NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center

Force in Play

Issued G4 storm warnings and coordinated response

On January 18, 2026, the Sun fired the most intense radiation storm in over 20 years directly at Earth. An X1.9-class flare launched a coronal mass ejection traveling at 1,700 kilometers per second—plasma moving fast enough to cross the Sun-Earth distance in just 25 hours.

Updated May 27

New Capabilities

Actively monitoring and forecasting AR4366 outbreak; issuing daily activity summaries and CME arrival predictions

Sunspot region AR4366 rotated into view February 1, two weeks after the January 19 X1.9 flare and G4.7 geomagnetic storm. At 23:44 UTC, AR4366 unleashed an X8.1 flare—the 3rd-largest of Cycle 25—triggering an R3 strong radio blackout across Earth's sunlit hemisphere, then fired four more X-class flares (X2.9, X2.8, X1.5, X1.7) within hours. By February 5, it had produced 10 X-class flares in five days and over 100 M-class flares, growing to nearly 10 times Earth's width with a magnetically unstable delta-class configuration.

Updated May 22