Welcome to the solar maximum. We do not know exactly when the peak of solar activity will be during this cycle, but we are near it and the Sun is showing it. Yesterday, we reported the release of the second most powerful flare for this cycle, and our star decided to one-up itself and release both the most powerful of cycle 25 and the most powerful since 2017.

The solar flare was an X9.0 class released by sunspot AR3842, the same that released the flare on October 1. It caused radio blackouts and communication loss on the sunny side of the Earth at the time, and more is yet to come.

The sunspot is facing Earth right now and the region has released coronal mass ejections directed at our planet. Two are coming in rapid succession, so there’s going to be a powerful geomagnetic storm. It doesn’t look like we are going to have a repeat of the May 2024 one, where three merged into a single cannibal coronal mass ejection reaching the level of an extreme storm. This is still just a strong storm.

In terms of tech, effects on communications, satellites, and power infrastructure are possible but they are manageable – experts know the storm is upon us and should know what to do. For those of us who don’t run these things, the possibility of aurorae is the exciting part of geomagnetic storms. 

The northern lights could become visible across lower latitudes, including all northern states of the continental United States, parts of the Midwest and central USA, Scandinavia, Britain, and Ireland. The southern lights might be visible in southern Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand's South Island.

Solar flares are massive releases of energy from the Sun, associated with sunspots. Sunspots are darker because they are cooler than the surrounding areas but they are a lot more magnetic. The magnetic field there can be about 2,500 times stronger than Earth's own, significantly stronger than the rest of the Sun.

Flares are also associated with coronal mass ejections, when electrically charged plasma from the Sun is launched at high speed into interplanetary space. This plasma can affect satellites and electrical infrastructure on Earth, as well as creating blazing aurorae across the higher latitudes.