Official News page 7

REAL LIFE NEWS: THE SUN WAKES UP AND THREATENS SAT-NAV

by Hazed

The sun has been going through a period of low activity, but that's starting to come to an end - and as it gets more active, we could start seeing problems with devices that depend on satellite navigation.

Solar activity runs on many cycles, but the one that affects the Earth the most is that for solar flares. A cycle lasts around 10 to 11 years. When that activity is at its peak it's called the solar maximum, and it's due again in a few years time.

The last time we experienced a solar maximum, satellite navigation was barely a commercial product, but now sat-nav signals have become a part of our infrastructure - not just for use in the car, but also in emergency response vehicles, in the military, for high-precision surveying, docking ships and so on.

Solar flares could cause large and unpredictable sat-nav errors, which would have the potential of messing up a whole lot of things.

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