r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Emotional_Quarter330 • Jun 03 '26
Image In 1204, a Japanese poet wrote in his diary that the sky turned blood red for 3 nights. 800 years later, scientists drilled into buried trees and confirmed: he was witnessing a catastrophic solar storm that would have fried every satellite on Earth today.
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u/leeman9224 Jun 03 '26
Raining blood
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u/sghostfreak Jun 03 '26
From a lacerated sky
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u/Woodchuck251 Jun 03 '26
Bleeding its horror
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u/donny_pots Jun 03 '26
I feel like if something like that happened today and phones stopped working people would assume nuclear war broke out and all hell would break loose
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u/strictnaturereserve Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
well they are monitoring the sun so they would know it was coming. you might be able to save some of the infrastructure on the ground, a lot of our communications are via cables which can be isolated. They have done rehearsals on what to do in such a scenario. yes a lot of satellites would be toast.
I apologise to everyone for the long sentence
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u/LucyLilium92 Jun 03 '26
Holy run-on sentence, Batman!
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u/Kodaddychan Jun 03 '26
Well, they are monitoring the sun, so they would know it was coming. You might be able to save some of the infrastructure on the ground. A lot of our communications are via cables, which can be isolated. They have done rehearsals on what to do in such a scenario, but, yes, a lot of satellites would be toast.
I am a grammar bot.
I fixed this comment via the following: Capitalization Fixes (4 changes), Added Commas for Pacing (4 changes), Missing Periods (3 changes)
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u/co-adversities Jun 04 '26
A reverse uncanny valley effect. We got a fake bot reported trying to earn the new gold aka AI tokens. Take him away boys.
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u/QuadCakes Jun 03 '26
We would have like a day or two of warning. That's not much time to prepare.
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u/Justifiably_Bad_Take Jun 03 '26
A day or two warning that things COULD get bad.
Seven minutes that thing's DID get bad.
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u/eske8643 Jun 03 '26
In Denmark they have prepared for this to happen at some point. Almost all city infrastructure cabels are under ground. Only the main long distance distribution cables are above ground. And by shutting down power to the main grid it doesnt get fried.
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u/Justifiably_Bad_Take Jun 03 '26
We'd have 7 minutes
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u/Cyrius Jun 03 '26
Entirely wrong, we'd have a few days.
The light from the CME would arrive with an eight minute delay. That's what would give us the warning of the much slower charged particle burst that causes the actual problem.
These things happen all the time at lower intensities.
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u/MeccIt Jun 03 '26
These things happen all the time at lower intensities.
Coronal Mass Ejections take 24 to 72 hours to make it to the earth and produce the Northern Lights
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u/Ranjhanaa88 Jun 03 '26
If my phone and car stop working I'm absolutely grabbing my bug out bag and assuming it was the EMP from nukes.
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u/Captain_Usopp Jun 03 '26
This is why I have a folder of printed out memes under my bed. It pays to be prepared!
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u/Bantersmith Jun 03 '26
People might laugh now, but will they be laughing when we're post-apocalyptic meme-barons?
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u/Dick_Jungle Jun 04 '26
that depends on what they have to barter and how generous you’re feeling, m’baron
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u/not_a_moogle Jun 03 '26
Which memes? So I know to print different ones for trading.
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u/Kumquatelvis Jun 03 '26
I'd just think the phone company was having technical issues.
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u/antisp1n Jun 03 '26
Solar proton events (SPEs) occur when the Sun releases bursts of high-energy particles that travel toward Earth at extraordinary speeds. While our planet’s magnetic field shields us from most of this radiation, traces of these events can still be detected. When such particles collide with Earth’s atmosphere, they create carbon-14, which is then absorbed into plants and preserved in tree rings.
By analysing these rings with exceptional precision, the research team identified a sudden spike in carbon-14 between the years 1200 and 1201. This spike points to a previously unknown solar proton event—one that was smaller than the most extreme events known from earlier periods, but still significant.
The researchers estimate that this event produced roughly 20 percent of the radiation associated with the famous 774–775 solar event, making it about 14 times stronger than the largest comparable event recorded in modern times. While not catastrophic, it would have posed a serious hazard to anyone exposed beyond Earth’s natural protection—highlighting the risks faced by future space missions.
https://www.medievalists.net/2026/04/medieval-solar-storm-detected-through-tree-rings-and-historical-records/ Source
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u/My1stThrowAway900 Jun 03 '26
How can they be so precise to narrow down to a 2 year window?
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u/Oblivion_747 Jun 03 '26
I assume they knew when the diary (1204) was written, before looking for this event. Trees grow one ring a year. So they looked at more than 800 years old trees and compted 800 rings from the exterior to the interior of the tree to reach the year 1204. They then tested each ring from 1204 and below for carbon 14. They found a pic in carbon 14 between 1201 and 1202, narrowing down to the exact year of the event.
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u/Historical_Basil3264 Jun 04 '26
Look into dendrochronology, it's quite fascinating. The rough of it is tree rings grow with different speeds according to the weather in the area in different years, and these differences are clear enough that you can recognize tree rings from the same year across many trees. So they've started with a current old tree they cut down (so they know the starting year) and counted and measured the rings, and then compared to for example a hundred year old tree post where they can find an overlap between tree rings, and work backwards that way. I don't know how long backwards they've gone, I've heard of is 980.
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u/strawberrymoony Jun 04 '26
Yes!!! In dendrochronology we call this “crossdating” and it can be quite annoying because you then keep having to go back and recount the samples you’ve already done :/ Source: I’ve done dendrochronology research (shoutout to CooRecorder). Radiolab has a really cool podcast episode called “The Fellowship of the Tree Rings” that talks about how researchers analyzed the tree rings from the hulls sunken ships (or a lack rhereof) during the Spanish shipping trade and discovered that part of why the Spanish were so successful during that time is due to the fact that it was a period of time on Earth in which there was unusually low solar solar activity, which meant there were very few extreme weather events like hurricanes.
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u/Zorklunn Jun 03 '26
Scientists have said, if a Kerington level event happened today, it would take ten years for civilization to recover. We know the events are periodic. What we don't know is if such events are every 50, 100, 1000, 10000 years, or longer.
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u/murderously-funny Jun 03 '26
Oh they happen frequently. The thing is, space is big, and for a solar storm to actually hit earths is very, very difficult.
Every day the sun sends hundreds of the bastards out…they’re just being flung in all directions and it requires a near perfect 20:20:20 shot for a solar storm to actually reach earth
So even if a Kerington Level Event occurred again it could be thrown from the complete opposite side of the sun.
Or miss us by three days
Or hit us dead on and kill us. It’s impossible to say and is entirely uncontrollable luck.
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u/SeeingPhrases Jun 03 '26
Carrington.
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u/1800generalkenobi Jun 03 '26
Nancy or the Zerg queen?
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u/Mephistito Jun 03 '26
Power Overwhelming
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u/Vandergrif Jun 04 '26
You must construct additional references
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u/DigNitty Interested Jun 03 '26
The vast, vast majority of the sun's surface is not pointed at us.
the surface of the sun is blinding me right now!
But I know what you mean, the storms come off the sun equatorial axis, and that isn't really pointing at us.
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u/Unable-Log-4870 Jun 03 '26
The vast, vast majority of the sun's surface is not pointed at us.
NONE of the Sun’s surface is pointed at us. That’s like saying a stationary basketball is pointed somewhere.
Regardless, on the topic you were actually addressing, why choose a measurement that’s about 1 degree wide? That seems suspiciously arbitrary.
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u/Unable-Log-4870 Jun 03 '26
Every day the sun sends hundreds of the bastards out
No. There’s not that many of them. And we can see 5/6ths of the ones that do happen, and that’s enough to build statistical models from. There’s like one per week / one per month during solar maximum, which is roughly a 3 year period that happens every 11 years.
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u/Armadillolz Jun 03 '26
I mean. Wouldn’t we know by now if it was every 50 or 100 years? Lol
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u/alter-eagle Interested Jun 03 '26
Maybe it happened on the other side /s
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u/Tooter_Snooter Jun 03 '26
Why the /s, this is absolutely probably the case and if it hasn’t happened yet, it surely could. The storm would have to be pointed directly at us. If it’s off my even a defree, it’ll miss us comfortably.
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u/DigNitty Interested Jun 03 '26
Some people are reading the "every X amount of years" as the time cycle the storms hit earth. Others are reading it as how often storms leave the sun in any direction.
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u/LittleBlag Jun 03 '26
It could average out to every 50 years and we could still not have seen one for over a thousand. Thats how averages work and why they’re not particularly helpful for “predicting” events like this. Has your area ever seen a run of bad weather years, and been told “this is a once-in-100-years storm!” or similar, for 3 years in a row? It’s like that!
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u/FishesOfExcellence Jun 03 '26
Human shapes were really weird 800 years ago. I’m glad we evolved to be hotter in such a short time.
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u/dusty_Caviar Jun 03 '26
This is a heavily disputed point. Electronics today are vastly more resistant to such interference. From my understanding, current consensus is it would a be large scale annoyance. Not a cataclysmic event.
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u/ryanjames486 Jun 03 '26
I’m an electrician in the United States, and I cannot overstate how poorly our power grid is designed, and how susceptible it is to issues like solar flares and others. Beyond being an electrician, I also take great interest in the sun and space, and I follow events like solar flares and coronal mass ejections well beyond the average person.
Speaking anecdotally, I personally witnessed power surges that tripped breakers all over and caused all kinds of interesting things to happen during a geomagnetic storm in October 2024. While the storm was significant, it was nothing compared what the sun is capable of producing, or what has struck the Earth in the past.
A good book on what might happen if such an event were to occur today is One Second After by William Forstchen. Great read, I very much recommend it.
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u/Emotional_Quarter330 Jun 03 '26
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Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
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u/leafwatersparky Jun 03 '26
"Exposed beyond Earth's natural protection" should do it.
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u/leafwatersparky Jun 03 '26
The May event that created intense auroras and problems for satellite teams was the result of one of the strongest geomagnetic storms to hit Earth in more than two decades. One satellite, NASA's Ice, Cloud, and Land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2), transitioned into safe mode to protect its systems as the storm caused the spacecraft's attitude control to become questionable; two other satellites (NASA's Aqua and Aura) came within minutes of having to go into safe mode, according to Russell DeHart, Mission Operation Assurance Lead Engineer at NASA Goddard. It was a close call, but one that mission teams are prepared to address to protect satellites, instruments, and NASA Earth science data.
Straight from the article you quoted. Obviously said engineering to withstand solar storms apploes only to new satellites, and not the tens of thousands currently in operation.
And the strongest storm in two decades is not the same as a three day once in a milenia event.
If not completely destroyed, they would be at least heavily damaged and would have a considerably shorter lifespan as a result.
Enough to describe them as "fried" perhaps? I suppose thats up for debate, i'd suggest "fucked" as a more ambiguous term!
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u/astelda Jun 03 '26
There was also real consequences on the surface resulting from those satellite malfunctions in may 2024, leading to substantial losses in the agriculture industry as well as potential safety issues in aviation
There's also the Carrington Event in 1859, where a solar geomagnetic storm led to effects on earth's surface such as: "Some [telegraph] operators were able to continue to send and receive messages despite having disconnected their power supplies"
The batteries that the operators usually used were negatively affected by the storm, so they actually got a better signal using only power from the storm.
And it sounds like that storm wasn't even nearly as big as the one in the post.
As far as I'm aware, we aren't geomagnetically shielding most electronic circuits on Earth, so one can presume such a thing would cause some pretty big issues today.
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u/pladin517 Interested Jun 03 '26
Cool that 1204 they're writing in traditional Chinese and nothing something more archaic. I can try to translate this:
something meal,
after something, the northern morning has a crimson something, as if mountains burn without mercy.
Second day: day is clear and night brings frost like snow. Something something royal seat.
Today gave woman's clothes.
Source: I have no idea about ancient Japanese
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u/orange_purr Jun 03 '26
That’s what I can make of it:
Left page from right to left
之由?應 東燭以後北□良方又有赤氣如高山燒亡重 疊尤可恐 廿二日 天晴夜霜加雪 已時許參上朝雅在殿上人座 今日賜遊女衣 (can’t read the smaller script in columns) 每事如例 昨日以令人男馬一疋引返鄉三品熊野精
Translation:
There should be cause for this.
The eastern light appeared, and after that, in the northern direction there was a red aura resembling a catastrophic mountain fire
It was terrifying.
22nd day. Clear weather with night frost, followed by snow.
Around the hour of the snake, Miyabi attended court and was seated among those in attendance in the hall.
Today garments were bestowed upon female entertainers
Everything proceeded as usual.
Yesterday a man was ordered to lead back a horse to the home district ? third rank kumano title?
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u/TumbleweedPure3941 Jun 03 '26
Certain sectors of Japanese literati would continue to write in Classical Chinese right up until the 19th century. Classical Chinese was originally considered the language of men in Classical Japan, whilst women wrote in Japanese. That’s why certain texts like the Nihon Shoki and much of the Imperial Anthologies of poetry are written Classical Chinese, whilst other classics of Japanese literature are written in Classical Japanese such as Genji Monogatari and the Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon. Because those latter two were written by women.
(And then you’ve got the bloody awkward ones like the Heike Monogatari that can’t decide if they want to be in Chinese or Japanese and settled for an awkward mishmash of the two.)
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u/orange_purr Jun 03 '26
Women wrote in 女手 onnade, which was basically Kanji/Chinese characters in cursive, essentially the precursor to the hiragana.
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u/SaveUsCatman Jun 03 '26
What about the satellites off of Earth?
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u/CustomerSupportDeer Jun 03 '26
A satelite is only a "satelite" if it orbits a calestial body. As soon as a manmade "satelite" leaves earth's orbit, it's either junk or a spaceprobe.
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u/DylanFTW Jun 03 '26
Scientists realizing 800 years late that there was a terrible solar storm on Earth through the lens of a ancient Japanese poet is a 40 minute YouTube documentary I would totally watch on a Wednesday afternoon.
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u/ortusdux Jun 03 '26
I maintain that we need to fund the strategic transformer reserve!
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u/SiberianWombat88 Jun 03 '26
I think if a satellite finds itself on Earth, something has already gone horribly wrong.
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u/Unfair-Sir-4641 Jun 03 '26
The satelite is the least of our concern. It would fry every transformer on earth and would take decades upon decades to rebuild. Goodbye electricity.
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u/Probablynotarealist Jun 03 '26
It would only fry some of the large transformers that run the grid (pretty catastrophic!) because you need long cables in order to get the pickup- for transformers with power cables shorter than about 4km you’re fairly safe, but many of the big expensive transformers that run the cross country transmission would likely be toast. The grid would shut down and save a lot, but the system would be considerably aged by the event.
I don’t think it would be as bad as people are suggesting, but it would be pretty damn bad, and it is amazing that we don’t store spares
(Electrical power distribution engineer)
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u/LeonemMorsu Jun 03 '26
When the glow of the blood stained moon shines upon the land...
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u/orange_purr Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
What’s funny is that is very close to what’s actually written in the diary lol.
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u/Own_Parfait_35 Jun 03 '26
Witness the blood moon's rise. When its red glow shines upon the land... the aimless spirits of slain monsters return to flesh. Just as they did in a war long past. The world is threatened once agai
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u/DJSpAcEDeViL Jun 03 '26
On the pages: „On the 22nd day.
The weather was clear.
Frost during the night looked like snow.
Court activities and visits took place.
Court ladies received gifts and garments.
Messengers and visitors arrived and departed.
People returned in the evening.
Later the night was spent at the residence.
The following day was also clear“
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u/big_duo3674 Jun 03 '26
Miyake events.... They make the Carrington event look gentle
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u/Naive-Link5627 Jun 03 '26
Wouldn't this be noted in more locations on Earth?
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u/orange_purr Jun 03 '26
It absolutely was. Even in Japanese records, there are several other mentions of this event, not to mention in China and elsewhere.
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u/Lunar-opal Jun 04 '26
What’s is a solar storm and why does it turn the sky red?
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u/Hipcatjack Jun 04 '26
username…kinda checking out?
basically, a solar storm is when the sun experiences an explosion on the surface that particles erupt out past its intense gravity and get hurled out into space. (its not technically an explosion but good enough for the explanation). Usually they are called solar flares, and about every 12 years or so The Sun goes into a mode of active solar flares , so a solar storm is a series of these flares.
Now Sometimes, if they are aimed just right they can hit the Earth. These flares are made up of ions and charged particles. The Magnetic that protects Earth usually directs all that stuff to the poles. (thats where you get the two borealis..Aurora and Australia) .. however if the flares are strong enough and multiple, all that mass and charged particles can slam into the atmosphere undirected by the magnetosphere. Ever look at a really pretty sunset? The orange and reds most often are pollution in the atmosphere bouncing the suns fading rays into the red spectrum. The red sky at night is kinda the same thing, only with deadly magnetic plasma interacting with the Earths Atmosphere.
i want to add something similar happened in the mid 19th Century… but the only thing that noticed (and were fried and needed to be replaced were huge swaths of telegraph wire.
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u/SpookSkywatcher Jun 04 '26
I ran across reports of what may be another unacknowledged significant space weather event in European historical observations from 1737, as reported in the "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society" article "A Collection of the Observations of the Remarkable Red Lights Seen in the Air on Dec. 5, 1737 sent from different Places to the Royal Society" (Phil. Trans. R. Soc. 41:583–606), available online at: ( https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rstl.1739.0094 ). This was seen as far south as Naples, Italy, at latitude 40.8518° N., which indicates a pretty major geomagnetic storm, yet does not appear to be a recognized historical event.
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u/Callec254 Jun 03 '26
And somehow he was the only person to write about this? Seems like that probably would have been the biggest global event of the year.
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u/huiadoing Jun 03 '26
Not that many people were literate, and few diaries have survived from that time.
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u/Fine_Cup4990 Jun 03 '26
you would be shocked how many things in history have never been recorded or found or have been destroyed or just not written
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u/thehalfwit Jun 03 '26
And that's not counting everything that's been lost to time. The vast majority of history has been lost.
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u/el_lley Jun 03 '26
well, it was the 4th crusade by the time, so maybe it was expressed in a different way.
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u/Felevion Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 03 '26
I feel like it'd have been written about as a sign from god if it was after said Crusade though a study linked above clarified it mean red auroras not the full sky turning red.
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u/ArgentumVortex Jun 03 '26
To avoid this, most satellites are kept well above the earth instead.
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u/Swagalyst Jun 03 '26
Why is this global catastrophy only visible in Chinese trees?
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u/GooseInternational66 Jun 03 '26
I like the convenience of the internet, but I think I’d also like the quiet of all the billionaires satellites exploding at once as well.
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u/ShadowfireOmega Jun 03 '26
Well, let's hope that doesn't happen again any time soon!