen some 50 to 65 percent. Unfortunately, the rate of decline is picking up. Five percent of the decline has occurred during the last 100 years alone. This decline, say geophysicists, may be a precursor to a new reversal attempt.
Two: When ice ages begin, they begin incredibly fast. At the end Eemian, for example, the climate descended from a period of warmth such as today's - such as today's - into full-blown glacial severity in less than twenty years.
Three: I think we're headed into such a twenty-year period right now.
Four: The North Magnetic Pole is moving! "The magnetic pole, which has steadily drifted for decades, has picked up its pace in recent years and could exit Canadian territory as soon as 2004," said Larry Newitt of the Geological Survey of Canada. "It's speed has increased considerably during the past 25 years," the geophysicist said. See: CNN.com - North Magnetic Pole - March 20, 2002. http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/03/20/north.pole/index.html

http://www.iceagenow.com/Magnetic_Reversal_Chart.htm

Five: According to John Tarduno, professor of geophysics at the Univerity of Rochester (NY), the next magnetic reversal could occur within a matter of centuries.

Tarduno based his findings on detailed studies of the Earth's magnetic field made during four trips above the Arctic Circle. (Published in the Proc. of the National Academy of Sciences, 16 Oct 2002.) See also: www.rochester.edu/pr/News/NewsReleases/latest/tarduno-cylinder.html
http://www.rochester.edu/pr/News/NewsReleases/latest/tarduno-cylinder.html
_______________________________

Ice ages also correlate with magnetic activity on the Sun.

According to Mukul Sharma, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences at Dartmouth, the Sun displays a 100,000-year cycle of magnetic activity that corresponds to the Earth's ice age history.

Sharma's calculations suggest that when the Sun is magnetically more active, the Earth experiences a warmer climate, and vice versa, when the Sun is magnetically less active, there is a glacial period. Right now, the Earth is in an interglacial period (between ice ages). This is also a time of high solar activity.

This cycle appears to match the 100,000-year ice-age cycle first theorized by Milutin Milankovitch, which suggests that ice ages correspond to the cyclical varations in the Earth's orbit around the Sun. (Earth & Planetary Science Ltrs, Vol. 199, issues 3-4, June 10, 2002)


(One of the methods Sharma used to determine historic magnetic activity on the Sun was through the study of berillium 10, which I thoroughly agree with. In fact, I mention berillium 10 production several times in my book.)

[Massacure]

20. Ice age??? WTF happened to global warming?

[indigobusiness]

21. It is counterintuitive, but melted Arctic ice

desalinates the N Atlantic and shuts down the Gulf Stream...presto chango---ice age in a matter of years.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

23. Don't listen to him.

I looked at his web page. He's just making stuff up.

[Dogmudgeon]

24. Who are you talking about?

Most of the "new Ice Age" scientists are extensively published and have survived years of peer review, much of it as dirty as politics can get. In Wallace Broecker's case, nearly 40 years of it.

I probably come closest to being a "pseudoscientist" here -- I am not an Earth scientist, just a somewhat literate layperson who has been beating the drum for some years now. The material is hard to fake or get wrong. Even Art Bell was able to put together a book on the subject and keep his facts straight.

The physical, ecological world is changing -- fast. We ignore it at great peril. I believe the peril is too great to ignore at all, since we'll be dealing with much more expensive oil and less food at the same time.

--bkl

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

27. Art Bell?

The fact that you even bring up his name in a science thread is just... incomprehensible.

[Dogmudgeon]

28. The Unspeakable Name of Art Bell

I mentioned his name for a very good reason.

He's an object of hatred among the Skep community. Personally, I think he's entertaining, though I would never take what he says about the nature of reality seriously.

So I was surprised to see that The Coming Global Superstorm was light on the hoodoo and covered the scientific issues in a depth I had not previously seen. Perhaps it is a case of the (or your) Devil citing Scripture. But Bell did an O.K. job, and I recognized it as such.

I should also credit Whitley Strieber, another Name Unmentionable, but he mainly wrote the fictional scenario. That scenario was made into The Day After Tomorrow.

When The Day After Tomorrow was released a few months ago, the Skep reaction was loud and outraged -- until they realized that we unenlightened barbarians knew it was entertainment, AND were more inclined to seek scientific opinions as a result.

I don't care what name says what -- when someone claims a scientific viewpoint, the position(s) can be scrutinized objectively, and debunkerly ridicule impresses me less than even spoon-bending. In the world of Science, even mistakes can be useful, as "beautiful losers" from Lorentz to Blondlot have found out.

The path of Pop Skepticism leads to madness, ignorance, and cheap sound bites. Heed, if you will, the humble cliché -- "Don't go there!"

--bkl

[indigobusiness]

30. Art Bell gloms onto scientists like a starry eyed groupy

And, while he has never had an original thought, he HAS skillfully engineered a career built on the work of others. From which, he somehow manages to mooch credit.

He doesn't have the slightest grasp of science, or most of the subjects he addresses. But, some of his guests are interesting, insightful, and well-versed in cutting edge issues.

Art Bell is a pretentious Bozo...who, if he knew anything about interviewing, would stay the hell out of the way of his guests and let them speak. Instead of pretentiously and domineeringly interrupting to ask his inane questions.

He goes where the wind blows. He claims now tohave been against the war in Iraq...yet he was so gungho when the tide was going out, that he was saying they should nuke the Bekka Valley, or whatever it takes to wipe out the terrorists. He doesn't mention this anymore, seems to have forgotten all about it now that the war is unpopular.

He also predicted Bush would win the election last Spring, before the polls went south.

[Boomer]

25. You don't get around much, do you?

He's not "making this stuff up" -- at least not the stuff about ice ages. There is extensive research on the complex interaction of global warming and ice ages, so the theory is quite intriguing and gaining wider acceptance. And there are also a number of respected scientists who believe the advent of a new ice age could happen in a matter of decades.

Since we're experiencing record-setting low temperatures for West Virginia, I must admit that I'm paying closer attention to those theories now.

As for the pole shift, there was a decent documentary on that topic just a few weeks ago Discovery Channel. They interviewed one scientist who believes that a pole shift can be MUCH faster than hundreds of years. He's found evidence of shifting magnetic directions in lava flows -- crystals suspended in the molten lava naturally align with the poles, so he's been able to chart pole shifts by marking the direction crystals are pointing when the lava cools.

To his amazement, he found one flow in which the crystals shifted direction from one depth to another, suggesting that within the time it took for the lava to cool all the way down to the bottom, there had been a rapid fluctuation back and forth until the pole shift stabilized in its final position.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

26. That's not what he said.

What he said was that there is a correlation between climate change, mass extinction events, and magnetic reversals, which is pure nonsense.

[Name removed]

29. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.