New Years Eve Fireworks

The day after Christmas, the Mars Perseverance Rover photographed the sun revealing the large spot as seen on the lower right image. The spot was estimated to be 200,000 kilometers across and was located on the far side of the sun. It was predicted to become visible from the earth in about a week.

Yesterday, it came into view and can be seen as the dark spot in the middle of a bright area on the far left side of my photo above. About six hours later it produced the most powerful solar flare since 2017, as seen on the upper right image which was taken in extreme ultraviolet light by the orbiting Solar Dynamics Observatory.

How it will affect earth remains to be seen; such flares can cause radio blackouts and can heat the outer atmosphere, causing it to expand and degrade satellite orbits. In February, 2023, approximately 40 Starlink satellites were lost due to a much smaller flare expanding the outer atmosphere and causing them burn up the atmosphere before they could ascend to their safe, operating altitude. Whatever the effects of this latest flare, earth will be in its line of fire for the next 10 days, and we can only hope that it becomes less active. Quite a start to the new year.

#solarflare #sunspot #starlinksatellites #fireworks #newyearseve