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Regarding India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 is expected to be like no other.

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed into space recently – will be able to observe the Sun during the peak of its solar cycle.

As per research, it comes approximately every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It involves the Sun changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a significant rise in the frequency of solar storms and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out from the solar corona.

Composed of charged particles, a CME may have a mass of billions of tons and reach velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can head out toward various directions, even toward our planet. At maximum velocity, it would take a CME 15 hours to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or quiet periods, our star emits a few solar eruptions a day," explains an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, it's anticipated there will be over ten each day."

Researching coronal mass ejections is one of the most important scientific objectives for the Indian first solar observatory. Firstly, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and two, since events that take place on the solar surface endanger systems on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to people, but they do affect life on Earth by causing geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, comprising Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most spectacular displays from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling toward our planet," the scientist clarifies.

"But they can also cause electronic systems aboard spacecraft malfunction, disable electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event ever recorded occurred during the Carrington Event that disabled communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, leaving six million people in darkness for hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, causing chaos in Sweden and some other European airports
• In February 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft being lost

With capability to see events on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, record its temperature at the source and track its path, this serves as advanced warning to switch off electrical systems and satellites and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other solar missions observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument is the exact size enabling it to nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere permitting continuous observation of almost all of the corona around the clock, throughout the year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the expert.

In other words, the coronagraph acts like a synthetic eclipse, blocking the solar glare to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, it's unique that can study solar events using optical wavelengths, letting it measure eruption heat and heat energy – key clues that show how strong of an eruption if it headed our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

In preparation for next year's solar maximum, scientists collaborated to study information gathered from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

It originated in September 2024 during early hours. Its mass totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent comparable to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison the atomic bombs used in Japan were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons respectively.

Although these figures seem massive, the expert describes it as a moderate event.

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth was 100 million megatons and when solar peak occurs, we could see CMEs carrying power matching even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what to expect during solar maximum arrives," he says.

"The insights gained will help us work out the countermeasures to be adopted to protect satellites in orbit. They will also help achieving deeper knowledge of our space environment," he adds.