Biggest solar flare in years erupts from the Sun as Nasa says star may be ‘waking up’
THE biggest solar flare since 2017 and new sunspots suggests our star could be 'waking up', according to Nasa.
The US space agency's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) recently spotted the largest flare to come from the Sun since October 2017.
A solar flare is a flash of radiation from sunspots, cooler patches on the Sun's surface.
Nasa has also observed more of these sunspots and thinks the giant star could be about to enter a new cycle.
The Sun actually has an 11 year cycle and increased activity hints it could be moving towards a more active stage.
However, the strong solar flare spotted recently posed no threat to Earth and wasn't heading in our direction.
Nasa said the flare was also not strong enough to alert scientists at the Space Weather Prediction Center.
We've had a few months of very little solar activity so astronomers have been keeping their eye on the Sun to see what happens next.
Nasa says we won't know whether the new sunspots indicate increased activity for a many more months.
The space agency said: "It takes at least six months of solar observations and sunspot-counting after a minimum to know when it's occurred.
"Because that minimum is defined by the lowest number of sunspots in a cycle, scientists need to see the numbers consistently rising before they can determine when exactly they were at the bottom."
It can take 12 months to confirm minimum solar activity, by which point the Sun should be out of that part of the cycle.
The Sun's 11 year cycle sees activity and sunspots rise and fall in number.
The latest solar flares, detected on May 29, were categorised as as M-class solar flares.
This means they came from new sunspots.
The M also stands for 'medium' as all solar flares are classified into A, B, C, M or X categories, depending on how powerful they are.
If an M-class solar flare was to impact Earth it could cause blackouts across the polar regions and small radiation storms.
The Sun – all the facts you need to know
What is it, why does it exist, and why is it so ruddy hot all the time?
- The Sun is a huge star that lives at the centre of our solar system
- It's a nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, and provides most of the energy for life on Earth
- It measures a staggering 865,000 miles across – making it 109 times bigger than Earth
- But its weight is 330,000 times that of Earth, and accounts for almost all of the mass in the Solar System
- The Sun is mostly made up of hydrogen (73%), helium (25%) and then a number of other elements like oyxgen, carbon and iron
- Its surface temperature is around 5,505C
- Scientists describe the Sun as being "middle-aged"
- The Sun formed 4.6billion years ago, and tt's been in its current state for around four billion years
- It's expected that it will remain stable for another five billion years
- It doesn't have enough mass to explode as a supernova
- Instead, we expect it to turn a hulking red giant
- During this phase, it will be so big that it will engulf Mercury, Venus and Earth
- Eventually it will turn into an incredibly hot white dwarf, and will stay that way for trillions of years
In other space news, the highest-ever resolution photos of the Sun were published online earlier this year.
A SpaceX rocket launched two US astronauts into orbit over the weekend.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
And, Flat-Earth conspiracy theorists were ridiculed on social media after footage from the launch captured the curvature of our planet.
What do you make of this solar flare activity? Let us know in the comments...
We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online Tech & Science team? Email us at tech@the-sun.co.uk