Complex sunspot region 2422

Tuesday, 29 September 2015 12:46 UTC

As sunspot region 2422 is facing Earth right now, it is by far the most interesting sunspot region on the earth-facing disk. Let's focus our attention on this region:

Compared to yesterday, we have to conclude that there has been some magnetic separation between the leading and trailing sunspot clusters but when we look at the delta sunspots we see that this region gained some serious magnetic complexity which will guarantee more M-class solar flares.

While there remains a small delta sunspot near the leading sunspot cluster, we see that there is one large delta sunspot surrounded by many tiny spots that have an opposite polarity. We have seen a flurry of low-level M-class activity but this structure could harbor massive magnetic tension which has the potential to let loose a strong M-class (R2) or even an X-class (R3) event.

Image: Sunspot region 2422 as seen by NASA SDO indicating two areas with magnetic delta structures.