Sun unleashes Solar Flare of M4.4 scale; The most powerful flare in 3 years

The Sun consists of 99.8% of the mass of our Solar system, and it is made of 70.6% hydrogen and 27.4% helium by mass. However, the enormously heated ball of gas, our home star, has unleashed its most powerful solar eruption in more than three years, as per the Space.com. This event was recorded on Sunday. 

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Sun unleashes the most powerful solar eruption

According to a new report by Space.com, on November 29, 2020, Sun has experienced a sudden solar eruption which is widely known as the Solar Flare. The bright explosion of electromagnetic energy is said to be an M4.4 on the scale astronomers use for Sun storms. The scale consists of three classes, C class, M class and X class flares in which C is small, M is medium and X is large. The scale also has ranks from 1 to 9, with larger numbers representing stronger flares. So, the recent most powerful solar flare in more than three years was a medium eruption with the rank of 4.4 on the Sun storms' scale.

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This powerful Solar Flare of M4.4 was accompanied by a coronal mass ejection. Coronal mass ejections commonly accompany the flares and they are large releases of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun's corona which is the outermost layer. As per Scientists, the flare kicked off the 25th Solar Cycle which was started in December 2019 and announced in September 2020. The previous cycle ran from 2008 to 2019. 

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Solar weather is an 11-year long cycle and after the passing of this duration, a new cycle begins. The 25th Solar Cycle is expected by scientists to be as quiet as the 24th cycle. Such large explosions on Sun can affect the Earth as well as they contain incredible bursts of electromagnetic radiation that can cause radio blackouts and other technological disruptions. An X Class solar flare might be capable of causing radio blackouts around the globe whereas M Class flares just do some minor consequences on our home planet. However, the M4.4 solar flare of November 2020 is the most powerful solar flare scientists have observed in more than three years.

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