SpaceX launches a pair of NASA satellites to probe the origins of space weather
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SpaceX launches a pair of NASA satellites to probe the origins of space weather
The two satellites are part of the TRACERS mission. The mission aims to study the effects of solar activity on Earth’s magnetic field. The satellites will orbit the Earth for at least a year before returning to Earth. They are the latest in a series of missions to study solar activity in the Earth’s solar system. The first of the missions was scheduled to launch Wednesday, but was delayed due to bad weather.
The twin spacecraft are part of the NASA-funded TRACERS mission, which will spend at least a year measuring plasma conditions in narrow regions of Earth’s magnetic field known as polar cusps. As the name suggests, these regions are located over the poles. They play an important but poorly understood role in creating colorful auroras as plasma streaming out from the Sun interacts with the magnetic field surrounding Earth.
The same process drives geomagnetic storms capable of disrupting GPS navigation, radio communications, electrical grids, and satellite operations. These outbursts are usually triggered by solar flares or coronal mass ejections that send blobs of plasma out into the Solar System. If one of these flows happens to be aimed at Earth, we are treated with auroras but vulnerable to the storm’s harmful effects.
For example, an extreme geomagnetic storm last year degraded GPS navigation signals, resulting in more than $500 million in economic losses in the agriculture sector as farms temporarily suspended spring planting. In 2022, a period of elevated solar activity contributed to the loss of 40 SpaceX Starlink satellites.
“Understanding our Sun and the space weather it produces is more important to us here on Earth, I think, than most realize,” said Joe Westlake, director of NASA’s heliophysics division.
NASA’s two TRACERS satellites launched Wednesday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California. Credit: SpaceX
The launch of TRACERS was delayed 24 hours after a regional power outage disrupted air traffic control over the Pacific Ocean near the Falcon 9 launch site on California’s Central Coast, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. SpaceX called off the countdown Tuesday less than a minute before liftoff, then rescheduled the flight for Wednesday.