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  • 9 hours ago
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00:03Just last week, the Sun looked like this, with a giant sunspot the size of dozens of Earths appearing on
00:09its surface.
00:10That event sent solar winds radiating out into space, causing absolutely spectacular auroras all over the world.
00:17Now it's happening again, but this time we might be more directly in its path.
00:21This is a photo of the sunspot astronomers say is around the size of 18 to 20 Earths.
00:25And when its magnetic field lines snapped and reconnected, it sent out solar winds traveling some 1.8 million miles
00:31per hour.
00:32The solar winds are expected to reach Earth on Friday.
00:34And while these types of events are known to cause issues with our power grids and other technologies,
00:39when they come into contact with our planet's ionosphere, this one isn't expected to do any of that.
00:43But they do expect more extremely vibrant auroras like the ones filmed last week.
00:47This will also prove to be more data for our planetary space weather predicting.
00:51Experts say our space weather forecasting abilities are still quite rudimentary.
00:55But we'll want that to change soon as the sun is approaching its 11-year solar maximum in 2025.
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