The sun is furiously demanding our attention again, flexing near the peak of its power with four eruptions at the same time.
Video footage from NASA‘s Solar Dynamics Observatory shows that, around 11:30 p.m. Eastern Time on Monday evening, four solar flares erupted at once across the visible surface of the sun.
The rare quadruple eruption, shown below, is not an immediate danger to us on Earth.
Solar flares can send solar material screaming toward Earth, causing geomagnetic storms in our planet’s atmosphere.
That can lead to GPS disruptions and radio blackouts, or bring the beautiful northern lights further south.
Indeed, a radio blackout occurred shortly after the flares, according to the Space Weather Prediction Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, though it was not clear from the agency’s report whether this was linked.
“These …