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For India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 is expected to be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – which was placed in orbit recently – can watch our star when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

According to research, it comes roughly every 11 years when the Sun's magnetic poles flip – the Earth equivalent could be the planet's poles swapping positions.

This period marked by intense activity. It sees the Sun changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of ionized particles, a CME may have a mass of billions of tons and reach a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out in any direction, including towards the Earth. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to cover the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun launches a few solar eruptions a day," explains an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, it's anticipated them to be 10 or more each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections is one of the key scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our solar system, and secondly, since events that take place on the Sun threaten infrastructure on Earth and in orbit.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present immediate danger to people, but they do affect our planet by causing geomagnetic storms affecting conditions in near space, where about 11,000 satellites, including many from India, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are direct evidence that solar particles from Sun are travelling to Earth," the expert explains.

"However, they may cause electronic systems aboard spacecraft fail, disable power grids and affect weather and communication satellites."

Past Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar event in history was the Carrington Event which knocked out communication systems across the globe
• In 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, leaving millions in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, causing chaos across Scandinavia and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

With capability to see events in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or solar eruption in real time, record its temperature at the source and watch its trajectory, this serves as advanced warning to switch off power grids and satellites and move them to safety.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories observing our star, India's spacecraft has an advantage over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, completely blocking the solar disk and allowing it continuous observation of nearly the entire of the corona around the clock, throughout the year, even during solar events," says the expert.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study eruptions in visible light, enabling it to measure a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data indicating the intensity of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Readiness for Peak Period

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, scientists worked together to study information gathered from one of the largest CMEs that Aditya-L1 has observed recently.

It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – in comparison the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

Even though the numbers make it sound massive, the scientist describes it as a moderate event.

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on our planet was 100 million megatons and when solar peak occurs, there may be CMEs carrying power equal to even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we analyzed to have occurred when the Sun of typical solar activity. Now this sets the benchmark for future comparison to evaluate what is in store during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The insights from this will help us work out the countermeasures to implement safeguarding satellites in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.