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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

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Science news and information about the Sun-Earth environment.

SPACE WEATHER
Current
Conditions

Solar Wind
speed: 663.3 km/s
density:
2.3 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2245 UT


X-ray Solar Flares

6-hr max:
A2 1940 UT Feb21
24-hr: A2 1940 UT Feb21
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2245 UT

Daily Sun: 21 Feb '06

The sun remains blank--no sunspots. Credit: SOHO/MDI


Sunspot Number: 0
What is the sunspot number?
Updated: 20 Feb 2006

Far Side of the Sun

This holographic image reveals no large sunspots on the far side of the sun. Image credit: SOHO/MDI

Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 4.5 nT
Bz:
2.9 nT south
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2246 UT

Coronal Holes:

Earth is inside a solar wind stream flowing from the indicated coronal hole. Image credit: SOHO Extreme UV Telescope.


SPACE WEATHER
NOAA
Forecasts

Solar Flares: Probabilities for a medium-sized (M-class) or a major (X-class) solar flare during the next 24/48 hours are tabulated below.
Updated at 2006 Feb 21 2203 UTC
FLARE 0-24 hr 24-48 hr
CLASS M 01 % 01 %
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 2006 Feb 21 2203 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 25 % 20 %
MINOR 10 % 10 %
SEVERE 05 % 05 %

High latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 35 % 30 %
MINOR 20 % 15 %
SEVERE 10 % 05 %

What's Up in Space -- 21 Feb 2006
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AURORA SURPRISE: Just when you thought there was no reason to look at the sky...

A solar wind gust hit Earth's magnetic field yesterday, sparking a mild geomagnetic storm. Beautiful auroras shimmered across far-North America. "I grabbed my camera and watched the best light show I have ever seen," says Mark Casadei of North Pole, Alaska:

The auroras have subsided, but Earth remains inside a high-speed solar wind stream. Another good gust could trigger more Northern Lights: gallery.

BIG CORONAL HOLE: What is a coronal hole? It is a gap in the sun's atmosphere, a place where solar wind escapes and spews out among the planets. Yesterday's auroras were caused by a gust coming from a small coronal hole straddling the sun's equator.

There's another, much larger, coronal hole on the sun today. It's the dark region surrounding the south pole in this ultraviolet image from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory:

If a small coronal hole can spark such bright auroras, imagine what a monster coronal hole like the one pictured above could do. Keep dreaming! The hole is at the sun's south pole, so the solar wind stream emerging from it misses Earth entirely. Equatorial coronal holes are the only ones that affect our planet.



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 21 Feb 2006 there were 772 known Potentially
Hazardous Asteroids

Feb. 2006 Earth-asteroid encounters
ASTEROID

 DATE
(UT)

MISS DISTANCE

MAG.

 SIZE
(meters)
2006 BM55

Feb. 5

8.4 LD

17

~110 m
2006 BX39

Feb. 10

8.2 LD

16

~225 m
Notes: LD is a "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 Environment Center -- The official U.S. government bureau for real-time monitoring of solar and geophysical events, research in solar-terrestrial physics, and forecasting solar and geophysical disturbances.

Atmospheric Optics -- the first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena. See also Snow Crystals.

Solar and Heliospheric Observatory -- Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO. (European Mirror Site)

Daily Sunspot Summaries -- from the NOAA Space Environment Center.

Current Solar Images --a gallery of up-to-date solar pictures from the National Solar Data Analysis Center at the Goddard Space Flight Center. See also the GOES-12 Solar X-ray Imager.

Recent Solar Events -- a nice summary of current solar conditions from lmsal.com.

SOHO Farside Images of the Sun from SWAN and MDI.

The Latest SOHO Coronagraph Images -- from the Naval Research Lab

Daily images from the sun -- from the Big Bear Solar Observatory

List of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids -- from the Harvard Minor Planet Center.

Observable Comets -- from the Harvard Minor Planet Center.

What is the Interplanetary Magnetic Field? -- A lucid answer from the University of Michigan. See also the Anatomy of Earth's Magnetosphere.

Real-time Solar Wind Data -- from NASA's ACE spacecraft. How powerful are solar wind gusts? Read this story from Science@NASA.

More Real-time Solar Wind Data -- from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory Proton Monitor.

Lists of Coronal Mass Ejections -- from 1998 to 2001

Mirages: Mirages in Finland; An Introduction to Mirages;

NOAA Solar Flare and Sunspot Data: 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999; 2000; 2001; 2002; 2003; 2004; 2005; Jan-Mar 2006;

Space Audio Streams: (University of Florida) 20 MHz radio emissions from Jupiter: #1, #2, #3, #4; (NASA/Marshall) INSPIRE: #1; (Stan Nelson of Roswell, New Mexico) meteor radar: #1, #2;

Recent International Astronomical Union Circulars

GLOSSARY | SPACE WEATHER TUTORIAL

This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips: email

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