Solar Bursts Spray Earth, With More to Come

Solar storms like the one that buffeted the Earth’s magnetic field on Thursday will soon become a common occurrence.

Magnetic eruptions on the Sun on Tuesday and Wednesday released two huge bursts of lights — two of the largest solar flares over the last five years — and accelerated a blob of high-speed particles headed toward us. As the charged particles slam the Earth’s magnetic field at more than a million miles per hour and are funneled toward the north and south poles, they generate the nighttime light now known as auroras or northern and southern lights.