What exactly are ion storms?

[Darkwing]

If they were simply abnormally high solar flare activity, the danger would be easily avoided, except the rare occasion of a ship at low sublight in a system where the natives are subject to the prime directive and advanced enough to possibly see something proving the existence of alien life. If ion storms are essentially thunderstorms in nebulae, they'd only be an issue when a ship goes into a nebula.
In order for an ion storm to really be an analog to severe storms at sea in the age of sail, they need to be difficult to predict, difficult to detect, and have at least the potential for propagating FTL. Should there be a connection to wormholes, verterons, or other phenomena?

 

[blssdwlf]

In TOS, IIRC, an ion storm and magnetic storm are the same or a type of the other. However it has special properties:
1. It can rapidly expand out across many light years and encompass many systems.
2. It is capable of dragging ships with lesser propulsion systems off course
3. It can damage a starship
4. It can disrupt shipboard systems (except I haven't seen it affect power generation)
5. You can warp through it
6. It is detectable in most cases and tracked as part of space weather
7. In one instance it was caused by an unusal quasar. Other times we're not told what the source is.

How TNG, and other series differ I'm sure others can fill in...

 

[Timo]

Reading the Memory Alpha entry ought to suffice... It's rather complete and non-controversial, for a change.

TOS "Court Martial" suggests ion storms are poorly understood, at least back in the 2260s, and prompt Starfleet to deliberately order starships into them to perform measurements that may one day save lives. It is acceptable to lose lives in performing that duty, too - Kirk only gets bad rap when foul play is suspected in connection with such a death. So ion storms can range from "ordinary" nasty weather to "mysterious and dangerous" space tornadoes (Kirk rattles off some parameters when describing the "Court Martial" storm, establishing there are other sorts), and come in all sizes, too (some episodes mention the lightyears or kilometers).

No actual or fictional physics have been associated with the storms yet - no doubletalk about verterons, no mention of pulsars or supernova shockwaves in the context. Although the mini-quasar at Murasaki 312 was creating a lot of ionization, the word "storm" wasn't used there.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[matthunter]

Don't forget that transporting during an ion storm has twice resulted in transfer into the Mirror Universe. Whether that's a property of the storm or an accidental effect on the transporter isn't clear, although regular transporters could later be modified for dimensional travel... so perhaps it confuses the Heisenberg Compensators or somesuch?

 

[Henoch]

Ions are electrically charged atoms or molecules formed by the loss or gain of one or more electrons, as a cation (positive ion), which is created by electron loss and is attracted to the cathode in electrolysis, or as an anion (negative ion), which is created by an electron gain and is attracted to the anode. The ion storm is a mass of charged gas that discharges between the positive or negative zones or objects. I envision lightning bolts magnitudes stronger than normal lightning on Earth. Ships traveling through the ion storm probably build up a strong electrostatic charge either on the hull or collected around the ship's shielding which makes them a prime target for a discharge lightning stroke. ZAP! (Camera shakes; sparks erupt from control consoles.)

Storms also have strong winds, too. I envision the gas mass (clouds) to be moving fiercely fast either in one general direction or circulating like a hurricane, or a combination of both. Ships would be carried off with the "wind" if their engines are weak, or at least cause difficult navigation with the strongest engines. The stresses could overwhelm a ship's inertial dampening field, and in extreme storms, damage or even break-up a ship. (Camera tilts; cast roll to one side and tumble out of chairs.)

Lastly, ion storms must affect subspace to some degree, causing subspace communication and transporter problems. The tech heads that adjust warp speeds by the environment would give the region a low Cochrane variable causing low velocities even at high warp factors.

 

[Darkwing]

Reading the Memory Alpha entry ought to suffice... It's rather complete and non-controversial, for a change.

Not really. Interesting read, and reminded me of things I had forgotten, but it doesn't really explain the subspace effects or why starships don't simply outrun it at high warp. I'm trying to decide for my writing the hows, whys, and wherefores of ion storms. Thanks for the input, some good stuff, but I still feel like there should be more to it.

 

[Darkwing]

In TOS, IIRC, an ion storm and magnetic storm are the same or a type of the other. However it has special properties:
1. It can rapidly expand out across many light years and encompass many systems.

That's the problem. How? Why? 'It just does' doesn't work for me. There has to be a reason.

2. It is capable of dragging ships with lesser propulsion systems off course
3. It can damage a starship
4. It can disrupt shipboard systems (except I haven't seen it affect power generation)

Pretty standard tropical cyclone in space properties, I'm not terribly worried about this part if the subspace and sheer spacial volume part can be explained.

5. You can warp through it

except when you can't - I like Diane Duane's idea of warp near a star blowing it up, although other sources contradict. So depending on the explanation for the ion storm, there may be circumstances in which you can't warp through it.

Thanks to everyone for the input.

 

[Henoch]

So depending on the explanation for the ion storm, there may be circumstances in which you can't warp through it.

I'm reading about the influence of Dark Matter and Dark Energy on the early formation of the universe which I think could play a roll in the odd physics effects attributed to ion storms. By now, most of the dark matter has been consumed in the galaxy, but maybe there are thin pockets of dark matter in clouds between solar systems. Once caught in the gravitational pull of a solar system or some other gravity well (small high speed blackholes zipping through the galaxy), it brings the dark matter together with normal matter causing violent reactions. Once a significant degree of reactions occur, then they may propagate like chain lightning throughout the cloud ionizing the remaining matter into an intense ion storm. Very dangerous to be caught up such a storm.

 

[Darkwing]

I'm reading about the influence of Dark Matter and Dark Energy ...

Very interesting!

 

[blssdwlf]

Although the mini-quasar at Murasaki 312 was creating a lot of ionization, the word "storm" wasn't used there.

Murasaki 312 from "The Galileo Seven"? The word "storm" was used in the episode

KIRK: I'm aware of that, Commissioner. At the same time I have certain scientific duties I must perform, and investigating the Murasaki effect is one.
...
KIRK: That thing out there has ionized this complete sector. None of our instruments work. At least four complete solar systems in the immediate vicinity. And out there somewhere, a twenty four foot shuttlecraft, off course, out of control. Finding a needle in a haystack would be child's play.
Captain's Log, stardate 2821.7. The electromagnetic phenomenon known as Murasaki Three Twelve whirls like some angry blight in space,a depressive reminder that seven shipmates still have not been heard from. Equally bad, the effect has rendered our normal searching systems useless. Without them, we are blind and almost helpless.
...
Captain's Log, stardate 2823.1. Our landing parties are on the surface of Taurus Two. We continue to hope.
Instruments are slowly returning to an operable condition as the ion storm slowly disperses. On the ship, we can only wait helplessly.​

And some more specifics from TOS...

From "Mirror, Mirror":

KIRK: Report on magnetic storm, Mister Spock.
SPOCK: Standard ion type, Captain, but quite violent and unpredictable.​

From "Court Martial":

KIRK: He may have blamed me that he never rose to command a ship, but I don't assign jobs on the basis of who blames me. It was Finney's turn, and I assigned him. He had just checked in with me from the pod when we hit the leading edge of the storm. Not too bad at first. I signalled a Yellow Alert. Then we began encountering pressure, variant stress, force seven, the works. I finally signaled a Red Alert. Finney knew he had a matter of seconds. I gave him those seconds and more. But apparently it wasn't enough.
...
UHURA: Meteorology reports ion storm upcoming, Captain.
...
HANSON: Approaching ion storm, sir.
KIRK: Warp factor one, Mister Hanson.
HANSON: Warp one, sir.
...
KIRK: Hold our course, Mister Hanson.
HANSON: Aye, aye, sir. Natural vibrations, force two, Captain. Force three.
...
CREWMAN: Engineering.
KIRK: One third more thrust.
...​

That's the problem. How? Why? 'It just does' doesn't work for me. There has to be a reason.

That's kinda like how does warp drive work? Or phasers set to disintegrate? It's specific enough to convey the effects but smart enough to not get pinned down by the details. You could just use the "Galileo Seven" example and attribute it to an unusual quasar, the "Murasaki effect" as being able to ionize several light years in a very short time. Or make up something else that isn't already covered in Star Trek

As to traveling through an ion storm...
I'm not aware of any instance in TOS where you can't travel through an ion storm at warp or impulse. Now whether your ship gets heavily damaged or is destroyed is a different matter.

YMMV

 

[Timo]

Not really. Interesting read, and reminded me of things I had forgotten, but it doesn't really explain the subspace effects or why starships don't simply outrun it at high warp.

Why would they? Trek is consistent about it being possible to fly right through ion storms if the skipper isn't afraid of a few bumps and bruises. The Boomers were doing it years before ENT, according to Mayweather. Kirk was able to maneuver into, inside, and out of an ion storm at warp quite at will in "Court Martial", even though turning around would clearly always have been an option.

Turning and running isn't a good idea if it adds to your travel time or prevents you from reaching the places you want or need to reach. And the only time we heard of a storm the heroes couldn't outrun because of lack of speed was in ENT "The Catwalk", and that one was a "neutronic wavefront", not an ion storm. But it's good data for establishing that many types of seemingly real-worldly phenomena like neutrons or ions can be pushed to high warp in suitable circumstances; we don't need and probably never would get a pseudo-physical explanation specific to ion storms, but rather a generic one relating to all subspace propagation phenomena.

We could concoct something out of the scraps we already have nicely enough. Any application of great energy density, even by semi-real-world means like antimatter explosions, seems to affect subspace, opening rifts and whatnot. An ion storm probably does that, too, boosting itself to great speeds by irritating subspace, much like a cloud here on Earth levitates itself by providing heat from condensation for sustained lift. The energy thus bleeds into subspace, rather rapidly dispersing the storm, which is why these supposedly devastating phenomena are only local nuisances.

So an ion storm would not be a singular phenomenon, either. Rather, it would be the automatic consequence of something, anything, happening to create lots of local ionization. Mini-quasars, collisions of perfectly real-worldly density waves from supernova explosions, space battles, ill-advised scientific experiments... You get your ionizing event, you get your subspace irritation, you get your storm. With lots of diversity, so that Starfleet will go tornado hunting with starships and ion pods to figure out at least some of the characteristics and thus prepare for the worst.

It need not be more specific than that: as said, the subspace part is just like the warp drive part, something we just take for granted for its generic qualities and inherent unfigureoutabilitynessiness.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[SPCTRE]

What exactly are ion storms?