Not all solar observations come looking like pretty pictures. This data shoes how the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite, or GOES, recorded the X-class flare. Note the high spike just before 18:00 – the Universal Time equivalent of 2:00 p.m. EDT -- on March 29. That spike shows how GOES detected a surge in X-rays from the sun, the signature of a solar flare. Credit: GOES

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