An explosion in the sun released a huge plume of energized particles that soared at 900,000 mph through space and caused blackouts in Australia and South Asia.
Reports emerged Tuesday morning that amateur radio operators and sailors had been disrupted around the two targets.
The long-lived flare launched on Monday at 8:30 pm ET and the solar storm reached our planet today shortly after 10 am ET.
NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center shows there is a 45 percent chance of more communications disruptions in the coming days.
An explosion in the sun released a huge plume of energized particles that soared at 900,000 mph through space and caused blackouts in Australia and South Asia.
Physicists noted that the explosion was a class M flare, which can cause small (R1) to moderate (R2) radio blackouts on Earth’s dayside.
The alert primarily applies to frequencies used by aviation communications, government time stations, weather stations, amateur radio and citizen band services, among other uses.
Physicist Dr. Tamitha Skov told DailyMail.com in January: ‘Those who are (typically) affected are people who rely on GPS/GNSS services, especially at high latitudes, as well as precision farmers and anyone using unmanned aerial vehicles for reconnaissance, search and rescue or aerial photography.
Strong M-class flares, like those seen on Monday, can trigger coronal mass ejection (CEM), which are large clouds of plasma and magnetic field that erupt from the sun.
The ejecta contains billions of tons of coronal material from the sun’s surface.
EMFs can produce a geomagnetic storm that temporarily disrupts Earth’s magnetosphere and orbiting satellites via a solar wind shock wave.
Reports emerged Tuesday morning that amateur radio operators and sailors had been disrupted around the two targets.
Keith Strong, a solar physicist, shared on
Keith Strong, a solar physicist, shared on
EarthSky predictions showed that over the next 24 hours there is a 99 percent chance of C flares, a 60 percent chance of M flares, and a 25 percent chance of X flares.
Class C flares are small and have few discernible consequences on Earth, although they are major events that can cause worldwide radio blackouts and long-lasting radiation storms in the upper atmosphere.
The unstable sunspot was identified as AR3575, which sent the M flare toward Earth.
However, the AR3576 region is also moving towards our planet and is so large that NASA’s Mars rover detected it last week.
NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center shows there is a 45 percent chance of more communications disruptions in the coming days.
The fury of the sun caused blackouts on Earth less than a month ago.
Data showed the incident occurred around 4:20 pm ET in waters off the coast of the western US and South America, but lasted only a few seconds.
The poles were also affected by the powerful stream of energized particles, and the disruption lasted approximately seven hours.
“Radio waves (called ‘radio bursts’) are what affect our reception of satellite signals like GPS and even HF radio communications,” Skov told DailyMail.com when the blackout occurred on January 24.
‘It’s like the Sun is literally screaming at us during a solar flare.
“This ‘scream’ is much louder than our satellites can ‘chirp’ and therefore temporarily drowns out satellite signals.
“That said, the sun doesn’t always scream at the exact frequencies that affect GPS signals.”