Consequences of a 1 Tesla magnetic field coming into the proximity of Earth?

[happyhacker]

TL;DR Summary

Strong magnetic field near Earth.

What would be the consequence if a powerful (1 Tesla) magnetic field came into proximity of Earth? Options open concerning size of generating body and distance. Thank You.

 

[Ibix]

You could make a loudspeaker out of it.

 

[Orodruin]

A typical MRI machine has a magnetic field of about 1 T.

 

[Dale]

TL;DR Summary: Strong magnetic field near Earth.

What would be the consequence if a powerful (1 Tesla) magnetic field came into proximity of Earth? Options open concerning size of generating body and distance. Thank You.

We have much stronger magnets already. I work with 1.5 T and 3 T magnets almost daily, and 7 T magnets on occasion. I know that other people I have worked with have 50 T magnets. You have to care for loose ferromagnetic material, but that is about it.

 

[Vanadium 50]

You have to care for loose ferromagnetic material, but that is about it.

Oh, you'll find it all right.

You also have to worry about the aglets on your shoes, because they will experience a force as the enclosed flux changes. It's actually possible to trip over a magnetic field.

 

[Ibix]

It's actually possible to trip over a magnetic field.

The voice of experience?

 

[Orodruin]

The voice of experience?

What doesn’t kill you make you … wiser?

 

[JT Smith]

Do you mean eyelets? I think aglets are usually plastic.

 

[Vanadium 50]

The voice of experience?

Um....maybe.

 

[berkeman]

Do you mean eyelets? I think aglets are usually plastic.

Looks like they can be made of either material. I learned a new word today...

An aglet (/ˈæɡlət/ AG-lət)[1] or aiglet is a small sheath, often made of plastic or metal, attached at each end of a shoelace, a cord, or a drawstring.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aglet

 

[Vanadium 50]

It's a great Wordle word.

It's a cylinder (if metal) as is the eyelet (again, if metal). Lenz' Law tried to keep the magnetic flux inside constant which then induces a force. You can trip over it, or it can untie your shoe, or any of a number of other surprising things. Jewelry too, I'm told. Rings, obviously, but what about links in a necklace?

Fields this strong (and perhaps more relevantly, gradient of the field) are not to be messed with. They will mess with you right back.

 

[nightvidcole]

If the entire planet were suddenly subject to a 1 T magnetic field, the Van Allen belts - made of moving charged particles, would be severely disrupted. Depending on the geometry of the field, it could result in an extremely bright aurora somewhere, and could cause large amounts of radiation to hit orbiting satellites and potentially destroy their electronics. Low-energy charged particles coming from space would reflect off the strong magnetic field and get sent back out, unless they came in parallel to the field lines. Also, charged particles gyrating around the magnetic field lines would emit EM waves. The frequency of the waves would differ in different regions of space, if the field was not uniform. A consequence of this might be that RF communication would be almost impossible due to the large background signal from this massive amount of cyclotron radiation.

All power lines carrying 60 Hz current would vibrate at 60 Hz, unless the current was running parallel to the field. This could result in very loud humming at the audible 60 Hz frequency. For that matter, if a 1 T field was applied to the entire planet, all power transformers with a ferromagnetic core would become almost ineffective due to the saturation of the induced magnetization.

In other words, civilization would shut down.