More Ozone Was Destroyed

Lets take a trip back in time to 1859. A massive solar flare in that year destroyed more ozone then any other celestial event.
How do we know this?
Ice samples from greenland show nitrate concentrations that reveal the amount of ozone destroyed.

Solar Protons from CME's are highly energetic particles that destroy ozone.

I thought with all the ozone talk in the past 20 years that this was an interesting find

www.aip.org...

Heh. Not only will they destroy ozone, they're a greenhouse gas.

What is a solar proton, after all? It's a hydrogen ion. Drop that puppy into the ozone, and it will first snag an oxygen off of one ozone molecule, destroying it, and become a hydroxyl. The hydroxyl radical merrily goes flying around catalytically destroying ozone until at last it grabs another solar proton and becomes water.

The stratospheric water can then act as a reaction substrate for other ozone destroying catalytic reactions that require impure water or ice crystals as substrates.

And stratospheric clouds add to the greenhouse effect.

I wonder if the water plays a role in noctilucent clouds
science.nasa.gov...

PS I always thought a hydroxal radical was short lived?

[edit on 16-6-2007 by junglelord]

Originally posted by junglelord
I wonder if the water plays a role in noctilucent clouds
science.nasa.gov...

PS I always thought a hydroxal radical was short lived?

[edit on 16-6-2007 by junglelord]

In general it is, because it's so reactive that it will interact with nearly anything it comes in contact with. But in the ozone layer, there's not a lot there, so you get a bit longer lifespan. It does a sort of two-step with ozone, becoming HO2 then the HO2 interacts with another ozone and you get the original hydroxyl back and two O2 molecules.