- Equinox — Mon, Mar 20, 2023 21:24 UTC • 5:24 PM EDT
Active Region
October 23, 2014
As of October 23, 2014, AR12192 is now the Biggest sunspot in 2 solar cycles. Just yesterday it reached the rank of largest sunspot in cycle 24. The sunspot measures a whopping 2700 microhemispheres (MH or millionths of a visible […]
October 19, 2014
Sunspot group, AR12192, released a strong burst of magnetic energy in the form of an X1.1 flare and a surge of solar plasma. The solar flare peaked in the GOES X-ray monitor at 5:01 UT, 10/19/2014. There was no significant […]
October 18, 2014
The active region on the southeast limb has now been designated as AR12192. This region has already produced several M and many C-class flares. Philippe Tosi of Nîmes, France, took this photograph of AR12192 on Oct. 18, 2014. The animated […]
February 28, 2014
It’s that time of year. SDO spring eclipse season started February 27, 2014. During the 3 week season, Earth will pass between SDO and the Sun around 07:30 UT each day. Initially the eclipses are a few minutes long. Their […]
February 12, 2014
A whole lot of spots going on! We no longer have the rumbling region AR11967 but the solar disk is covered with smaller regions and AR11974 is sitting at disk center popping of lots of small and medium-sized flares. It […]
February 1, 2014
There are two main active regions (ARs 11967/11968) on the sun and both are giving a moderate show. AR11967 continues to produce C- and M-level events, including an M3.0 flare at 07:14 UT Feb. 1, 2014. The region continues to show signs […]
January 28, 2014
Sunspot group or active region AR11944 that gave us such a show at the beginning of the year is back. After taking its trip around the sun it has rotated onto the Earth facing solar disk and NOAA has labeled it […]
May 14, 2013
The active region that could, has again given us an X flare! That makes 4! 12:15 UT – The NASA GSFC Space Weather Research Center has estimated that the CME may give a glancing blow to Epoxi (~5/18/2013 06:00 UT) and […]
November 7, 2012
An M1.7 flare peaked at 02:23 UT, November 8, 2012. This is not really a big flare but everybody’s attention picks up when the activity level reached M-class (mine included). I don’t yet know where the event came […]
October 10, 2012
Two new active regions could bring solar activity, one numbered (AR11589) and one not yet on the solar disk. Based on recent activity M class flares are possible from both. The region just over the limb produced an M1 […]
June 29, 2012
Over the past 24 hours, sunspot group AR11513 has increased in complexity, producing several C-class flares and 2 M-class flares, an M2.4 on June 28 at 16:07 and an M2.2 on June 29 at 9:10 UT . Both AR11513 and […]
May 6, 2012
4 M-class Flares and More A new active region (AR11476) has been rotating into view during the beginning of May 2012. It has been producing CMEs and by May 5th it started releasing small M-class flares and lots of C-class […]
April 23, 2012
At 17:40 UT, the Sun produced a C2 solar flare with a radio burst and a SCORE-C CME. NASA Goddard Space Weather Center predicts it will reach Earth 4/27/2012 at 5:49 UT with only minor impact. Currently, there is a […]
March 14, 2012
Sunspot group or active region AR11429 has almost rotated out of view but it still had enough energy to release an M7.9 X-ray solar flare, a fast coronal mass ejection (CME) and a solar energetic particle event (SEP). A […]
March 11, 2012
CMEs are on their way to us! Estimated impact is March 11, 2012 around 2-3 PM EDT. High latitude aurora watchers keep lookout the night of March 11, 2012. On March 10, 2012, the sun produced 1 C-class […]
March 9, 2012
Nature never ceases to surprise and amaze. Just when it looked like the geomagnetic storm from yesterdays CME impacts had fizzled out, Earth’s magnetosphere continues its upset state. Even before the Kp index (a measure of the […]
March 7, 2012
Sunspot group, AR11429 (Active Region), is at it again. When it first began its journey across the Earthward side of the Sun it released an M-class flare, an X-class flare and several more M flares, along with several CMEs. Early […]
March 6, 2012
Sunspot group, AR11429, started off its journey across the Earth facing side of the Sun with several bangs. First it produced an M flare on March 2 at 17:29 UT (with a CME) then came another M flare (with a […]
March 5, 2012
Sunspot group AR11429! Here is a look at AR11429 from Friday to today showing the 2 M-class and 1 X-class flare blasting away from the Sun. In addition to those events and their associated CMEs there is a lot of […]
February 6, 2012
Ten years ago yesterday (5 February 2002) saw the launch of the Reuven Ramaty High-Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager, or RHESSI (pronounced reh-see). RHESSI was designed to study particle acceleration and energy transport during solar flares by observing the highest energy […]
November 3, 2011
Solar Activity Solar activity was at low to moderate levels, with occurrences of several C-class flares and three M class flares (see the list below). Quite a few slow to moderate CMEs were detected emanating from different regions of the […]
May 20, 2011
An extensive series of arcs, observed in profile, can be seen making a long distance connection between two active regions (Mar. 15-17, 2011). As SDO observed in extreme ultraviolet light, a series of magnetic field lines generated a well-defined pathway […]
January 10, 2011
We have reached the milestone of 1000 Fans on our FaceBook page! As promised, we have been preparing a small treat for all of you as a sign of appreciation for making the TheSunToday page such a great success in […]
December 1, 2010
For seven days SDO’s HMI instrument watched as a small sunspot group morphed, merged and grew into two large sunspots (Nov. 13-19, 2010) as other sunspots begin to emerge as well. We selected an image about every 15 minutes (approximately […]