Fast Solar Wind, a Mini-Solar Storm, and a Whole Lot of Flaring | Space Weather News 24 April 2024

This week our Sun decides to show us how busy things can get during solar maximum. We have 18 sunspot clusters in Earth-view, including multiple big-flare players that are making a lot of noise on the dayside radio bands. Luckily, the numerous radio blackouts are mostly short-lived and only at the R1-level so they are more a minor inconvenience than anything. Radio flux has also topped the 200s again (with a peak over 250! for a short while), which means radio propagation is good, even on the nightside, but GPS users at low latitudes might find this high level causes more reception issues, especially in the afternoon and early evenings. As far as storming goes, we are expecting some fast solar wind along with a partially Earth-directed solar storm coming over the next few days, which will give aurora photographers some aurora to smile about, especially at high latitudes. Learn the details of the coming solar storm and fast solar wind, see when these radio blackouts might die down, and find out what else our Sun has in store.