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‘Significant change’ in Sun’s activity may come as good news for sky watchers ahead of next year’s solar eclipse
The sun will reach solar maximum, or a peak in activity across its 11-year cycle, about a year sooner than originally predicted. Auroras, solar flares and space weather are all expected to increase.
At its top speed, it would take just about 15 hours to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.” The coronal ejection that Velc captured on 16 July had started at 13:08 GMT.
Solar activity has been on a declining trend since the 1960s, as indicated by solar cycles 19–24, in which the maximum number of sunspots were 201, 111, 165, 159, 121 and 82, respectively. [14] In the three decades following 1978, the combination of solar and volcanic activity is estimated to have had a slight cooling influence. [ 15 ]
Solar cycle 24 is the most recently completed solar cycle, the 24th since 1755, when extensive recording of solar sunspot activity began. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] It began in December 2008 with a minimum smoothed sunspot number of 2.2, [ 3 ] [ failed verification ] and ended in December 2019. [ 4 ]
The level of solar activity beginning in the 1940s is exceptional – the last period of similar magnitude occurred around 9,000 years ago (during the warm Boreal period). [ 11 ] [ 12 ] [ 13 ] The Sun was at a similarly high level of magnetic activity for only ~10% of the past 11,400 years.
A prediction for Sunspot Cycle 24 (2008-2020) gives a smoothed sunspot number maximum of about 66 in the Summer of 2013. Current observations make this the smallest sunspot cycle since records began in the 1750s. [1] Solar maximum is the regular period of greatest solar activity during the Sun's 11-year solar cycle.
More people currently live in the path of totality compared to the last eclipse . An estimated 31.6 million people live in the path of totality for 2024’s solar eclipse, compared to 12 million ...