On June 10, 2024, NASA published a press release from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory highlighting a surprising event that happened on Mars on May 20, 2024. The red planet was hit by a solar storm caused by a powerful solar flare and this led to the presence of auroras on Mars.
However, that’s not all. This very large-scale event also made it possible to know the quantity of radiation to which future astronauts who set foot there could be exposed.
A powerful solar flare causes auroras on Mars
On Earth, the Northern Lights are the result of a bombardment of charged particles coming from the Sun, following a solar flare, in our upper atmosphere. At least that’s what’s happening on Earth.
Thus, the spectacle that people generally living in the Scandinavian and polar regions can observe is in fact a series of mini collisions between radiation and certain gases present in the Earth’s atmosphere.
If Mars also has an atmosphere, the planet is however devoid of its magnetic field and therefore no longer has any barrier against charged particles coming directly from the Sun.
In fact, during these events, the resulting auroras encompass the entire planet.
So this is what happened shortly after May 20, 2024, when a category X and degree 12 (X12) solar flare, according to data collected by NASA’s Solar Orbiter , took place. X-rated solar flares are the most powerful that can be recorded.
For comparison, the solar flare which caused the northern lights on the weekend of May 10, 2024, was an eruption classified as X8.7.
For more context, here is the caption of the animation given by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory: The purple color in this video shows auroras on the night side of Mars, detected by the ultraviolet instrument aboard NASA’s MAVEN orbiter between May 14 and May 20, 2024. The brighter the purple, the more there had dawns.
Highest amount of radiation recorded on Mars since 2012
In the NASA press release, we also learn that the red planet was then bombarded by radiation which was not filtered by a possible magnetic field that we may have on Earth.
Thus, the equipment of the Rover Curiosity, on the planet since 2012, and in particular the RAD (Radiation Assessment Detector – a radiation detector) were able to record impressive data.
Indeed, the American space agency revealed that the radiation dose simply received by Curiosity was 8,100 micrograys, the unit of measurement for absorbed radiation dose.
To relate this data, NASA explained that if an astronaut were on the planet at that time, he would have received the equivalent of 30 chest x-rays (X-rays) in a few seconds.
This is not a lethal dose, but it is the largest dose of radiation recorded by Curiosity since its arrival on Mars.
To quote NASA: “During the May 20 event, the storm hit the surface with such energy that black-and-white images from Curiosity’s navigation cameras danced with the “snow,” that is, streaks and white dots caused by charged particles hitting the cameras.”
photo credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech The spots in this video’s image sequence were caused by charged particles from a solar storm that hit one of the navigation cameras aboard NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity.
photo credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover captured streaks and spots using one of its navigation cameras when particles from the solar storm arrived on Martian soil. These visual artifacts are caused by charged particles hitting the camera’s image detector.
20 years ago, a record solar flare fried a Mars orbiter
Although the solar flare and resulting storm were impressive on Mars, it pales in comparison to another flare that took place in 2003.
A year after being placed in orbit, the Mars probe Odyssey launched in 2001 saw its radiation detector completely “burned”, to quote the expression used by the American space agency. In fact, the Martian probe’s equipment had been bombarded by a solar flare estimated at X45.
It had left the scientists helpless in the situation because the probe had been designed to withstand this dose of radiation.
Source: NASA
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