Adding on to a series of solar flares throughout October and November,
the sun emitted another significant solar flare on Nov. 19, 2013,
peaking at 5:26 a.m. EST. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation.
Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere
to physically affect humans on the ground, however -- when intense
enough -- they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and
communications signals travel.
An
X1-class flare erupts from the right side of the sun in this image
captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory on Nov. 19, 2013. The
flare erupted from a region that produced many flares in its two-week
journey across the face of the sun, and is shown here just before
rotating out of view.Image Credit: NASA/SDO
To see how this event may impact Earth, please visit NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center, the U.S. government's official source for space weather forecasts, alerts, watches and warnings.
This flare is classified as an X1.0 class flare. "X-class" denotes
the most intense flares, while the number provides more information
about its strength. An X2 is twice as intense as an X1, an X3 is three
times as intense, etc.
This flare came from an active region numbered AR 1893 that is just
rotating out of sight over the sun's right side. Increased numbers of
flares are quite common at the moment, since the sun's normal 11-year
activity cycle is ramping up toward solar maximum conditions. Humans
have tracked this solar cycle continuously since it was discovered in
1843, and it is normal for there to be many flares a day during the
sun's peak activity.
Updates will be provided as needed.
