(Cape Canaveral) An unusually strong solar storm heading toward Earth could produce northern lights in the United States and disrupt communications this weekend.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has issued an advisory for a geomagnetic storm watch – the first in nearly 20 years. It starts Friday and will last all weekend.
NOAA said the Sun produced strong solar flares starting Wednesday, leading to five plasma explosions capable of disrupting orbiting satellites and power grids on Earth. Each flare – known as a coronal mass ejection – can contain billions of tons of solar plasma.
NOAA describes this event as unusual. The agency points out that the flares appear to be associated with a sunspot whose diameter is 16 times that of Earth. In 2003, an extreme geomagnetic storm caused power outages in Sweden and damaged power transformers in South Africa.
The current storm could produce northern lights as far away as the southern United States, Alabama and northern California, according to NOAA.
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