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Space

The Sun Has Erupted Non-Stop All Month, and There Are More Giant Flares Coming (sciencealert.com) 68

Posted by EditorDavid from the flaring-up dept.
Over the past few weeks the sun "has undergone a series of giant eruptions that have sent plasma hurtling through space," reports Science Alert: Perhaps the most dramatic was a powerful coronal mass ejection and solar flare that erupted from the far side of the Sun on February 15 just before midnight. Based on the size, it's possible that the eruption was in the most powerful category of which our Sun is capable: an X-class flare.

Because the flare and CME were directed away from Earth, we're unlikely to see any of the effects associated with a geomagnetic storm, which occurs when material from the eruption slams into Earth's atmosphere. These include interruptions to communications, power grid fluctuations, and auroras. But the escalating activity suggests that we may anticipate such storms in the imminent future. "This is only the second farside active region of this size since September 2017," astronomer Junwei Zhao of Stanford University's helioseismology group told SpaceWeather. "If this region remains huge as it rotates to the Earth-facing side of the Sun, it could give us some exciting flares."

According to SpaceWeatherLive, which tracks solar activity, the Sun has erupted every day for the month of February, with some days featuring multiple flares. That includes three of the second-most powerful flare category, M-class flares: an M1.4 on February 12; an M1 on February 14; and an M1.3 on February 15. There were also five M-class flares in January. The mild geomagnetic storm that knocked 40 newly launched Starlink satellites from low-Earth orbit followed an M-class flare that took place on January 29.
The article suggests this is normal activity, since the sun is about halfway towards "solar maximum" (its peak of sunspot and flare activity) expected to arrive in 2025, while the "solar minimum" was in 2019.

Further Reading: SciTechDaily reports that the ESA/NASA Solar Orbiter spacecraft has now "captured the largest solar prominence eruption ever observed in a single image together with the full solar disc."

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 for submitting the story
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The Sun Has Erupted Non-Stop All Month, and There Are More Giant Flares Coming More

The Sun Has Erupted Non-Stop All Month, and There Are More Giant Flares Coming

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