The sun unleashed two huge flares early Wednesday, one day after a NASA observatory captured a dramatic photo of a separate solar flare.
Denise Chow reports for NBC News: https://www.nbcnews.com/science/space/massive-solar-storm-causes-communications-blackouts-rcna206725
Firings at US #weather and #oceans agency risk lives and economy, former agency heads warn
By SETH BORENSTEIN
Updated 9:48 AM EST, March 1, 2025
WASHINGTON (AP) — "The federal weather and oceans agency touches people’s daily lives in unnoticed ways, so massive firings there will likely cause needless deaths and a big hit to America’s economy, according to the people who ran it.
"The first round of firings started Thursday at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a government agency that monitors the oceans, the atmosphere where storms roam and space, and puts out hundreds of 'products' daily. Those products generally save lives and money, experts say.
"#NOAA’s 301 billion weather forecasts every year reach 96% of American households.
The firings are 'going to affect safety of flight, safety of shipping, safety of everyday Americans,' Admiral Tim Gallaudet told The Associated Press Friday. President Donald Trump appointed Gallaudet as acting NOAA chief during his last administration. 'Lives are at risk for sure.'
"Former NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad agreed.
"'We’re getting into prime #tornado time. We’re getting into #planting season for the agricultural season for the bread belt,' Spinrad said. 'It’s going to affect safety. It’s going to affect the economy.'"
https://apnews.com/article/noaa-doge-federal-cuts-musk-weather-danger-6f60e7c511989aeff8930ae87c9a5ee8
#USPol #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #PolyCrisis #HungerGames #FoodInsecurity #WeatherForecasts #ExtremeWeather #Safety #Spaceweather #SolarFlares #ClimateScientists #OceanWarming #Oceanographers #BadDOGE
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Makes History With Closest Pass to Sun https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/heliophysics/nasas-parker-solar-probe-makes-history-with-closest-pass-to-sun/ #NASA #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #Heliophysics #HeliophysicsDivision #ParkerSolarProbePSP #ScienceResearch #ScienceMissionDirectorate #SolarFlares #SolarWind #SpaceWeather #TheSun
The Times of India: Solar superflares more dangerous than atomic bombs to hit Earth, scientists warn…
Solar superflares are incredibly large energy surges from the Sun, and scientists are gradually becoming worried about them more... TOI #solarflares #sun #satellites #earth #solarsystem
This seems as though it might be rather important.
"We used photometry from the Kepler space observatory to investigate superflares on other stars with Sun-like fundamental parameters. We identified 2889 superflares on 2527 Sun-like stars, out of 56,450 observed. This detection rate indicates that superflares with energies >1034 erg occur roughly once per century on stars with Sun-like temperature and variability."
https://www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1126/science.adl5441?af=R
The #X9 solar 
flare emitted is the largest categorised by #NASA. A second #CME is likely to hit Earth on Saturday and Sunday. #SolarFlares do not cause the Northern Lights. They are caused by a phenomenon called coronal mass ejections that erupt from an active sun spot. Combined with flares, they can create #SolarStorms that interact with Earth's magnetic field 
or #magnetosphere. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy437gnp28zo
NASA, ESA Missions Help Scientists Uncover How Solar Wind Gets Energy https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/nasa-esa-missions-help-scientists-uncover-how-solar-wind-gets-energy/ #NASA #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #Heliophysics #HeliophysicsDivision #ParkerSolarProbePSP #ScienceResearch #ScienceMissionDirectorate #SolarFlares #SolarOrbiter #SolarWind #SpaceWeather #TheSun
NASA’s Heliophysics Experiment to Study Sun on European Mission https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasas-heliophysics-experiment-to-study-sun-on-european-mission/ #NASA #ScienceResearch #Heliophysics #SolarFlares #SolarWind #SpaceWeather
Smite us, oh mighty smiter.
"THE FLARES WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES: A new source of #SolarFlares is emerging over the sun's southeastern limb. Today at 1438 UT, it emitted a dramatic X3-class explosion, shown here in a movie from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory"
Interesting paper from 2018 quantifying the impact of #solarflares on #GNSS systems.
The 
BeiDou system was outperforming 
Galileo and 
GPS during solar flare conditions due to more frequently updated broadcast ionospheric models.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2018RS006591
I know Galileo/EGNOS did a recent system upgrade to provide increased resilience against solar peak activity, anticipating Solar Cycle 25, but not sure what those consisted of. Maybe @bert_hubert would know?
I wonder how crazy it would be if the aurora borealis (or australis) would become visible in the tropics. 
Anyone have more information on the aurora that might be viewable in the next few days. I'm near Philadelphia. I found the NOAA dashboard but perhaps there's a better site? #sun #aurora #SolarFlares #NorthernLights #plasma https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/aurora-30-minute-forecast
#SolarFlares, #Spaceweather via Spaceweather.com And there's a reason I held onto my eclipse glasses. Read on...
"THIS SUNSPOT IS HUGE: Sunspot #AR3664 has grown so large, it is now visually rivaling the great #Carrington sunspot of Sept. 1859. To illustrate their similarity, Carrington's famous sketch (to scale) has been added to a picture of today's sun:
"How big is AR3664? Sprawling almost 200,000 km from end to end, it is 15 times wider than Earth. You can see AR3664 through ordinary eclipse glasses with no magnification at all. Moreover, it is easy to project an image of this sunspot onto the sidewalk or a white screen just as Carrington did in the 19th century.
"Carrington's sunspot is famous because in August and Sept. 1859 it emitted a series of intense #SolarFlares and #CMEs. The resulting #geomagnetic storms set fire to telegraph offices and sparked auroras from Cuba to Hawaii. The '#CarringtonEvent' has since become a touchstone of space weather in pop culture, with headlines stoking fears of an "internet apocalypse" if it repeats. Recent studies suggest that Carrington-class storms occur once every 40 to 60 years, so we're overdue.
"Does this mean we're about to get hit by another Carrington Event? Probably not. Big sunspots don't always produce big CMEs. Indeed, the CME AR3664 hurled toward us earlier today is puny compared to the CMEs of 1859. It won't cause much trouble when it arrives this weekend. Nevertheless, it would be wise to keep an eye on this growing active region while Earth is in its strike zone."
Two NASA Sounding Rockets Launch from Alaska During Solar Flare https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/two-nasa-sounding-rockets-launch-from-alaska-during-solar-flare/ #NASA #SolarFlares #SoundingRockets #SoundingRocketsProgram #WallopsFlightFacility
