Solar modulation of galactic cosmic ray flux on the wane? Something extraordinary is happening
Since last Saturday, May 5, 2018 it has been generating a solar wind well in excess of 600 km/s and as high as 700 km/s. Normally, in the face of such a strong solar wind, GCRs would show a significant drop of around two percent. It has not happened. In fact, GCR’s are actually climbing. I am not a scientist. I am a semi-retired computer programmer, but I am not a casual observer, either. For the past five years I have checked spaceweather.com and the Oulu Cosmic Ray Station in Finland obsessively, as many as five times a day, studying the relationship between solar activity and GCRs. One thing I have noticed along with others is that after a long lull in solar activity, a “proton event” (high solar winds with an elevated proton density) triggers large earthquakes. I actually predicted a “7.0 or higher earthquake” in an email to a dear friend days before the 7.5 earthquake in Mexico on February 16, 2018. I