CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida, USA – Just days after fierce solar storms battered Earth, the sun made its biggest flare on Tuesday and produced dazzling northern lights in places unaccustomed to such a sight.
“It's not over yet!” The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced.
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According to NOAA, the largest flare of this 11-year solar cycle is nearing its peak. The good news is that Earth must be out of the line of fire at this time, because the spark erupted in a part of the Sun that is away from Earth.
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured the brightest light from the X-ray flare, the strongest since 2005, with a rating of X8.7 for these flares.
Brian Presser of NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center in Boulder, Colorado, said it would have been even stronger if scientists had collected data from other sources.
The event comes nearly a week after flare-ups and massive coronal plasma discharges that threatened to disrupt power supplies and communications on Earth and in orbit.
A geomagnetic storm over the weekend caused one of the orbiting satellites to unexpectedly spin up and enter a protective hibernation, known as safe mode, due to a drop in altitude caused by space weather, NASA said. Additionally, on the International Space Station, all seven astronauts were instructed to stay in areas with strong radiation shielding. According to NASA, the crew was never in danger.
