The sunspot AR3590 is enormous, about eight times the size of Earth and can be safely viewed through ordinary eclipse glasses/solar filter.

Photos by the Astronomical Society of Brunei Darussalam (PABD) from Mini-Astronomical Observatory, Keriam.

Bandar Seri Begawan – The current sun is increasingly active with larger sunspots and the number increasing. Local solar observers are encourage to look at these sunspots safely with solar filters within this few days (Warning: Do NOT look at the sun directly).

As it can be seen from the photograph below, the sunspots appeared dark but in fact they are not. They were just appear dark by contrast. These regions can reach between 1100 to 2500 degrees Celcius and cooler than the surrounding surface.

These spots were capable of producing X-class solar flares which can effectively damage the man-made communication satellites but also interestingly producing green auroras around the Earth’s poles.

Images of the sun from Brunei, photos taken by Pg Shahdani, yesterday (21st July 2004). Seen on the photos is a massive sunspot (black) having about 10 times of the Earth’s size.

The giant sunspot seen on the photos is visible to the naked eye without the aid of telescope but a safe solar observing should be practice such as using eclipse shade, solar filter or using projection method.

The sunspots will remain visible within the next 5 days before dissapearing on the far side. I suggest everyone to make daytime observation of our active Sun.