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GEOMAGNETIC STORM IN PROGRESS: A G1-class geomagnetic storm is underway on Oct. 11th as Earth moves deeper into a stream of fast-moving solar wind. "The sun's light has barely left the sky and we are already seeing powerful auroras dance above Abisko National Park in Sweden," reports Chad Blakley of Lights over Lapland. "Our live webcam is broadcasting the show." Free: Aurora Alerts
SOLAR WIND SPARKS AURORAS ... MORE TO COME: The solar wind causing today's display of polar auroras is coming from a hole in the sun's atmosphere. First contact with the gaseous material during the early hours of Oct. 11th caused a bright display of auroras that wowed air travelers flying near the Arctic Circle. Marc Swanson took this picture from the window seat of a commercial air flight from Denver to Reykavik:
"The display first became visible near the Canadian border and continued, with some pauses, all the way to landing in Iceland," says Swanson. "So cool!"
NOAA forecasters say there is a 70% chance of additional G1-storms during the next 24 hours, as Earth moves deeper into the stream of solar wind. Arctic sky watchers should remain alert for auroras. Free: Aurora Alerts
Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery
THESE CRYSTALS HAVE TOUCHED SPACE: On Aug. 21st during the Great American Solar Eclipse, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched 11 space weather balloons from the path of totality and filmed the shadow of the Moon from the stratosphere. As a fundraiser, some of the balloons carried jewelry--like this:
During the 2.5 hour flight, this rose quartz crystal eclipse pendant was wrapped in the Moon's shadow for more than two minutes, experiencing a spooky darkness colder than -50 C.
You can have one for $149.95. Each crystal pendant comes with a unique gift card showing the jewelry passing through the Moon's shadow and floating at the top of Earth's atmosphere. The interior of the card tells the story of the flight and confirms that this gift has been to the edge of space and back again.
Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All proceeds support hands-on STEM education
ASTEROID TO BUZZ EARTH TONIGHT: House-sized asteroid 2012 TC4 is approaching Earth today for a close encounter only 1/8th the distance to the Moon. At closest approach, the space rock will skim just outside Earth's zone of geosynchronous communications satellites and be visible in telescopes as small as 8-inches (observing tips). Alberto Quijano Vodniza, of Pasto, Colombia, made this movie of the faint asteroid moving among the stars on Oct. 11th:
There's no chance of a collision. "We know the orbit of 2012 TC4 well enough to be absolutely certain that it won't hit Earth," says Paul Chodas, manager of the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies at JPL,"but we haven't established its exact path just yet."
To get a better handle on the asteroid's orbit (and possible future encounters), an international network of telescopes will monitor 2012 TC4 as it goes by. Pinging the asteroid with its Goldstone radar, NASA hopes to learn much about the space rock's physical properties. The space agency will even exercise some aspects of its planetary defense systems.
Asteroids of this size are numerous in the solar system, and Earth is a frequent target. The last time an asteroid akin to 2012 TC4 hit Earth was barely more than 4 years ago. On Feb. 15, 2013, a previously undiscovered asteroid ripped through the atmosphere over Chelyabinsk, Russia. Shock waves knocked onlookers off their feet and shattered windows in hundreds of buildings. Years later, meteorite hunters are still finding pieces of the "Chelyabinsk asteroid" that rained down after its 17m-wide body disintegrated in the atmosphere.
Tracking house-sized asteroids is important, and tonight astronomers will have a front row seat as one passes by. Got a picture of 2012 TC4? Submit it here!
Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery
Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery
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 Oct. 11, 2017, the network reported 36 fireballs.
(35 sporadics, 1 Southern Taurid)
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]
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 October 11, 2017 there were 1843 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Note to readers: A software bug that froze our daily asteroid count in recent months has been found and corrected. The scary numbers are increasing again!
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Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters: Asteroid | Date(UT) | Miss Distance | Velocity (km/s) | Diameter (m) |
2017 TH1 | 2017-Oct-06 | 16.9 LD | 8.9 | 33 |
2017 TA | 2017-Oct-06 | 2.7 LD | 11.3 | 39 |
2017 SN21 | 2017-Oct-10 | 9 LD | 7.6 | 22 |
2017 SB20 | 2017-Oct-11 | 9 LD | 7.1 | 38 |
2017 RV1 | 2017-Oct-12 | 17.8 LD | 10.9 | 347 |
2012 TC4 | 2017-Oct-12 | 0.1 LD | 7.6 | 16 |
2017 TT1 | 2017-Oct-13 | 2.5 LD | 10.7 | 15 |
2017 TU1 | 2017-Oct-13 | 5.2 LD | 10.4 | 20 |
2005 TE49 | 2017-Oct-13 | 8.5 LD | 11.2 | 16 |
2017 TV1 | 2017-Oct-14 | 5.6 LD | 10.4 | 19 |
2013 UM9 | 2017-Oct-15 | 17 LD | 7.8 | 39 |
2006 TU7 | 2017-Oct-18 | 18.7 LD | 13.3 | 148 |
2017 SY20 | 2017-Oct-20 | 18.9 LD | 7.2 | 52 |
2017 SH14 | 2017-Oct-20 | 15.3 LD | 6.8 | 43 |
171576 | 2017-Oct-22 | 5.8 LD | 21.2 | 677 |
2003 UV11 | 2017-Oct-31 | 15 LD | 24.5 | 447 |
444584 | 2017-Nov-17 | 8.7 LD | 14.8 | 324 |
2008 WM61 | 2017-Dec-03 | 3.8 LD | 4.7 | 16 |
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. | Cosmic Rays in the Atmosphere |
Readers, thank you for your patience while we continue to develop this new section of Spaceweather.com. We've been working to streamline our data reduction, allowing us to post results from balloon flights much more rapidly, and we have developed a new data product, shown here:
This plot displays radiation measurements not only in the stratosphere, but also at aviation altitudes. Dose rates are expessed as multiples of sea level. For instance, we see that boarding a plane that flies at 25,000 feet exposes passengers to dose rates ~10x higher than sea level. At 40,000 feet, the multiplier is closer to 50x. These measurements are made by our usual cosmic ray payload as it passes through aviation altitudes en route to the stratosphere over California.
What is this all about? Approximately once a week, Spaceweather.com and the students of Earth to Sky Calculus fly space weather balloons to the stratosphere over California. These balloons are equipped with radiation sensors that detect cosmic rays, a surprisingly "down to Earth" form of space weather. Cosmic rays can seed clouds, trigger lightning, and penetrate commercial airplanes. Furthermore, there are studies ( #1, #2, #3, #4) linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death in the general population. Our latest measurements show that cosmic rays are intensifying, with an increase of more than 13% since 2015:
Why are cosmic rays intensifying? The main reason is the sun. Solar storm clouds such as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) sweep aside cosmic rays when they pass by Earth. During Solar Maximum, CMEs are abundant and cosmic rays are held at bay. Now, however, the solar cycle is swinging toward Solar Minimum, allowing cosmic rays to return. Another reason could be the weakening of Earth's magnetic field, which helps protect us from deep-space radiation.
The radiation sensors onboard our helium balloons detect X-rays and gamma-rays in the energy range 10 keV to 20 MeV. These energies span the range of medical X-ray machines and airport security scanners.
The data points in the graph above correspond to the peak of the Reneger-Pfotzer maximum, which lies about 67,000 feet above central California. When cosmic rays crash into Earth's atmosphere, they produce a spray of secondary particles that is most intense at the entrance to the stratosphere. Physicists Eric Reneger and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.
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