At the beginning of this month, scientists noticed a solar storm heading to earth. This past week had been hit especially hard from these solar storms or solar flares. 

Now what are solar flares? According to USA Today, solar flares are “bursts of radiation from the sun that release  magnetic energy associated with sunspots.” This means that there are waves of radiation that are coming from the sun. Possibly lasting up to a few minutes or hours. 

On the other hand, this whole week there have been back to back solar flares (solar storm) that have hit earth.

How has this solar storm affected the earth and people? Generally it’s affecting technology more than anything. If you experienced your internet going out or technology just not working, it’s due to these flares. They tap into the power grids, radios and the satellites which makes every communication system on earth glitch for a little bit.

Minus the technological issues, this storm has brought some pretty interesting things. In New York, citizens were able to see the Northern Lights. In other states like Pennsylvania and Oregon were able to see these auroras this Wednesday and Thursday this week.