Although the intensity and spectrum radiated from the Sun as CME’s varies quite a bit, that is not the determining factor in whether we could suffer extensive outages.
It is the AIM. This one mostly skipped off to one side. There was another one several years ago, but It had primarily XRAY radiation, and it was a 1000 times stronger than any previous ‘known’ Flare or CME.
It too, got shoved past the Earth by our atmosphere and electromagnetic shielding. Had it hit dead on, you and I wouldn’t be communicating via the internet (or much of anything else).
There are like a jillion ‘directions’ a CME/Flare can travel in, and none of them are on a line direct to Earth.
There is only ONE direction that would hit us dead center, and that is why it doesn’t happen very often. The SUN does, however, shoot off these Flares/CMEs on a regular basis, many of them just as high intensity.
There is only ONE direction that would hit us dead center...
You do mean at any given point in time, don't you?
In any case, that is one HUGE CME!
Given the sun dia = approx Earth dia x 110, that bad boy is maybe 35 - 45 x Earth dia at the source. (Is that about right?)