M9.3 solar flare, S3 proton storm, Earth-directed CME

Saturday, 8 June 2024 15:29 UTC

M9.3 solar flare, S3 proton storm, Earth-directed CME

Sunspot region 3697 has been relatively quiet the past few days as she made her way towards the west limb but she was not planning to exit stage right without one final song. At 01:49 UTC this night the region produced a highly eruptive long duration M9.7 (R2-moderate) solar flare.

The eruption was associated with Type II and IV radio sweeps and produced a bright coronal mass ejection and quickly following the flare solar protons started to arrive at Earth. We currently are in a moderate S2 solar radiation storm but we briefly crossed the strong S3 solar radiation threshold which makes this the first time we reached the S3 threshold since 2017 and the strongest solar radiation storm of the current Solar Cycle thus far. For more information about solar radiation storm we invite you to read this help article

Let's take a look once again at that beautiful coronal mass ejection. Sunspot region 3697 is close to the west limb but despite that we still see an asymmetrical halo CME outline. A majority of the ejecta is heading well west of our planet but a glancing blow is possible around mid-day on Monday, 10 June. A minor G1 geomagnetic storm watch is in effect for the second half of 10 June.

Thank you for reading this article! Did you have any trouble with the technical terms used in this article? Our help section is the place to be where you can find in-depth articles, a FAQ and a list with common abbreviations. Still puzzled? Just post on our forum where we will help you the best we can! Never want to miss out on a space weather event or one of our news articles again? Subscribe to our mailing list, follow us on Twitter and Facebook and download the SpaceWeatherLive app for Android and iOS!

Latest news

Support SpaceWeatherLive.com!

A lot of people come to SpaceWeatherLive to follow the Sun's activity or if there is aurora to be seen, but with more traffic comes higher server costs. Consider a donation if you enjoy SpaceWeatherLive so we can keep the website online!

100%
Support SpaceWeatherLive with our merchandise
Check out our merchandise

Latest alerts

Get instant alerts!

Space weather facts

Last X-flare2024/10/09X1.4
Last M-flare2024/10/14M3.3
Last geomagnetic storm2024/10/12Kp5 (G1)
Spotless days
Last spotless day2022/06/08
Monthly mean Sunspot Number
September 2024141.4 -74.1
October 2024162.5 +21.1
Last 30 days146.1 -23.6

This day in history*

Solar flares
11999X2.63
22024M3.3
32014M3.27
42002M3.21
52000M1.63
DstG
11981-133G4
22000-106G2
32016-102G2
42002-100G1
51982-91G2
*since 1994

Social networks