He-e-e-ere it comes!
Posted on 02/25/2014 1:48:46 PM PST by BenLurkin
The so-called X-class flare erupted a few hours ago (at 7:25 p.m. EST Feb. 24, or 12:25 a.m. UTC Feb. 25) and was captured by several spacecraft. If you have a pictures of the sun yourself to share, feel free to post them in the Universe Today Flickr pool.
NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory saw the flare growing in at least six different wavelengths of light, which are visible in the image above. This is classified this as an X4.9-class flare, which shows that it is pretty strong. X-flares are the most powerful kind that the sun emits, and each X number is supposed to be twice as intense as the previous one (so an X-2 flare is twice as powerful as X-1, for example).
SpaceWeather.com says this is the most powerful flare of the year so far, emitted from sunspot AR1967 (or more properly speaking, AR1990; sunspots are renamed if they survive a full rotation of the sun, as this one has done twice already!) While solar flares can lead to auroras, in this case it appears the blast was pointed in the wrong direction, the site added.
“Although this flare is impressive, its effects are mitigated by the location of the blast site–near the sun’s southeastern limb, and not facing Earth,” SpaceWeather stated. “Indeed, a bright coronal mass ejection (CME) which raced away from the sun shortly after the flare appears set to miss our planet.”
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
/johnny
He-e-e-ere it comes!
Thanks BenLurkin, extra to APoD.
No matter the size of a solar flare it just isn’t going to make the VAST majority of peeple any smarter.
Yeah, the difference between their heads and the round object in the sky is that the Sun has a light in it. :’) [apologies to Dennis Miller and Dan Quayle]
Guess the rate at which a cubic meter of the Sun’s core produces energy.
46 Watts!!!
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