Hello all and welcome to... August? Time flies when you are having fun and we hope all of our visitors are having an awesome summer... or winter for our friends down under! Solar activity has been pretty quiet in June and July which gave us the opportunity to recharge our batteries before the new aurora season kicks off in the northern hemisphere. Our Sun was on the same wavelength as us as there has been little activity worth mentioning on our nearest star. Did we pass solar maximum or is this the quiet before the storm? What do you think?
However, today our Sun gave us a little wake up call with an interesting solar flare from an interesting location. Sunspot region 4168 produced an M4.4 solar flare today which peaked at 15:53 UTC. This sunspot region is interesting for two reasons: it has a complex Beta-Gamma-Delta magnetic layout which gives it the potential to produce significant solar flares. It is also located pretty much on the center of the earth-facing solar disk which means any eruptions are likely to hit Earth.
Despite the fairly impulsive nature of the flare to our surprise Type II and IV radio emmisions were observed which indicate the solar flare likely launched a coronal mass ejection. Exciting considering it is at the center of the earth-facing solar disk right? Yeah... about that... LASCO coronagraph imagery unfortunately only show a faint coronal mass ejection (CME) which is heading pretty much completely west of our planet and we should see little or no influence of this plasma cloud at our planet. A bit of a shame but keep an eye on sunspot region 4168 as it remains a significant sunspot region on the earth-facing disk right now. Could this sunspot group indicate we are entering a period with higher solar activity?
