Sun uncorks double-barreled blast

The sun has unleashed a pair of solar flares accompanied by twin solar storm outbursts, NASA reported on Monday.

The blasts aren't aimed at the Earth, so we shouldn't feel their effects, but they do represent the first "X-class" solar flares of the year, the strongest class of solar eruptions. They clocked in at X1.7-class and an X2.8-class flares, according to NASA. The strongest one yet recorded in the current solar cycle of sunspot activity was an X6.9 in 2011.

The two solar storm outbursts, or coronal mass ejections, that accompanied the flares, departed the sun at a speed of 1,200 miles-per-second, according to space agency data.

Solar flare erupts

On May 12-13, the sun erupted with two X-class flares as well as two coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, off the upper left side of the sun.

NASA/SDO/ESA/SOHO