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Regarding Aditya-L1, 2026 is expected to be like no other.

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – which was placed into space last year – can observe the Sun during the peak of its solar cycle.

According to scientific data, it comes roughly once every 11 years when the Sun's magnetic poles flip – a similar Earth scenario could be the planet's poles changing places.

This period of great turbulence. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of fire that erupt from the solar corona.

Made up of ionized particles, a CME may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and can attain a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out in any direction, including towards the Earth. At maximum velocity, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to traverse the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or low-activity times, our star launches two to three CMEs a day," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, it's anticipated them to be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections is one of the key scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. One, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the Sun at the centre of our planetary system, and secondly, because activities occurring on the solar surface endanger infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Earth and Space Infrastructure

CMEs rarely pose immediate danger to human life, yet they impact life on Earth by causing geomagnetic storms affecting conditions in Earth's vicinity, where about thousands of spacecraft, including many from India, are stationed.

"The most spectacular manifestations of a CME are auroras, being a clear example that charged particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the scientist explains.

"However, they may make all the electronics aboard spacecraft fail, disable electrical networks and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar storm ever recorded was the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, affecting millions in darkness for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disturbed flight operations, leading to disruption in Sweden and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites failing

If we are able to see events on the Sun's corona and detect solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, measure its heat at origin and watch its path, it can work as advanced warning to switch off power grids and satellites and move them to safety.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

There are other solar missions watching the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph has perfect dimensions that lets it nearly mimic the Moon, completely blocking the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire of the corona around the clock, throughout the year, including during eclipses and occultations," says the expert.

In other words, this instrument functions as an artificial Moon, blocking the solar glare allowing scientists constantly study its faint outer corona – a feat the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Moreover, it's unique that can study eruptions in visible light, letting it determine eruption heat and heat energy – key clues indicating how strong a CME would be if it headed toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated to study information obtained from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

It originated on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – the iceberg that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – in comparison nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons in scale each.

Even though the numbers make it sound incredibly large, the expert describes it as a moderate event.

The asteroid that eliminated prehistoric life on our planet was 100 million megatons and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see eruptions with energy content equal to greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated happened when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard that we'll be using assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he says.

"The learnings gained will help us work out the countermeasures to implement safeguarding satellites in near space. They will also help achieving a better understanding of our space environment," he adds.