Solar activity has emerged from a lull. As TASS reported from the Institute of Applied Geophysics, on June 20 at 04:51 Moscow time, an M1.3 class flare, the second-highest power class, was registered in the X-ray range. The event occurred in sunspot group 4472, located at coordinates S12E70, and lasted 38 minutes.
M-class flares are categorized as "strong" but not record-breaking. The X-ray radiation power scale is divided into five classes: A, B, C, M, and X, where each subsequent class signifies a tenfold increase. The minimum class A0.0 corresponds to a radiation power of 10 nanowatts per square meter in Earth's orbit. This current flare is the first M-class flare since June 6 – for the previous two weeks, the star had been in a relatively calm state.
Flares of this level can be accompanied by ejections of solar plasma, whose clouds, upon reaching Earth, provoke magnetic storms. So far, there have been no reports of an ejection directed towards Earth, but the very fact that sunspot group 4472 has awakened means that the period of calm has ended.