Detect invisible belt around the earth

A radiation belt that unprecedented scientific circles surrounded the earth last year before being destroyed by the shockwave.

Van Allen satellite pair of the US Aeronautics Agency (NASA) is monitoring the Earth's radiation belts. Recently, based on their data, NASA scientists found a radiation belt that once formed around our planet in 2011, Livescience reported.

"It formed on September 2 last year, from 19,100 to 22,300km from the Earth and survived for about 4 weeks. Then the meteorite's position in the belt was disturbed by a certain cause and it dissolved broke on October 1, " NASA announced.

Illustration of Van Allen satellite pairs and two outer radiation belts of the earth. (Photo: NASA)

NASA experts predict a strong shock wave that has broken the radiation belt. A strong increase in solar wind speed is the cause of that shock wave.

After humanity began to explore space, the first major finding was two Van Allen radiation belts - the area containing high charged particles (protons and electrons) outside the Earth. They are capable of destroying artificial satellites. Two Allen belts, occupying a space of several thousand kilometers in length, were discovered in 1958.

"This finding shows that we still don't know a lot about the universe, even the closest to the earth," NASA researchers commented.

Usually two Van Allen radiation belts are located just above the International Space Station (ISS) and low orbiting satellites. However, they can bulge and reach the orbits of satellites when the solar storm hits the globe. If solar storms are strong enough, they can damage artificial satellites, inflict astronauts, paralyze electricity and telecommunications networks.

The pair of satellites fly over to follow both Van Allen belts. The closest and furthest distance between them and the globe will be 480km and nearly 32,000km respectively. Sometimes they are about 160km apart, but sometimes they are more than 38,000km apart.