The Sun Unleashes Coronal Mass Ejection At Earth

astroengine writes "Yesterday morning, at 08:55 UT, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory detected a C3-class flare erupt inside a sunspot cluster. 100,000 kilometers away, deep within the solar atmosphere (the corona), an extended magnetic field filled with cool plasma forming a dark ribbon across the face of the sun (a feature known as a 'filament') erupted at the exact same time. It seems very likely that both eruptions were connected after a powerful shock wave produced by the flare destabilized the filament, causing the eruption. A second solar observatory, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, then spotted a huge coronal mass ejection blast into space, straight in the direction of Earth. Solar physicists have calculated that this magnetic bubble filled with energetic particles should hit Earth on August 3, so look out for some intense aurorae — a solar storm is coming."

So should I unplug all my stuff or not?

[assemblerex]

I hope this isn't some hyped up story about something the sun does regularly.

clarification requested.

[pezpunk]

sooo are you saying i should check out the sweet sunset that evening, or prepare for oblivion, or put on some sunscreen, or what? i beg your pardon, i'm just not sure what the proper reaction is when a huge coronal mass ejection blasts a magnetic bubble filled with energetic particles at me.

Irony

[blair1q]

Wouldn't it be ironic if this solar flare knocks SOHO out of commission?

Re:Irony

[Anomalyst]

"God is an iron". http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Spider_Robinson#God_Is_An_Iron_.281977.29 [wikiquote.org]
RIP Jeanne Robinson

Can't wait

[fyngyrz]

It just means I get to take more pictures like these [flickr.com].

I wrote an application that keeps track of auroral potential WRT photography [jamesblish.com]. It's public domain, and you can get the latest version of the project here [fyngyrz.com]. Linux, OSX. Nothing for windows, sorry. At least, not without substantial linux-like underpinnings. Love to hear about it if you did get it running under windows, of course.

Re:This is not news...or news-worthy

[DJRumpy]

I actually found this far more interesting. Apparently the sunspot that created the intial flare is large enough it can be spotted with the naked eye. This sunspot is huge.

http://spaceweather.com/ [spaceweather.com]

Image of the sunspot in question: http://spaceweather.com/swpod2010/02aug10/Oleg-Toumilovitch1_strip.jpg [spaceweather.com]

SUNSPOT SUNRISE: Sunspot 1092, a key player in yesterday's Earth-directed eruptions, is big enough to see without the aid of a solar telescope. Oleg Toumilovitch "spotted" it on July 31st rising over Blairgowrie, South Africa:

Photo details: Canon EOS-350D, ISO-800, 1/1600s exposure

"During the first few minutes of sunrise only a fraction of the sunlight makes it's way to the observer - mostly from the red part of visible spectrum," notes Toumilovitch. "During this time large sunspots can be seen without a special solar filter." Be careful, though! Even when dimmed by clouds and haze, direct sunlight can hurt your eyes. "If you try to take a picture like this," advises Toumilovitch, "look only at the screen of your digital camera, not the optical viewfinder."

Re:So should I unplug all my stuff or not?

[Hadlock]

The carrington flare was an X class flare, two classes above this C class (out of three) flare. And it's near the bottom of the C class scale as well, a C-2. This is like interupting your normally scheduled program to report that there was a 2.0 earthquake in Los Angeles county... the rural portion.

Re:So should I unplug all my stuff or not?

[downix]

The story is not the flare itself, it is the sensory system which spotted it. They've been developing these activity sensors for years, and now it is starting to give results.

This is the space version of Hurricane tracking technology. While not every tropical wave that comes off of africa becomes another Katrina, we need to watch all of them for the one which does.