There’s a pretty hefty dent in Earth’s magnetic field and it’s giving scientists cause for concern.
Earth’s magnetic field is essential for protecting the planet from the Sun’s rays, but an area of weakness in the field has been spotted that has experts nervous.
The weak spot is a region called the South Atlantic Anomaly and it has been studied by NASA for years.
According to ScienceAlertthe grassland area between South America and Africa has been described as a “hole in space”.
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Although the region does not post an immediate threat to life, it could have a significant impact on man-made structures in our orbit.
This means that spacecraft and satellites that remain in the Earth’s magnetic field as they orbit the planet may face technical difficulties as protection from the sun’s rays is reduced. Exposure in this way can lead to critical damage in the long term.
“The magnetic field is actually a superposition of fields from multiple current sources,” geophysicist Terry Sabaka from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center said in 2020.
“The observed SAA can also be interpreted as the result of a weakening of the dominance of the dipole field in the region,” said fellow NASA Goddard geophysicist Weijia Kuang.
“More specifically, a localized field with reversed polarity grows strongly in the SAA region, thus making the field intensity very weak, weaker than the surrounding regions.”
“Even though the SAA is moving slowly, it’s going through some morphological changes, so it’s also important that we continue to observe it by having ongoing missions,” Sabaka said.
“Because that’s what helps us make models and predictions.”
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