An X1.3 Flare and a Cool View of Plasma Leaving the Sun

On March 30, 2022, active region 12975 was the site of an X1.3 flare. Here is the daily movie in AIA 171 from that day. AR 12975 is in the upper right quadrant to the right of the far more impressive looking coronal loops above AR 12976.

During the day we adjusted the fine guidance telescope, which causes the images to bounce a little bit. The flare starts at 17:26 UTC and ends at 17:46 UTC. What I found cool about this flare was the lass of plasma just south of the flare site. Here are two stills from the movie.

On the left the arrow points at some haze in the AIA 171 image. In the right image the arrow points at about the same place (there is a bright streak just to the right to get you oriented), but the image is less hazy where plasma has left the Sun.

The material that left the Sun isn't all that close to the flare. But you can see in the movie that the haze goes away just after the flare. Look at the movie a few times and you will see the haze disappear.

There is also an excellent coronal cavity display at about 4 o'clock on the limb. These cavities are usually much slower in their evolution.

It is already a great Solar Cycle!

X-class flare at 1555 UTC (11:55 am ET)

Active region 12887 emitted an X-class flare today at 1555 UTC. There also appears to be a filament eruption (the precursor to a coronal mass ejection). This is the second X-class flare of Solar Cycle 25 (the first was on July 3, 2021.)

Before the flare a filament cam be seen over AR 12887 (in the blue circle).

The flare begins to brighten up at 1529 UTC.

The filament liftoff from the surface can be seen as the dark region a litle to the left of the flare in the third image.

The flare continues to brighten until its peak flux. Check out the flare in the Browse AIA/HMI Images at the SDO website.
Solar Cycle 25 is alive and well!

New Picture of the Week

Twin M-class Solar Flares

Although visually it only looks like a single flare, sensitive scientific instruments indicated that these were actually two flares very close together (June 13, 2012) from Active Region 1504.  At 12:47 UT a M1.5 solar flare started and only five minutes later a M1.9 flare erupted from the same active region. The M1.5 flare peaked at 14:08 and ended at 15:00 UT. The M1.9 flare peaked at 14:35 and ended at 15:56 UT.  The image and video clips were taken in extreme ultraviolet light.  Indicators show that the coronal mass ejection associated with these flares might impact Earth a few days later.

  Link to Quicktime Movie View Movie (QT)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

The X Class Flare observed by SDO is the Astronomy Picture of the Day. view the APOD here

Read more about the Valentine's Day Solar Flare:

• here


• and here

M6.6 Solar Flare - Largest of this solar cycle

A M6.6 solar flare has just occurred, peaking at 17:38 UT on Feb 13. This is the largest solar flare so far from this solar cycle based on X-ray irradiance magnitude. Check for other movies and images on the SDO website!

A lively active region

With a large active region currently in the northern hemisphere of the Sun, there has been a flurry of small solar flares over the past day. This larger active region may actually be comprised of four different active regions that are very close to each other forming one large, interconnected active region with multiple magnetic poles. This magnetically complex region has lead to 12 B-class and 1 C-class solar flare over the last 24 hours. Make sure to check out the daily and past 48-hour movies to see this rapidly evolving active region!