Auroras, the weird dancing lights in the sub-polar air that fascinated our ancestors, appear when eruptions on the Sun disturb the Earth's space environment.
Solar storms are more troublesome to modern technology.
They can endanger astronauts and satellites, and at ground level they can disrupt communications, computers, power supplies and navigation systems. For these reasons, space weather is a hot topic for scientific research. It is also a matter of vigilance, with spacecraft watching for events on the Sun that may cause trouble in our part of the Solar System, minutes or days later. Eruptions on the Sun can produce a sequence of events in space and in the Earth's vicinity, although not all of the elements are apparent every time. The Sun's powerful magnetic forces directly affect the Earth and the rest of the solar system At the speed of light, flashes of X-rays and ultraviolet rays from the Sun arrive at the Earth in 8 minutes.