Big Sunspot Faces Earth

Space Weather News for April 1, 2017 http://spaceweather.com https://www.facebook.com/spaceweatherdotcom BIG SUNSPOT FACES EARTH: 2017 has been a year of few sunspots. That makes AR2645 even more remarkable. In recent days, the young sunspot has grown rapidly into a behemoth more than 150,000 km wide with a magnetic field that harbors energy for M-class (moderately strong) solar flares. Because it is directly facing Earth, any eruptions this weekend could partially ionize the top of our planet's atmosphere and alter the normal propagation of radio transmissions around the globe. Visit Spaceweather.com to view a movie of the growing sunspot. Remember, SpaceWeather.com is on Facebook! Above: Sunspot AR2645, photographed on April 1, 2017, by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. Share Tweet Forward Copyright © 2017 Spaceweather.com, All rights reserved.