In a message dated 10/22/2001 6:26:18 AM Pacific Daylight Time, Electronics_101@... writes:
???As some of you my be aware there was a category X6.1 solar flare last
Friday and coincidentally occoured at approximately the same time a backbone
switch failed, as well as a number of (very expensive) workgroup switches,
along with a couple of processors a various other bits of minor ancillery
equipment.
My question (or discussion point) is this: How likely is a solar flare of
this magnitude to have caused our equipment problems? If "yes", then what is
the most likely method of transmission? The power? The kilometers of Cat 5e
copper in the building? Radiation via the microwave/HF amplifiers? Direct
X-ray radiation into the equipment? Earthing faults? None of the above?
How many minutes between the two? If they were simultaneous, it wouldn't make any sense, since the radiation couldn't have gotten here that fast. At the speed of light, it's about 8 minutes from there to here if I recall correctly, and I don't think any particles from a coronal mass ejection are traveling at anywhere near that speed.
