Powerful solar flare hits Earth, causes radio blackout in Asia, Australia

Agencies | Washington                                                 

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com    

A powerful explosion from the Sun ionized the top layer of Earth's atmosphere and led to a strong shortwave radio blackout over southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand. The flare erupted from sunspot AR3256 near the southwestern limb of the star in our Solar System.

The eruption was captured by Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory, which watches the Sun. This flare was classified as an X1.2 flare. X-class denotes the most intense flares, while the number provides more information about its strength.

Nasa said that solar flares are powerful bursts of energy. Flares and solar eruptions can impact radio communications, electric power grids, and navigation signals, and pose risks to spacecraft and astronauts.

This was the seventh such explosion from the Sun in just three months of 2023. It is equal to the total number of flares that emerged from the Sun in 2022. The explosion indicates the fast ramping up of activity on the Sun as it continues in its solar cycle inching closer toward peak activity.

The event comes just days after a geomagnetic storm hit Earth, which was the strongest in three years. The geomagnetic storm was triggered by a massive explosion from a large coronal hole in the southern hemisphere of the Sun.

Geomagnetic storms are a major disturbance of Earth’s magnetosphere that occurs when there is a very efficient exchange of energy from the solar wind into the space environment surrounding Earth. Last week, plasma exploded high above the sun’s surface, going as high as the height of 14 Earths stacked together. Four notable solar flares, 22 coronal mass ejections, and a geomagnetic storm were triggered by the Sun in just the last week.