Powerful Solar Blast Heralds Sun’s Strong Rise to Next Summer’s Solar Maximum (with video)

The Sun in the Extreme Ultraviolet

An Extreme Ultraviolet view of the sun at 23:00 UT, August 1, 2024 as imaged by the Solar Dynamics Observatory at 9.4, 19.3 and 33.5 nanometers wavelength. The likely source of last week’s X-14 Solar Flare is coming into view from the sun’s eastern (left) limb.

Strong Rise in Solar Activity

With the magnitude and frequency of solar flares increasing along with the accompanying Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), the Sun continues its strong rise towards next summer’s probable record-setting Solar Maximum. After May’s series of powerful flares and CMEs, the latest outburst occurred on July 23 with an X-14 solar “far-side” flare accompanied by a CME whose effects were felt throughout the entire solar system!

Europe’s Solar Orbiter (SolO) spacecraft registered an X14 category solar flare with its STIX x-Ray telescope. STIX, an X-ray telescope on SolO, can detect solar flares and classify them on the same scale as NOAA’s GOES satellites.

This video from the SOHO Orbiting Observatory recorded the extent of the July 23rd blast. Note the charged particles streaking through the video. For a size reference, the solar disk is represented by the white circle!

The Solar Dynamics Observatory is a powerful platform from which to study the sun. All data is publicly available: SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory (nasa.gov) with a broad spectral range to choose from, from the visible through the extreme ultraviolet.

A Blast From the Far-Side

Time-lapse courtesy the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory or SOHO.

According to the account on Spaceweather.com,

the CME sprayed energetic particles all over the solar system. Earth itself was hit by ‘hard’ protons (E > 100 MeV) despite being on the opposite side of the sun!

According to George Ho, the principal investigator for one of the energetic particle detectors onboard SolO:

This is a big one–a 360 degree event [and] also caused a high dosage at Mars

The report continues

SolO was squarely in the crosshairs of the CME, and on July 24th it experienced a direct hit. In a matter of minutes, particle counts jumped almost a thousand-fold as the spacecraft was peppered by a hail storm energetic ions and electrons.

Ho goes on to explain

This is something we call an ‘Energetic Storm Particle’ (ESP) event. It’s when particles are locally accelerated in the CME’s shock front [to energies higher than a typical solar radiation storm]. An ESP event around Earth in March 1989 caused the Great Quebec Blackout.

Since the sun rotates once in approximately 26 days, the far-side blast site would have rotated into view within 7–10 days, putting the likely source of the blast into full view yesterday or today (August 2nd).

The following image links to our video and clearly shows how active the sun is right now, with the probable source of the “far-side” blast coming into view during the last 5 seconds of the video. That source can be seen on the sun’s eastern (left) limb.

An Extreme Ultraviolet view of the sun at 23:00 UT, August 1, 2024 as imaged by the Solar Dynamics Observatory. The likely source of last week’s X-14 Solar Flare is coming into view from the sun’s eastern (left) limb.

X-Ray Emission

The solar flare classification system is logarithmic (each value is 10x stronger than the previous): A, B, C, M and X with A the weakest with an associated X-ray flux less than 10^-7 watts/ sq. meter (0.1 micro-watts/sq. meter) and X, the strongest, with an associated X-ray flux greater than 10^-4 watts/sq. meter or 0.1 milli-watts per square meter at the earth’s distance from the sun.

X-rays are emitted by gas at million-degree temperatures and are produced by super-heated gas in the solar interior. Solar flare classifications are based on the intensity of x-rays produced by a flare at the earth’s distance from the sun. Each category is 10x more powerful than the previous; an X-class flare has 10x the intensity of an M-class flare and so on. A Solar flare occurs when this superheated gas is ejected in the region of a sunspot, a breach in the sun’s photosphere (the sun’s “disk”). Only gas in this temperature range can produce x-rays and since we observe these x-rays, we can infer the presence of this super-heated gas. The Extreme UV region of the spectrum corresponds to these temperatures where a nanometer is one billionth of a meter.

The following video clearly shows how active the sun is right now, with the probable source of the “far-side” blast coming into view during the last 5 seconds of the video. It shows the sun in the extreme Ultra Violet part of the spectrum at 9.4, 19.3 and 33.5 nanometers wavelength. At 9.4 nanometers, superheated 15-million degree plasma is observed as it is ejected from breaches in the Solar Photosphere. Full details about the source of these emissions can be found here: Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (lmsal.com).

Image and video sources: The Solar Dynamics Observatory and the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO)

The Solar Dynamics Observatory is a powerful platform from which to study the sun. All data is publicly available: SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory (nasa.gov) with a broad spectral range to choose from, from the visible through the extreme ultraviolet.