Sun storm may supercharge auroras for Valentine's Day

claw-shaped solar flare bursting from the sun
The sun unleashes a powerful flare on Feb. 7, 2023. (Image credit: NASA/SDO/helioviewer.org)

A big solar outburst over the weekend might produce bright auroras here on Earth tonight (Feb. 14).

The sun blasted a powerful X-class flare into space on Saturday (Feb. 11), an outburst accompanied by an eruption of solar plasma known as a coronal mass ejection (CME). Some of the CME particles could hit Earth's upper atmosphere late on Valentine's Day (Tuesday, Feb. 14) and create shining auroras, experts said.

"Minor G1-class geomagnetic storms are possible on Feb. 14 and 15 when one or more CMEs could deliver glancing blows to Earth's magnetic field," SpaceWeather.com wrote of the event.

More activity might be coming from "a number of sunspot groups [that] are present on the visible solar disk," added the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in a Monday (Feb. 13) update. These sunspots may generate medium-sized or M-class flares in the coming days, NOAA added.

Related: The sun just erupted with a major X-class solar flare. Here's what it looked like on video

The sun will reach the peak of its current 11-year activity cycle around 2025, but most of the sun storms don't affect us much. Brief interruptions can happen in shortwave, and particles associated with CMEs may supercharge auroras, which are shining lights high in our atmosphere caused by solar particles interacting with molecules in Earth's atmosphere.

NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) partner with telescopes around the world to keep an eye on the sun, just in case it happens to blast out something a bit stronger that would affect power lines or satellite communications. 

The agencies also run a number of sun-gazing spacecraft, as well as missions that swoop close to the sun to learn more about its activity. NASA's Parker Solar Probe and ESA's Solar Orbiter sample the solar wind — particles streaming from the sun — and take a look at solar structures and the sun's atmosphere from a relatively close-up view.

Elizabeth Howell is the co-author of "Why Am I Taller?" (ECW Press, 2022; with Canadian astronaut Dave Williams), a book about space medicine. Follow her on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom or Facebook.

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Elizabeth Howell
Former Staff Writer, Spaceflight (July 2022-November 2024)

Elizabeth Howell (she/her), Ph.D., was a staff writer in the spaceflight channel between 2022 and 2024 specializing in Canadian space news. She was contributing writer for Space.com for 10 years from 2012 to 2024. Elizabeth's reporting includes multiple exclusives with the White House, leading world coverage about a lost-and-found space tomato on the International Space Station, witnessing five human spaceflight launches on two continents, flying parabolic, working inside a spacesuit, and participating in a simulated Mars mission. Her latest book, "Why Am I Taller?" (ECW Press, 2022) is co-written with astronaut Dave Williams.