Solar eruptions from our sun are nothing compared to eruptions from some other stars – so-called ‘superflares’. Two scientists say our sun could also be a superflare star.
Every now and then large sun storms strike the Earth, where they cause auroras and in rare cases, power cuts. These events are, however, nothing compared to the apocalyptic destruction we would experience if the Earth were struck by a superflare. An international research team suggests that this scenario might be a real possibility.
Solar eruptions consist of energetic particles that are hurled away from the sun into space, where those directed towards Earth encounter the magnetic field around our planet. When these eruptions interact with Earth’s magnetic field they cause beautiful auroras – a poetic phenomenon that reminds us that our closest star is an unpredictable neighbor.
Solar eruptions are, however, nothing compared to the eruptions we see on other stars, the so-called ‘superflares’. Superflares have been a mystery since the Kepler mission discovered them in larger numbers four years ago.
Questions arose: Are superflares formed by the same mechanism as solar flares? If so, does that mean that the sun is also capable of producing a superflare?
An international research team has now suggested answers to some of these questions. Their alarming answers were published in Nature Communications on March 24, 2016.
The dangerous neighbor
The sun is capable of producing monstrous eruptions that can break down radio communication and power supplies here on Earth. The largest observed eruption took place in September 1859, where gigantic amounts of hot plasma from our neighboring star struck Earth.
On September 1, 1859, astronomers observed how one of the dark spots on the surface of the sun suddenly lit up and shone brilliantly over the solar surface. This phenomenon had never been observed before and nobody knew what was to come. On the morning of September 2, the first particles from what we now know was an enormous eruption on the sun, reached Earth.
The 1859 solar storm is also known as the “Carrington Event.” Auroras associated with this event could be seen as far south as Cuba and Hawaii. Telegraph system worldwide went haywire. Ice core records from Greenland indicate that Earth’s protective ozone layer was damaged by the energetic particles from the solar storm.
The cosmos, however, contains some stars that regularly experience eruptions that can be up to 10,000 times larger than the Carrington event.