astronomy
Northern lights, power and internet disruption: Violent solar flare could have an impact on Earth
A NASA telescope has captured the largest solar flare in years
© NASA
The surface of the sun is bubbling. We could also feel the effects of the eruptions on Earth.
According to the US Space Weather Prediction Center, one of the strongest solar flares ever recorded occurred on Thursday. The American space agency Nasa captured the event in extreme ultraviolet light with its Solar Dynamics Observatory. In the colorized image sequence above it can be seen as a bright flash. The event had already affected certain radio communications on Thursday.
The consequences could be more severe at the weekend Solar flares hit the Earth because they take a few days from the sun to reach our planet. Geomagnetic storms in categories G1 (minor) to G2 (moderate) are expected over the course of Saturday and Sunday, the US Space Weather Forecast Center wrote on its website.
Solar flare: Geomagnetic storms can cause disturbances on Earth
G2 storms can therefore lead, among other things, to disruptions to the Internet and GPS signals. For spacecraft, the alignment may need to be corrected by ground control. In addition, certain types of radio traffic may be affected at higher latitudes. Damage to power grid transformers is also possible there. Northern lights could also be seen far south of the North Pole region.
According to the information, the cause of the geomagnetic storms are so-called coronal mass ejections from the sun on Thursday and Friday. A plasma cloud consisting of electrons, protons and certain atomic nuclei is thrown into space.
The sun’s activity has been increasing again since December 2019. Approximately every eleven years, in a so-called solar cycle, there are phases of weak and strong activity. The sun is currently approaching a maximum.
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