South Atlantic Anomaly: 2015 through 2025
- Visualizations by:
- Greg Shirah
- Scientific consulting by:
- Weijia Kuang
- View full credits
South Atlantic Anomaly from 2015 through 2025 showing the geomagnetic intensity at the Earth's surface and the core-mantle boundary. There are versions that include the dates and colorbars and versions without the date and colorbat.
This video is also available on our YouTube channel.
The SAA creates no visible impacts on daily life on the surface, and its weakening magnetic intensity is still within the bounds of what scientists consider normal variation. However, recent observations and forecasts show that the region is expanding westward and continuing to weaken in intensity. Observational data from 2015-2020 found that the SAA has recently started to split from a single valley, or region of minimum field strength, into two cells; and models out to the year 2025 show the split continuing in the future, creating additional challenges for satellite missions.
NASA’s geomagnetic and geophysical research groups are using observations and models to monitor and predict future changes in the SAA and the rest of Earth’s geomagnetic field – helping prepare for future challenges to satellites and humans in space.
Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio
Visualizer
- Greg Shirah (NASA/GSFC) [Lead]
Writer
- Ellen T. Gray (NASA/HQ)
Scientists
- Weijia Kuang (NASA/GSFC) [Lead]
- Andrew Tangborn (UMBC)
- Scott Luthcke (NASA/GSFC)
- Terence J. Sabaka (NASA/GSFC)
Producer
- Jessica Merzdorf (Telophase)
Technical support
- Ian Jones (ADNET)
- Laurence Schuler (ADNET)
Datasets used in this visualization
Terra and Aqua BMNG (A.K.A. Blue Marble: Next Generation) (Collected with the MODIS sensor)
Credit: The Blue Marble data is courtesy of Reto Stockli (NASA/GSFC).
Dataset can be found at: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/BlueMarble/
See more visualizations using this data setCM6 geomagnetic field model and GEMS assimilation system
2015-2019: global geomagnetic field made by CM6 from satellite and observatory magnetic data; 2020-2025: geomagnetic forecasts made by GEMS (Geomagnetic Ensemble Modeling System)
See more visualizations using this data setNote: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.