Solar flare real-time value

[ratro]

Hi! I'm new here.

Is there anywhere I can see the real-time value of solar flares hitting Earth? This page only shows an hour delay. If it's not possible to get this data, could anyone please explain why? 

Thanks :)

[Jesterface23]

I believe you are talking about the solar wind. The satellites that monitor the solar wind for Earth are orbiting around lagrange point 1, about 1,500,000km from Earth. Between the Earth and the Sun. We can use magnetometers on Earth to tell when CMEs or other geomagnetic disturbances impact us though.

Earth's magnetic field helps protect us from the solar wind, so we can't really have good observations if a satellite is right next to us.

Magnetometers can be found here,
https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/auroral-activity/magnetometers.html

Edited February 8, 2023 by Jesterface23

[Philalethes]

2 hours ago, ratro said:

Hi! I'm new here.

Is there anywhere I can see the real-time value of solar flares hitting Earth? This page only shows an hour delay. If it's not possible to get this data, could anyone please explain why? 

Thanks

Greetings.

The primary reason why real-time values of Solar flares hitting Earth aren't listed is because Earth's upper atmosphere absorbs the vast majority of shortwave radiation, particularly the X-rays that are typically used as the primary measure of how strong flares are. Thus the majority of power from the flares themselves never reaches the surface of Earth at all. Instead the X-ray flux is measured outside of Earth's atmosphere, primarily by the GOES satellites (perhaps there are other satellites measuring this too, someone else might know; at one point I know MinXSS also did this, but it's no longer operational). This data does not have an hour of delay at all, only a few minutes, and the X-rays hit the satellites roughly at the same time as they hit Earth's atmosphere, depending on where in their orbit the GOES satellites are situated. That data can be found here.

Flares do typically also produce longwave radiation, such as radio waves, and so can be a source of what's known as a Solar radio emission. Powerful flares will in fact frequently cause radio blackouts on the part of the Earth facing Sol as the flare hits Earth.

This is of course all assuming you're indeed referring to the flares themselves; if you're actually referring to Solar wind that's another matter entirely, as addressed by Jesterface23 above.

Edited February 8, 2023 by Philalethes Bythos

[ratro]

Thanks so much for your explanations! I was referring to the flares, but I realized after your replies that my problem was I didn't double check the time zones on the graph. I thought it was in my local time zone, but it's of course in UTC. Thanks again for helping me out