Colossal X-class Solar Flare Erupts on Sun, Active Flare Region Turns Towards Earth

The sun unleashed an intense X-class solar flare Monday night, which caused a brief radio blackout, NASA reported on Tuesday. According to NASA, the flare emerged from "an active region on the left side of the sun" and has been classified as an X1.8 classes flare.

There are three types of solar flares with "X-class" indicating the most intense class of flare. The Washington Post reported that the other weaker flare classes include M-class (medium-sized) and C-class (small-sized). NASA noted that the number attributed to the flare denotes information regarding the flare's strength, with X1 being the weakest X-class flare.

According to NASA, X-class flares can cause brief "degradation or blackouts of radio communications for about an hour." Solar flares, which are potent bursts of radiation, cannot penetrate the Earth's atmosphere or physically affect humans, NASA said.

However, solar flares can affect the atmospheric layer containing GPS and communications signals. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) categorized the radio blackout caused by Monday's solar flare as an R3, on a scale from R1 to R5.

Although Monday's flare was not emitted in the direction of Earth, the Washington Post reported that space weather forecasters say the area where the sun flare emerged from, known as AR1598, is slowly rotating towards Earth.

"[T]he potential for continued activity remains so stay tuned for updates as Region 1598 makes its way across the visible disk," NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center stated.

NASA reported that this week's flare is the 15th X-class flare of the current solar cycle, which began on February 15, 2011. "The largest X-class flare in this cycle was an X6.9 on Aug. 9, 2011. This is the 7th X-class flare in 2012 with the largest being an X5.4 flare on March 7," NASA wrote.

There were no Earth-directed coronal mass ejection (CME), or burst of plasma, associated with the October 22 flare. According to the Washington Post, Earth-directed CMEs "can produce aurora (northern lights) and geomagnetic storms capable of disrupting satellite communications and the electrical grid."

WATCH "ACTIVE REGION ON THE SUN EMITS ANOTHER FLARE"