https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/5997ea/solar-flares-interfered-with-radio-networks-ability-to-warn-people-about-hurricane-irma

A series of massive explosions on the Sun caused a radio network designed to warn people of hurricanes in remote regions, including the Caribbean, to go on the fritz during the time period when it would have been issuing information about Hurricane Irma, both the manager of the network and a NOAA representative confirmed to Motherboard.

Solar flares like the ones reported this week are known to interfere with high frequency radio signals. "When that solar flare happens, it's like static frying," Bobby Graves, Net Manager for Hurricane Watch Net (HWN), told me over the phone. This group of licensed amateur radio operators, based across North and central America and the Caribbean, works with the National Hurricane Center to disseminate information about storms. When a solar flare happens, "it's like they just turned the radio off," Graves, who lives in Brandon, Mississippi, told me.