What are the characteristic of solar storm?
1. The Earth has been subjected to solar storms throughout its history. Except for two occasions, in 1859 and 1989, not one person on Earth has been affected by or has even _noticed_ a solar storm, except for seeing pretty displays of northern lights. We are a bit more vulnerable now than in the past because of our greater dependence on electronics and satellites, but not a single human being throughout history has ever been injured or killed by a solar storm. Not one! 2. Solar flares occur _only_ on the Sun and never get anywhere near Earth, 3. A solar flare _may_ trigger a coronal mass ejection (CME): ionized material ejected from the Sun’s corona. 4. A CME may get pushed to Earth by the solar wind, _if_ it’s pointed in the right direction. 5. CMEs are deflected by the Earth’s magnetic field, _sometimes_ producing aurora (northern lights). 6. _Only twice_ in human history have CMEs affected anything other than aurora, in 1859 and 1989 — these only affected really large wire networks
