On Wednesday an active region of the Sun erupted with a powerful solar flare, bombarding the Earth with ionizing radiation that blocked high-frequency radio communications.
Space weather forecasters have confirmed an active region of the Sun produced a coronal mass ejection that is hurtling towards Earth, Discovery News reported. Two solar flares are expected to hit the Earth in upcoming days, which could contribute to geomagnetic storms.
"The two solar storm clouds were launched on Sept. 9th and 10th by strong explosions in the magnetic canopy of sunspot AR2158," NASA's Tony Phillips said, Discovery News reported.
"Radio emissions from shock waves at the leading edge of the CME suggest that the cloud tore through the sun's atmosphere at speeds as high as 3750 km/s (over 8 million miles per hour)," Phillips said "That would make this a very fast moving storm, and likely to reach Earth before the weekend."
The first CME encountered the Earth's magnetic field on Thursday night, and the second flew by sometime Friday. NBC News reported.
As of right now the storm appears to have a northward pointing field, meaning past predictions may have been incorrect.
"It will not interact as strongly with Earth's magnetic field, as far as we can tell," Thomas Berger, director of the National Weather Service's Space Weather Prediction Center told NBC News.
Berger said the storm could reach a relatively strong G3 level by Saturday, meaning the grid operators would have to adjust the levels on their dials and GPS signals may be slightly less accurate. Some planes flying over Earth's polar regions may be advised to follow different routes to avoid solar radiation
The up side is the phenomenon could generate beautiful auroras Friday and Saturday night.
"We would expect to see aurora perhaps as far south as the middle of Wyoming, Idaho, and perhaps as low as Connecticut and Rhode Island, maybe even New York," Berger said.
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