The Van Allen Belts are a collection of charged particles held in place by the earth’s magnetic field, the wax and wane in response to incoming energy from the sun, the Belts sometimes swelling up enough to expose satellites in low earth orbit to damaging radiation.

Two donuts of radiation that surrounds earth, called Van Allen Belts have been found to contain a nearly impenetrable barrier that prevents the fastest, most energetic electrons from reaching earth. The Van Allen Belts are a collection of charged particles held in place by earth’s magnetic field.

The barrier of ultra fast moving electrons are remarkable, says Dan Baker. The Belts were first discovered with the launch of the Explorer one in 1958. The inner Belt can stretch from 400 to 6,000 miles above the earth’s surface, and the outer from 8,400 to 36,000 miles. Between the two Belts there is dead space, what keeps them separated? The outer Belt has a highly pronounced edge, and a sharp boundary that electrons can not penetrate.

Between us and the Van Allen Belts there is a giant cloud of cool charged particles called the plasma sphere, stretching from 600 miles to the lower Belt. The electrons move quickly around the earth, the plasma sphere is strong enough to create a wall at the inner edge of the Van Allen Belt.

NASA engineers admit they can’t get past the Belts.

In 2012 was the first time two space craft were able to study the Van Allen Belt, scientists were able to observe a storm up close in March 2015, NASA describes such a storm similar to a tsunami when triggered by an earth quake. Coronal mass ejection traveling at the speed of light, would short out our electrical equipment, and depends how large the mass ejection is could black out a large portion of the earth.

In 1962 the Van Allen Belt was amplified by a nuclear explosion called THE STARFISH PRIME TEST.