Images of the largest solar flare in recent years were captured on Thursday by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, a satellite that has been constantly monitoring the sun for 14 years.
“In case you’re wondering, this is the most powerful solar flare in the current cycle. We haven’t had an X9 flare since 2017,” the US space agency posted on its X account.
Category X solar flares are actually the strongest. To date, the strongest solar flare recorded since the turn of the century was measured in April 2003, and saturated sensors could not exceed X28.
The power of this solar flare can be explained by changes in the activity of the Sun, which reaches a peak every 11 years. This activity is currently growing and could peak next year.
In addition to being spectacular, this solar flare is also synonymous with a coronal mass ejection. And this coronal mass is what determines the appearance of the aurora borealis in our sky.
“Matter is on its way to Earth. The aurora borealis may appear in the next 2-3 days,” said Éric Lagadec, astrophysicist at the Côte d’Azur Observatory, on his X account.
According to the Space Weather Prediction Center, the geomagnetic storm caused by the solar flare, which is expected to last until Sunday, is a level 3 on a scale of up to 5.
In theory, with a storm of this magnitude, the aurora borealis can be seen from the North Pole to northern Britain.
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