In the weekend of 10–12 May 2024, the biggest solar storm to hit Earth in over 20 years swept over our planet. This produced an intense geomagnetic storm, creating beautiful auroras.
The culprit? An active sunspot region called AR3664. As it rotated away from Earth’s view around 14 May, it sent out the strongest flare yet (class X8.79), causing large radio blackouts on Earth. But the fact that we could not see it anymore from Earth did not mean that this monster had gone to sleep.
Watching the Sun’s far side on 20 May, Solar Orbiter’s X-ray instrument STIX observed a massive flare with an estimated class of X12. This makes it the strongest flare yet of the current solar cycle, and in the top ten flares since 1996.
📹 ESA – European Space Agency
📸 ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI
#ESA #Aurora #SpaceWeather
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