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A massive solar storm is heading toward Earth, threatening to disrupt communications, navigation systems, and power grids around the world. NASA issued the warning after a powerful burst of energy from the sun last week, which measured as an X2.7-class solar flare, the highest category for solar flares. Solar flares are intense bursts of radiation that come from sunspots — darker, cooler areas on the sun's surface — and are among the most powerful explosions in the solar system. These flares can last from a few minutes to several hours.

Okay, this is starting to get really weird. At the same time that the Middle East is erupting in flames, the U.S. is being pummeled by major natural disasters and we are preparing for the most pivotal election in modern history, extremely unusual things are happening in the heavens. The “Comet of the Century” is making a spectacular run past our planet, the Sun has unleashed an extremely powerful coronal mass ejection, a “second Moon” is now orbiting our world, and it is being suggested that we are witnessing an “intriguing alignment of constellations and stars” that appears to relate...

Could this be the Perfect Geo-storm? October is off to a hot start: The sun unleashed a massive X-class solar flare — the “strongest of its kind,” according to Space.com — that has the potential to pummel our planet with a powerful geomagnetic storm this week. The supercharged sunburst erupted from sunspot AR3842 on Tuesday evening. It clocked in at X7.1, making it the second most powerful in the last seven years after the monster X8.7 magnitude in May, Live Science reported. This also triggered a coronal mass ejection (CME) — when plasma and magnetic particles burst forth from the...

The sun has unleashed an enormous X-class solar flare, temporarily triggering a radio blackout above parts of the U.S. and unleashing a hefty coronal mass ejection (CME) that will likely slam into our planet, potentially triggering vibrant aurora displays later this week. The X-class solar flare — the most powerful type the sun can produce — exploded outward from sunspot AR3842 near the solar equator at around 6 p.m. ET on Tuesday (Oct. 1). The flare had a magnitude of X7.1, making it the second most powerful solar explosion of the current solar cycle, Solar Cycle 25, which began in...

Explanation: It's back. The famous active region on the Sun that created auroras visible around the Earth earlier this month has survived its rotation around the far side of the Sun -- and returned. Yesterday, as it was beginning to reappear on the Earth-facing side, the region formerly labeled AR 3664 threw another major solar flare, again in the highest-energy X-class range. The featured video shows the emerging active region on the lower left, as it was captured by NASA's Earth-orbiting Solar Dynamics Observatory yesterday in ultraviolet light. The video is a time-lapse of the entire Sun rotating over 24...

A solar flare measured at X8.7 on the strength scale just emerged from AR 3664, the sunspot region responsible for last weekend's solar storms that sparked vivid auroras.That's the most powerful solar flare of the current cycle, absolutely the most powerful since 2017, and comfortably within the top 20 solar flares ever measured.As AR 3664 made its way toward the edge of the Sun's disk, it wasn't just the X8.7 flare on May 14 that erupted from the solar limb. On May 15, an X3.4 flare followed suit, suggesting that the giant sunspot region is going to continue its party...

A solar flare slammed into the Pacific Ocean on Monday, causing radio blackouts, while a second is set to hit the Earth on Tuesday. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a geomagnetic storm watch on Monday, monitoring two large solar flares ejecting from the sun. Both left the sun on Sunday, the first hitting over the Pacific on Monday, while the second is projected to make contact on Tuesday. Despite the cosmic proportions of the event, NOAA said citizens shouldn’t be concerned. Some minor inconveniences could occur, such as minor power grid interruptions or an impact on radios, aviation...

Another apocalyptic conspiracy theory is going around on TikTok — but there’s a simple answer to it. The online panic started when a video of Friedrich Merz, a German politician, posted to Twitter saying, “Dear Colleagues…September 24, 2022, will be remembered by all of us as a day which we will say, ‘I remember exactly where I was.’ “ The remark sparked several conspiracy theories of things going wrong that day, including that a big solar flare would hit the earth and create tropical cyclones resulting in mass destruction, according to Middle East Mashable.

According to space and weather experts, a recent development regarding the appearance of two new sunspots on the Sun has sparked a wave of concern, with the expectation that a global blackout can be hitting the Earth anytime soon. The National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration (NOAA) has recently issued a warning about an upcoming solar storm, which can cause major electricity and signal blackouts soon. This comes as two unstable sunspots are visible on the side of the Sun which is facing the earth. According to experts, a solar storm sparked by a massive solar flare explosion on Earth can...

A medium-intensity solar flare hit the Earth's magnetosphere in the early hours of Monday, Spaceweather.com reported. It is unlikely that a coronal discharge will follow the solar activity, and if it does, whether will head toward Earth. The recent solar flare came from the sunspot AR 3141, which has grown in size in the past 24 hours, EarthSky.org said in its report. The eruption was classified as an M5.2, even where M denotes the class of solar flares and is a medium-intensity eruption. In comparison, classes A, B, and C are low-intensity events, while Class X flares are wildly the...

Large swathes of Bangladesh were left without electricity on Tuesday after a grid failure, a government official said, adding that authorities were working to gradually restore power supply in the country of 168 million people. The country's power grid malfunctioned at around 2 p.m. (0800 GMT) on Tuesday, leading to blackouts across 75-80% of the Bangladesh, Bangladesh Power Development Board official Shameem Hasan told ReuteAn investigation was underway to ascertain the reason for the grid's collapse and power had been restored in 45% of the regions hit by the blackouts, he said. Bangladesh, which gets three quarters of its electricity...

Dhaka (AFP) – At least 130 million people in Bangladesh were left without power on Tuesday after a grid failure caused widespread blackouts, the government's power utility company said. Bangladesh has suffered a major power crisis in recent months as a result of higher global energy prices following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and has imposed regular cuts to conserve electricity. But it remained unclear what caused Tuesday's unscheduled blackout, which hit more than 80 percent of the country shortly after 2:00 pm (0800 GMT), according to the Power Development Board. Apart from some locations in Bangladesh's northwest, "the rest of...

The solar flare, a powerful X1 (the mildest form of the strongest category of flares) erupted from the sun on Sunday at 3:53 p.m. EDT (1953 GMT) and peaked about 30 minutes later. Since solar flares travel at the speed of light, the burst of electromagnetic radiation caused an immediate radio blackout up to an hour long on the sun-facing side of the planet. The affected region included the whole of the U.S., according to the SpaceWeatherWatch(opens in new tab). The radio blackout, classed by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) as a strong R3 category, likely affected...

The solar flare, classified as M8 in the second-most energetic category of flares, departed from the sun at 5:49 a.m. EDT (0949 GMT) on Friday, disrupting shortwave radio communications in the sun-facing parts of the world. According to Spaceweather.com(opens in new tab), amateur radio operators in Africa and the Middle East could have experienced signal distortion for up to one hour after the flare. The U.K. space weather forecaster Met Office predicts there is a chance of further flares today before the sunspot AR3098 disappears behind the sun's limb (the edge of the sun's visible disk). Space weather forecasters think...

The Sun has been up to some pretty intense shenanigans lately, but a recent eruption on the far side looks to be absolute science gold. On the evening of September 5 GMT, an enormous coronal mass ejection (CME) was recorded exploding on the far side of the Sun, sending a radiation storm out across the Solar System. It was a type known as a halo CME, in which an expanding halo of hot gas can be seen spewing out around the entire Sun. Sometimes this means that the CME is headed straight for Earth. However, this eruption was on the...

Yet another series of solar flares(opens in new tab) series shimmied out from the sun on Friday (Aug. 26) after a dazzling show of green-hued auroras(opens in new tab) crashed through the atmosphere just days ago. "Sunspot AR3089 is crackling with a series of intensifying M-class [moderate] solar flares," SpaceWeather.com(opens in new tab) said in a Friday update. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured an especially powerful flare at 7:16 a.m. EDT (1116 GMT) as populations in Europe and Africa experienced a brief radio blackout. A huge ejection of charged particles from the sun(opens in new tab), known as a coronal...

The sunspot, known as AR3085, has also been shooting off several minor solar flares, though nothing strong enough to be disruptive on Earth. The sunspot, known as AR3085, has also been shooting off several minor solar flares, though nothing strong enough to be disruptive on Earth. Sunspots are regions on the sun where magnetic fields are so intense that some heat is prevented from reaching the sun's surface. As such, sunspots may appear as dark patches. Due to the intense magnetic fields, sunspots are known sources of solar activity. When these magnetic field lines suddenly shift, a vast amount of...

One of those bursts, called a coronal mass ejection, or CME, is expected to collide and consume another, creating what's called a cannibal CME event. According to The Weather Channel, these events can spark strong geomagnetic storms — and in this case, it's headed in our direction. NOAA expects that the CMEs will hit on Thursday, but before they do, the agency said that Earth will also be blasted on Wednesday with relatively fast solar winds, known as a recurrent coronal hole high speed stream. The solar winds alone could trigger a minor geomagnetic storm on Wednesday, but those conditions...

The sun has spat out two clouds of plasma in the past two days, which might trigger beautiful aurora displays observable much farther south than usual. The two coronal mass ejections (CMEs), eruptions of charged particles from the sun's upper atmosphere known as the corona, burst from the sun on Aug. 14 and 15 respectively, according to the U.K. forecaster Met Office (opens in new tab). As the CMEs cross the 900,000-mile (150 million kilometers) distance between the star and our planet, they might cannibalize each other, according to SpaceWeather.com (opens in new tab), creating a single super powerful CME....

A MINOR solar storm struck Earth over the weekend, sparking displays of the Northern Lights in the Arctic. The storm was caused by a volley of radiation known as a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME), according to space weather trackers. “Forecasters aren't sure why. The prime suspect is an unexpected CME embedded in the solar wind." G1 storms can cause weak power grid fluctuations and have minor impacts on satellite communications. “Expect unsettled to stormy conditions for the next 48-72 hrs. “High latitude #aurora chasers should get good shows with sporadic views at mid-latitudes.