A serious solar storm has been battering Earth's magnetosphere, in the wake of a series of solar flares that erupted from a highly active sunspot over the last few days.

The flashes of electromagnetic waves from the flares reach Earth in just a few minutes, but enormous bursts of charged particles — known as coronal mass ejections, or CMEs — take longer to get here. The CME from the latest flare, on Sunday, was particularly fast and arrived on the coattails of earlier outbursts. As if that weren't enough, another strong flare occurred Monday.


more @
http://www.nbcnews.com/science/space/solar-storm-strikes-earth-spawning-low-latitude-aurora-n379966

I like the sound of 'em... like the sound of a bonfire at the opposite end of a barren gully. 

In the old days, my uncle knew the AM-radio 'signature' of auroras enough to tune it in and turn it up... so you could see the shiftings in-sync with the now louder static-cracklings.

The Ancients ascribed them as the 'lights of great hunters'.   

My power went out briefly, I wonder if it was caused by a solar flare.

Quote from: Dori on June 25, 2015, 03:41:31 PM
My power went out briefly, I wonder if it was caused by a solar flare.

Unlikely...  A flare (which are particles) would've zapped your substation more than 'briefly'.  A nearby transformer probably went offline via age or by a car-hitting-a-power-pole.

Sol's back in hydrostatic equilibrium today, the li'l dear.  -Knocking out some great hydrogen fusion-sequences.   

I heard about it, went out several times to look, saw nothing, went to bed.  Next mornig local news is full of pictures.  Seems I gave up about 30 minutes too early.

Quote from: zewazir on July 06, 2015, 02:21:40 PM
I heard about it, went out several times to look, saw nothing, went to bed.  Next mornig local news is full of pictures.  Seems I gave up about 30 minutes too early.

A noteworthy thing is that most of the Milky Way's solar-systems are binary.  A single star is pretty rare.  So an aurora is far-from-rare elsewhere.  Companion stars = dueling flares.