Solar Flare!

     This article was scientific article about a recent solar flare, which created quite a commotion due to the inconveniences we faced in communication and transportation. They mentioned the sheer size of the radiation waves that impacted Earth by describing it as a, "cosmic tsunami of energy, in the form of charged particles, radio static and X-rays, across the 93 million miles to Earth."  The flare interrupted global positioning systems as well as airplane communications, and to avoid this, the airlines intentionally avoided locations where radiation levels were high as well as fling low to reduce the level of radiation. I found it interesting that the radiation levels were so high, but there isn't really much worry at the moment. I also  found it interesting that this happens thousands of times, and that this news article was written due to the size of the flare.
This article was written by two authors, Robert Lee Hotz and Doug Cameron. I found it peculiar when i read the word Hotz, but they both have written many articles for the Wall Street journal. As for a rhetorical analysis on the article, I found the external sources to be most interesting. There were many links to videos and pictures of the flares which increased just how they looked and it really helped with the imagery and increased the interest level of the article as a whole. The authors use Quotes from scientists as well as examples of what the companies did to account for the discrepencies of the level of radiation, but I feel that if they had included just how, " the charged particles can cause computer glitches or temporary control malfunctions aboard some of the 860 or so satellites orbiting Earth", it would increase the level of pathos because it shows they understand what relevance it has to the current topic as well as increase audience's knowledge on the subject as well. Besides that, the most alarming thing in the article was by far the mention of radiation shelters, and how the flares were only going to get bigger when nearing the solar maximum, which wasn't really explained either.