Hi Kevin,

That's an interesting question, although a lot of us might say that it usually isn't the "solar" storm that causes the damage on the surface of the Earth, it's the geomagnetic storm. When disturbances like coronal mass ejections (CMEs) reach the Earth, they can interact strongly with the Earth's magnetic field, which accelerates particles in the Van Allen Radiation belts to relativistic energies and produces huge electrical currents.

One of the most damaging geomagnetic storms that I know of happened on March 13, 1989. The electrical currents induced by this disturbance damaged the Hydro-Quebec power grid and left about 6 million people without electricity for several hours and caused aurora to be visible as far south as Texas. Here is an image from NASA showing the damage to a transformer caused by this geomagnetic storm:

There have been other large geomagnetic storms throughout recorded history, but the impacts have not been felt quite as strongly on the Earth, since these storms occurred during times in history when people were not as dependent on the kinds of technology we use today. You can read more about severe space weather and how it can affect the electrical power grid here:

http://science.nasa.gov/s..._severespaceweather/

Solar storms and geomagnetic storms can also disrupt radio communications and cause problems for satellites in space.

Kris

Hi Kevin,

Generally solar storms don't really hurt the Earth, at least as far as we can tell. They can really effect our technology, though. That meant our technology had to reach a certain level before much damage could be done.

The biggest case on record happened in 1859 - which was also the first record of a solar flare. It was a really bright one. It was connected with what we now know was a CME. There was a giant storm in the Earth's magnetic field. There was major damage to telegraph systems by extra currents traveling through the telegraph wire. Telegraph operators got shocks. You can read more about it here:

http://science.nasa.gov/s...may_carringtonflare/

Another one that did a lot of damage was the one in 1989 which cause the Hydro-Quebec blackout. That one is also mentioned in the article I link to above.

cheers,Terry