Satellite: GOES-19 (GOES East)
Product: Visible imagery, wavelength 480nm to 730nm
Instrument: Compact Coronagraph (CCOR-1)
Timespan: Jan. 18, 2026 (00:00:25 UTC) - Jan. 19, 2026 (05:45:25 UTC)
Did you see the auroras? Our satellites certainly had an eyeful as they watched a powerful coronal mass ejection (CME) erupting from the sun on Jan. 18, 2026. This imagery, seen above, is from the Compact Coronagraph (CCOR-1) instrument on NOAA’s GOES East satellite. This is NOAA’s first coronagraph in geostationary orbit and it provided NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) forecasters with the first confirmation that a CME had occurred, allowing them to begin early analysis of its size, speed, and direction.
Sunday’s CME produced one of the strongest solar storms in decades. It prompted SWPC to issue a G4 (severe) geomagnetic storm watch for January 20, 2026. A G4 storm can severely impact power grids, satellites, navigation (GPS), and radio communications, while making auroras visible at much lower latitudes, as many of you saw. In the center of this imagery, the CCOR-1’s occulting disk blocks the sun’s bright light, enabling observation of its outer atmosphere, known as the solar corona. Within the same field of view, you can see Earth’s moon passing through the image.
The strong solar flare associated with the CME was also caught by the Solar Ultraviolet Imager (SUVI) on NOAA’s GOES East satellite. This animation above provides a view of the sun in a 131 Ångstroms wavelength, which is one of several wavelengths SUVI provides scientists monitoring the sun's activity
Another compact coronagraph (CCOR-2) is onboard NOAA’s Space Weather Follow On - Lagrange-1 (SWFO-L1) observatory, which is expected to begin operational service in spring of 2026. This will provide continuous monitoring of the sun from roughly one million miles away from Earth. Observations from this unique vantage point will give forecasters critical lead time to assess incoming space weather, improve forecasts, and allow operators on Earth to better prepare for potentially dangerous space weather events.