You are viewing the page for Apr. 9, 2015
  Select another date:
<<back forward>>
SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids Internet Shopping Sites high quality binoculars excellent weather stations all-metal reflector telescopes rotatable microscopes
 
Solar wind
speed: 384.9 km/sec
density: 12.3 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2348 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: C6
1901 UT Apr09
24-hr: C6
1901 UT Apr09
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2300 UT
Daily Sun: 09 Apr 15
Sunspot AR2320 has developed an unstable 'delta-class' magnetic field that harbors energy for M-class solar flares. Credit: SDO/HMI

Sunspot number: 40
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 09 Apr 2015

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
2015 total: 0 days (0%)

2014 total: 1 day (<1%)
2013 total: 0 days (0%)
2012 total: 0 days (0%)
2011 total: 2 days (<1%)
2010 total: 51 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)

Updated 09 Apr 2015


The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 106 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 09 Apr 2015

Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/Ovation
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 2 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 3
quiet
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 3.8 nT
Bz: 0.3 nT south
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 0005 UT
Coronal Holes: 09 Apr 15

There are no large coronal holes on the Earthside of the sun. Credit: SDO/AIA.
Noctilucent Clouds The southern season for NLCs has come to an end. The last clouds were observed by NASA's AIM spacecraft on Feb. 20, 2015. Now attention shifts to the northern hemisphere, where the first clouds of 2015 should appear in mid-May.
Switch view: Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctic Penninsula, East Antarctica, Polar
Updated at: 02-28-2015 02:55:03
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2015 Apr 09 2200 UTC
FLARE
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
CLASS M
15 %
15 %
CLASS X
01 %
01 %
Geomagnetic Storms:
Probabilities for significant disturbances in Earth's magnetic field are given for three activity levels: active, minor storm, severe storm
Updated at: 2015 Apr 09 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
35 %
15 %
MINOR
20 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
10 %
20 %
MINOR
25 %
25 %
SEVERE
50 %
20 %
 
Thursday, Apr. 9, 2015
What's up in space
 

Learn to photograph Northern Lights like a pro. Sign up for Peter Rosen's Aurora Photo Courses in Abisko National Park.

 
Lapland tours

INCOMING CME, POSSIBLE IMPACT TODAY: A faint CME hurled directly toward Earth by sunspot AR2320 is expected to hit our planet's magnetic field on April 9th. NOAA forecasters estimate a 60% chance of minor G1-class geomagnetic storms when the CME arrives. Aurora alerts: text, voice

A MIXTURE OF DISSIMILAR THINGS: Venus and the Pleiades are converging for a close encounter in the sunset sky. This weekend, the planet and the star cluster will cross paths only 2o apart. Jean-Baptiste Feldmann of Nuits-Saint-Georges, France, photographed the Seven Sisters +1 on April 7th, just three days before closest approach:

Consider it a mixture of dissimilar things. The Pleiades are elusive. They're best seen out of the corner of your eye, a pretty little surprise that pops out of the night sky when you're staring elsewhere. Venus is just the opposite. Dazzling, bright enough to cast faint shadows on a moonless night, it beams down from the heavens and grabs you when you're not even looking.

For the next few nights, look west after sunset. Venus pops out of the twilight long before nightfall. As the sky fades to black, you can see the Pleiades, too. The nights of closest approach are Friday, April 10th, and Saturday, April 11th. Bright Venus makes for a stunning contrast against the pinpoint beauty of the star cluster. Observing tip: For maximum contrast, use binoculars.

Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery

SUN AND MOON HALO: Ice crystals in high clouds have a beautiful effect on sunlight. Sunbeams that strike the crystals are bent into luminous rings called ice halos. Moonbeams are affected the same way. Exactly the same way. Göran Strand proved it with this composite image of the sun and Moon over Östersund, Sweden, on April 1st:

"During the day I took a photo of the 22° solar halo," says Strand. "And later that night, 10 hours later, when the Moon was in the same position in the sky, I took another shot from the same location, showing a 22° Moon halo. Merging the two photos shows the halos are a perfect match."

22º radius halos are visible all over the world and throughout the year. The ice crystals that create them float 5 km to 10 km above the ground. Those altitudes are always freezing even during the warmest months of summer. Look for halos, night and day, whenever the sky is wisped with cold cirrus clouds.

Realtime Eclipse Photo Gallery


Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery


Realtime Comet Photo Gallery


  All Sky Fireball Network

Every night, a network of NASA all-sky cameras scans the skies above the United States for meteoritic fireballs. Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented here on Spaceweather.com.

On Apr. 9, 2015, the network reported 9 fireballs.
(9 sporadics)

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue). [Larger image] [movies]

  Near Earth Asteroids
Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are space rocks larger than approximately 100m that can come closer to Earth than 0.05 AU. None of the known PHAs is on a collision course with our planet, although astronomers are finding new ones all the time.
On April 9, 2015 there were potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Size
2015 FN33
Apr 6
9.8 LD
26 m
2063 Bacchus
Apr 7
76 LD
1.6 km
2005 KA
Apr 12
13 LD
50 m
5381 Sekhmet
May 17
62.8 LD
2.1 km
2005 XL80
Jun 4
38.1 LD
1.0 km
2012 XB112
Jun 11
10.1 LD
2 m
Notes: LD means "Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256 AU. MAG is the visual magnitude of the asteroid on the date of closest approach.
  Essential web links
NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center
  The official U.S. government space weather bureau
Atmospheric Optics
  The first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena.
Solar Dynamics Observatory
  Researchers call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO is the most advanced solar observatory ever.
STEREO
  3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory
Solar and Heliospheric Observatory
  Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO.
Daily Sunspot Summaries
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather
Space Weather Alerts
   
  more links...
©2010 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved. This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips.
©2019 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved.