Fireworks from the Sun

By Nancy Atkinson - July 6, 2012 at 2:17 AM UTC | Solar Astronomy

From July 2 to July 5, the Sun shot off a whopping

eighteen

M-class solar flares. Most originated from Active Region 1515 and ranged from M1.1 to M6.1. On July 4th alone, there were seven M-class solar flares. According to

SpaceWeather.com,

big sunspot AR1515 appears to be on the verge of producing an X-class explosion. NOAA forecasters estimate an 80% chance of M-flares and a 10% chance of X-flares during the next 24 hours.

The same region has also produced numerous coronal mass ejections (CMEs). They have been observed and modeled by NASA's Space Weather Center (SWC) and are thought to be moving relatively slowly, traveling between 300 and 600 miles per second. Most flew south of the ecliptic plane (the orbital plane of the planets), and won't be an issue, but one of them appears to be heading toward Earth. According to analysts at the Goddard Space Weather Lab, the cloud will reach Earth on July 7th around 0600 UT. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras on that date.

Click here

to see an animation from SpaceWeather.com of when the cloud should reach Earth.

This video shows the solar activity from July 2, 13:00 UT through July 5, 13:00 UT in two different wavelengths: red (304 angstroms), which shows areas where coolers dense plumes of plasma (filaments and prominences) are located above the visible surface of the Sun; and turquoise (131 angstroms) which shows solar flares.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com