Storm-boosted auroras dazzle skywatchers around the world (photos)

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The sun is flaring and showing us its power.

The sun awakened once again.

A flurry of charged particles ejected from the sun on Wednesday (Aug. 17) supercharged the auroras, which shone spectacularly above Earth overnight.

The storm was classified as a moderate-sized or G2-class storm, according to SpaceWeather.com — and that's not all that's coming from our sun.

A new pair of flares were associated with a fresh coronal mass ejection (CME), or cloud of solar plasma, from a sunspot known as AR3078. The CME may cause a slightly stronger (G3-class) geomagnetic storm on Thursday (Aug. 18) and Friday (Aug. 19) after it hits Earth, according to forecasts from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

While the CME is expected to only graze Earth's magnetic field, according to SpaceWeather.com, it may still produce stunning auroras as charged solar particles interact with molecules high in our atmosphere.

Related: Hyperactive sunspot just hurled a huge X-class solar flare into space

flare emerging from sun at bottom right

The Solar and Heliophysics Observatory spacecraft captured a coronal mass ejection from the sun on Aug. 17, 2022. (Image credit: SOHO/ESA & NASA)

Such ramped-up space weather suggests that the sun is beginning to wake up from the more quiescent phase of its 11-year-cycle of activity.

This year has seen far more sunspots on the sun's surface, which is where magnetic activity clusters and occasionally produces tangles that generate flares and CMEs.

Geomagnetic storms induced by space weather are usually harmless, but the stronger ones can be problematic. Satellites, power lines and other infrastructure can be vulnerable to the strongest flares from the sun, which is why NASA and other agencies keep an eye out for rare but super-strong solar events.

Last night's storms generated a stream of tweets from around the world as people spotted auroras in their locales.

Related stories:

— Northern lights (aurora borealis): What they are & how to see them
— Where to see the northern lights: 2022 aurora borealis guide
— Where and how to photograph the aurora 

If you captured a stunning photo of the northern lights let us know! You can send in images and comments to Space.com by emailing spacephotos@space.com. Be sure to let us know your name, where you were observing from and what it was like to see the auroras.

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Elizabeth Howell
Elizabeth Howell
Staff Writer, Spaceflight

Elizabeth Howell (she/her), Ph.D., is a staff writer in the spaceflight channel since 2022 specializing in Canadian space news. She was contributing writer for Space.com for 10 years before joining full-time. Elizabeth's reporting includes multiple exclusives with the White House, speaking several times with the International Space Station, witnessing five human spaceflight launches on two continents, flying parabolic, working inside a spacesuit, and participating in a simulated Mars mission. Her latest book, "Why Am I Taller?" (ECW Press, 2022) is co-written with astronaut Dave Williams.