Massive solar flare may impact satellite communications, GPS on April 20: CESSI

A massive solar flare took place today (April 20), Center of Excellence in Space Sciences India (CESSI) informed. This fresh solar flare emitted by Sun is believed to have possibility to impact satellite communications and global positioning systems. CESSI confirmed that this strong ionospheric turmoil is ongoing over India, South East Asia, and Asia-Pacific regions.

" X2.2 class solar flare eruption took place at 3:57 UTC (9.27 IST) from solar magnetic active region AR12992," Dibyendu Nandi, Associate Professor and Coordinator of CESSI at Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata, told PTI.  Center of Excellence in Space Sciences India (CESSI) stated that re are possibilities of high-frequency communications blackouts.

"Strong ionospheric perturbation is ongoing over India, South East Asia, and Asia-Pacific regions. Expected high-frequency communication blackouts, satellite anomalies, GPS scintillations, airline communication impacts", CESSI tweeted. CESSI categorized flare as an X-Class, which denotes most intense flares.

What are Solar Flares?

magnetic field lines near sunspots often tangle, cross, and reorganise, NASA informed in a post, ding that this can cause a sudden explosion of energy called a solar flare. Solar flares release a lot of riation into space. If a solar flare is very intense, riation it releases can interfere with rio communication services on Earth. 

According to NASA, biggest solar flares are known as 'X-class flares' which are based on a classification system that categorises solar flares according to ir strength. smallest ones are A-class (near background levels), followed by B, C, M, and X, it said. This is similar to  Richter scale for earthquakes, each letter represents a 10-fold increase in energy output. An X class flare is ten times an M class explosion and 100 times a C class flare. Previously, in March, CESSI detected new sunspots on Sun's surface, which were, n, believed to result in emission of solar flares. 

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