SOLAR WIND STORM IN PROGRESS: Earth Has Entered A Stream Of Fast-moving Solar Wind With Gusts Reaching

SOLAR WIND STORM IN PROGRESS: Earth has entered a stream of fast-moving solar wind with gusts reaching 700 km/s (1.6 million mph). G1-class geomagnetic storms and high latitude auroras are possible on May 3rd. Aurora alerts: SMS Text

A VERY BIG SUNSPOT: How big is it? Sunspot 4079 is, by far, the biggest sunspot of 2025. It stretches 140,000 km across the solar disk and covers an area equal to 50% of Carrington's sunspot in 1859. Amateur astronomer Eduardo Schaberger Poupeau of Rafaela, Argentina, peered into the sunspot's dark heart on May 2nd, and this is what he saw:

The two jet-black cores are each large anough to swallow Earth. They are bristling with hair-like solar fibrils as much as 20 thousand km long. Fibrils are, essentially, magnetic tubes that guide hot plasma in and out of the sunspot. When they start to wave back and forth, it means the sunspot is becoming unstable and about to erupt. Videos of the sunspot show dynamic activity within these structures.

Any solar flares this weekend will be geoeffective as the giant sunspot turns toward Earth.