The Sun is approaching its peak activity in the current solar cycle, an 11-year period in which its magnetic field goes through one cycle. This means that the north and south poles of the sun change places.
It takes about 11 years for the sun’s north and south poles to flip again. During this period, the Sun emits many flares capable of affecting the natural life of the Earth. A few days ago, two massive solar flares erupted from the sunspot region AR3663 and Earth is in the firing line.
The first explosion occurred on May 2 and was an X-class flare, the most powerful type of solar flare, according to space.com. This causes shortwave radio blackouts across much of Australia, Japan and China.
Solar physicist Keith Strong said on his X site, “X Flare! Sunspot region AR3663 just produced an X1.7 flare, the 11th largest flare so far this cycle. It was an inspiratory flare that lasted 25 minutes and peaked at 02:22 UT.”
The second outbreak was reported on May 3, which was an M-class flare, the company added.
A newly formed sunspot has seen several flares erupt on the sun’s surface. During both flares, the sunspot faced Earth and a coronal mass ejection (CME) may have accompanied either of these solar flares.
