X-Factor
This picture was taken on Monday, February 14th 2011. Whats better than a bunch of roses for Valentine's day? The Sun has the answer. An X-class flare is what we all of humanity likes. This is like the dawning of the age of Aquarius for solar astronomers. An X-class flare is a massive solar flare, one that has not been seen for quite some time. The flare was so bright that it distorted the pixels of the image from overflow. This X-class flare caused an coronal mass ejection. What none of these sites or the APOD explained was that if there is a possibility for a flare of this magnitude to damage or effect Earth, other than in some killer Aurora. Anyways, this flare is the courier for a much welcomed solar maximum, which will mean even more ejections and flares. The solar maximum also peaks around 2012...
No comments:
Post a Comment