Astronomers have said they have detected a powerful storm on a star other than our sun for the first time, discovering an explosion so violent it could have stripped away the atmosphere of any planets unlucky enough to be nearby. 

New research, published in the journal Nature has now revealed that an international team of researchers has finally achieved the feat. The discovery used data from a European network of telescopes called LOFAR. 

The team of astronomers has been using LOFAR since 2016 to detect the most extreme and violent events in the universe — such as black holes — which emit relatively stable radio signals over time. This field opens up perspectives on how the magnetic activity of stars influences the habitability of planets that surround them. However, the researchers have set up a data processing system that also records what is going on with the stars behind the behemoths they are chasing.

     They found that there was a huge explosion which only lasted a minute on May 16, 2016. It came from a red dwarf star called StKM 1-1262 more than 133 light years away. The team then determined it was a coronal mass ejection. "It's the first time we have detected one" on a star other than our own, Mr. Tasse said. But this coronal mass ejection was "at least 10,000 times more violent than known solar storms" on the sun, researcher added.  

"The first radio detection inaugurates a new era for space weather applied to other star systems," said Philippe Zarka, research director at the Paris Observatory and a study co-author. "This emerging field opens up major perspectives for how the magnetic activity of stars influences the habitability of the planets that surround them." Mr. Tasse said that it appears that red dwarf stars have "much more erratic and violent" behavior than the sun. "The implication is that these stars can be rather inhospitable when it comes to life and exoplanets," because they have storms so powerful they could destroy the atmospheres of planets nearby, he added.