There is something very odd happening high over South America and the nearby Atlantic Ocean, and NASA is on the case.
Meet with the South Atlantic Anomaly, a peculiar dent in Earth's magnetic field that is growing and dividing. It's been around for a long time, but over time that the anomaly has slowly changed. Although you'd never notice anything was wrong from the floor, for satellites, changes to the magnetic field that envelopes Earth can be a huge deal -- consequently NASA's interest from the anomaly and its activities. The link comes since the magnetic field blocks charged particles spewed out by sunlight from reaching Earth. But in the South Atlantic Anomaly, the area is dented, lowering the protective barrier above that part of Earth. The decrease barrier means that radiation bombards satellites since they fly over this area, triggering intermittent shutdowns to prevent possible damage to the hardware, according to a NASA statement. The International Space Station is just one of the many spacecraft that fly through the anomaly, but it also carries additional shielding to prote