While we are past the solar maximum, the peak of activity of the Sun in its 11-year cycle, we are still getting fireworks from our little star – fireworks that have caused several radio blackouts and one of the strongest flares in the last 30 years. 

They are all coming from the same sunspot complex, a region known as 4366. Since Sunday, it has released six X-class flares. The X-class is the category to which the most powerful solar flares belong; multiple occurrences from the same region indicates that a lot is happening there. 

Sunspots are cooler regions of the Sun’s surface where intense magnetic fields penetrate deep into the Sun. These magnetic field lines can snap and reconnect as the sunspots move, accelerating electrically charged particles to extremely high-speeds. This produces the flashes of intense light.