Judged only to be medium-sized by the US space agency, the powerful flare
erupted from the sun on Monday and was caught on camera by Nasa's SDO
satellite.
The ejections of plasma, known as coronal mass ejections (CME), can cause
electrical storms and vivid displays of the aurora borealis phenomena on
Earth, but this flare was not fired in our direction according to
scientists.
The strength of solar flares, caused by the release of magnetic energy stored
in the sun's atmosphere, is measured on a letter scale by astronomers
The strongest eruptions, which can release as much energy as one billion
megatons of TNT, fall into three categories – C, M and X – with X marking
the strongest.
The latest flare registered as an M1 class, placing it in the middle of the
scale.