A huge solar flare ...

[Ilsa]

http://www.spaceweather.com/

MAJOR SOLAR FLARE: This morning at 0805 UT, sunspot 1263 produced an X7-class solar flare--only the third X-flare of new Solar Cycle 24 and the most powerful so far. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured the explosion's extreme ultraviolet flash:

The brunt of the explosion was not Earth directed. Nevertheless, a minor proton storm is in progress around our planet, which could affect satellites in high-altitude orbits. Also, radiation from flare created waves of ionization in Earth's upper atmosphere, briefly disrupting communications at some VLF and HF radio frequencies.

SOHO coronagraphs show a CME emerging from the blast site. The cloud will probably miss Earth. At this time, however, we cannot rule out a glancing blow from the flank of the CME on or about August 11th. Stay tuned for updates. Solar flare alerts: text, voice.
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A friend say we appear to have quite a bit of activity considering we haven't reached the peak, which is estimated to be next year. Comments?

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. the sun god is reacting to Tea baggers.

Watch them blame Obama, though.

[lonestarlib]

2. Didn't a solar flare fry a Canadian satellite about 15 or so years ago?

[Ilsa]

3. There was a NOAA GOES satellite that was damaged about 5

years ago by radiation from a flare.

There was a really big one about 150 years ago, now referred to a the Carrington event.

[originalpckelly]

4. This cycle has been weird and is expected to produce very strong storms.

Just in case you haven't heard elsewhere.

[Ilsa]

5. I've heard that also. A friend says she has looked at the graphics

of the peaks and the solar activity is greater than it should be at this time. She said we were lucky that this flare and CME were pointed in a different direction or we might have had our electrical grids affected in the next day or two.