sun: Sun emits massive solar flare that may impact radio, satellite communications
The Sun on Wednesday unleashed a massive solar flare that has the potential to impact satellite communications and global positioning systems, the Centre of Excellence in Space Sciences India (CESSI) said. This flare is classified as an X-Class, which denotes the most intense flare. The X2.2 class solar flare eruption took place at 3:57 UTC (9.27 IST) from the solar magnetic active region AR12992. “It erupted from a region beyond the southwest limb of the Sun,” according to US space weather forecasting site NOAA Space Weather. “Strong ionospheric perturbation is ongoing over India, South East Asia and the Asia-Pacific regions. Expected high frequency communication blackouts, satellite anomalies, GPS scintillations, and airline communication impacts,” the CESSI said on Twitter. Solar flares are powerful bursts of energy that can impact radio communications, electric power grids and navigation signals, and pose risks to spacecraft and astronauts. During a solar flare, the highly ener