Along with advancement of technology and human’s curiosity, more researches and dissemination on climate and weather should be conducted. This inspires Dr. Dhani Herdiwijaya, M. Sc to address a public lecture titled “Space Weather and Its Effect on Technology and Health”.

According to Dhani, History recorded a major detrimental event when solar storm occured on outer space. “This occurred in UK during the 18th century. Electricity and telecommunication were cut. That time, they initially did not know the cause. But then they discovered that the cause did not come from inside the Earth but outside the Earth called solar storm,” he said. The occurrence had great effect on technology and economy, hence starting human’s seriousness in understanding weather on space.

Today, researches, explorers, and development regarding space weather increases. Space weather can cause many effects to human’s health. “This happens when cosmic ray shower occurs. This shower produces various particles with varying energy distribution,” he explained. The result is quite severe even though not immediately. Particles carrying high energy are not resistible by Earth’s atmosphere, hence when the particles reach Earth’s surface it can affect the genetics of living organisms.

Space weather will also affect transportation. This is because modern navigation and communication system rely highly on space satellites. “We would see airplanes especially on upper latitudes (areas where latitudes values are high) will get their navigation disturbed. It is not only about the satellites, but also the magnetic disturbance and radiation exposure on polar regions,” Dhani said. That is why, countries which are most active to uncover secrets of space weather are still limited to countries located in upper latitude or poles.

According to Dhani, even though Indonesia is located on relatively-safe equator line, Indonesia shall begin to study about space weather. “Today Indonesia has many telecommunication satellites, but we cannot access our satellites data because of restriction by countries that produce our satellites,” he said. It clearly indicates that in the future knowledge on space is a new ‘weapon’. Dhani hopes Indonesia can have independence in knowledge about space, including the development and research. “Keep in mind that Indonesia has complex ionosphere layer. One day the knowledge and measurement will be fought over,” he concluded.

Reporter: Ferio Brahmana (Engineering Physics 2017)