Contrary to the claim of a viral video that the biggest solar flare hit the earth on March 4, the reported flare was not the largest and the solar storm that it caused was minor.
Speculations that it caused the massive outage on Meta’s social media platforms on March 5 are also unfounded. It was a technical issue, not a solar flare, that caused several users to be logged out of Facebook (FB), Instagram (IG) and Messenger.
Uploaded on March 7 on FB and YouTube, two days after the global outage took place, the seven-minute video bore the headline:
“Pagkatapos Tumama Ng Pinaka Malaking SOLAR FLAIRE (sic), Ito Ang Nangyari, Na Hindi Ibinabalita sa Mundo
(After the biggest solar flare had hit, this is what happened that is not in the news worldwide).”
Its thumbnail also carried the logos of FB, IG and their parent company Meta, along with a text that read: “PATIKIM NG SOLAR SUPERSTORM (A taste of the solar superstorm).”
The United States Space Weather Prediction Center reported minor and moderate solar storms on March 4, adding that they would just cause “generally negligible” and “controllable” power fluctuations. The agency did not say they would have any impact on the earth’s communication systems.
In a March 6 post on X (formerly Twitter), Meta Communications Director Andy Stone said that several users were logged out of their platforms FB, IG, Messenger, Threads and WhatsApp because of a “technical issue.”
At the 3:32 mark, the video narrator made the following remarks without offering any proof:
“Ngunit sa aking inaakala, hindi ito basta basta isang shutdown, dahil hanggang ngayon hindi pa rin naglalabas ang Meta patungkol sa ano talaga ang rason kung bakit nangyari ito. Ngunit para sa akin, ito’y parang may kinalaman sa nangyari nito-nito lamang linggo, na ang pinaka malakas sa solar flare sa loob ng anim na taon ay nangyari sa ating planeta.
(To my mind, this is not a mere shutdown because Meta has not explained the cause of the outage until now. For me, this has something to do with what happened this week, when the strongest solar flare in six years happened on our planet).”
Meta’s Stone never said that the outage, which lasted for about two hours, was because of a solar flare or solar storm.
While the strongest solar flare since 2017 did occur in Feb. 21 to 22, the European Space Agency said it was not accompanied by a coronal mass ejection (CME) which causes solar storms.
CMEs are huge bursts of plasma and magnetic fields from the Sun, which could damage the earth’s power and communication infrastructure if they are powerful enough.
VERA Files Fact Check has previously debunked claims about a solar superstorm causing an internet apocalypse and a shutdown of communication signals in other countries. (Read: Solar superstorm causing ‘internet apocalypse’ has NO BASIS and ‘Solar superstorm’ DID NOT cause communication shutdown in Australia)
Uploaded by FB page and YouTube channel Sa Iyong Araw, the erroneous video has received a total of 12,316 interactions. This channel was previously flagged for spreading disinformation about space weather.
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(Editor’s Note: VERA Files has partnered with Facebook to fight the spread of disinformation. Find out more about this partnership and our methodology.)
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