The brightest celestial body in Earth’s sky is currently “punctured” with two large holes, continuously shooting intense flares towards us, with the recent radio blackout on May 19 serving as a “warning signal.”
According to Space, widespread shortwave radio blackouts occurring across the globe on May 19 were due to these “cosmic flares,” which are powerful energy beams from the Sun directed straight at us, colliding with the magnetosphere and causing geomagnetic storms (solar storms).
At least 7 of the M-class flares responsible for this phenomenon are attributed to AR3311, a massive sunspot.
Two sunspots are rotating towards Earth, potentially bombarding our planet with intense flares – (Image: SDO/NASA).
Even more concerning, on May 19, these sunspots had not yet fully rotated toward Earth, meaning that in the following days, multiple geomagnetic storms could strike our planet heavily throughout the weekend.
They are not alone; another massive sunspot named AR3310 is also present, which was responsible for the solar flare recorded by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) on May 16.
This flare caused intermittent radio disruptions across various regions in the Americas shortly thereafter, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center.
All these radio blackouts are merely a “warning signal,” due to the “slight” effects from flares that have not directly impacted Earth, merely grazing it.
However, this weekend, people on Earth will need to be more cautious as these two “gun barrels” aim directly at our planet.
Geomagnetic storms are not visible storms, but they can affect human systems such as radio communication, GPS systems, and more, due to the Earth’s magnetic field being disrupted when energy from flares strikes the magnetic forces of the magnetosphere.
A flare at the highest level of class X (the strongest) could completely knock out power grids over vast areas.
With the M-class flares that these sunspots are expected to emit, aviation, space agencies, and other operations related to radio and navigation will need to exercise caution.
Geomagnetic storms can even cause migratory birds to become disoriented and have previously caused 40 SpaceX satellites to be “thrown back” towards Earth in February 2022 when they were launched just as a strong geomagnetic storm hit.
