Solar Flares heading for Earth

One of the largest known solar flares erupted from the sun on Tuesday, heralding a storm of superheated gas that could hit Earth within a day.

The outburst was classified an X17.2 flare, the third largest on record, according to Paal Brekke, a project scientist with the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), a sun-watching satellite mission jointly run by NASA and the European Space Agency.

In comparison, two solar storms observed last week were between X1 and X5, Brekke said.

Solar flares are associated with coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, eruptions from the sun that, if headed our way, can disrupt communications satellites and power grids.

Solar flares have been in the new lately and typically they are of much concern to us. In the past they have disrupted our electronics and have caused minor inconveniences. This doesn’t appear to be the case this time around. We seemed to learn how to build better electronics. At least that is what we believe after the last solar flare erupted. Yesterday’s flare, that is estimated to reach us today, is slightly different.

“The eruption was positioned perfectly. It’s headed straight for us like a freight train,” said John Kohl, a Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics scientist, in a statement. “A major geomagnetic storm is bound to happen.”

Brekke is not so sure and awaits more data from SOHO and another deep space solar-watching satellite positioned between the sun and Earth.

“Until we know the orientation of the magnetic field in this cloud, we will not know how severe the geomagnetic storm will be.”

I can’t wait to see what will happen. In addition to the electronics disruption, we should see some pretty striking Northern and Southern Lights. The solar flare interacts with the earth’s magnetic field and displays auroras.

Source: CNN.com