GOES-class Estimation for Behind-the-limb Solar Flares Using MESSENGER SAX

Abstract

Abstract Mercury mission MESSENGER's Solar Assembly for X-rays (SAX) observed almost 700 solar flares between 2007 May 28 and 2013 August 19, as cataloged by Dennis Brian et al. The SAX instrument, part of the X-ray Spectrometer, operated at 1–10 keV, partially overlapping the energy range of the GOES X-ray spectrometers. SAX provides viewing angles different from the Earth–Sun line and can therefore be used as a GOES proxy for partially or fully occulted flares as seen from Earth. For flares with GOES classes above C2 seen on-disk for both instruments, we found an empirical relationship between the soft X-ray (SXR) fluxes measured by both SAX and GOES. Due to the different energy response of the two SXR instruments, individual events can deviate on average by about a factor of 2 from the empirical relationship, implying that predictions of the GOES class of occulted flares from SAX data are therefore accurate to within the same factor. The distinctive GOES energy response in combination with the multithermal nature of flares makes it difficult for any instrument, even other soft X-ray spectrometers, to provide a GOES proxy more accurate than a factor of 2.