They came from outer space--and you can have one! Genuine meteorites are now on sale in the Space Weather Store. | | |
QUIET SUN: Considering the fact that 2012 is thought to be on the threshold of solar maximum, the sun is strangely quiet. None of the spots on the solar disk is actively flaring, continuing a weeks-long pattern of low activity. NOAA forecasters say the chance of an X-flare today is no more than 1%. Solar flare alerts: text, voice.
ENDEAVOUR HAS LANDED: Space shuttle Endeavour has landed for its last time. Hitchhiking atop a modified jumbo jet, the retired orbiter touched down at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) at 12:51 p.m. PDT, ending a cross-country ferry mission and returning to its place of birth, California.
En route to landing, photographer James W. Young caught the shuttle soaring over Palmdale, California:
"At 8:30 am, Endeavour was flying over Assembly Plant 42 where the orbiter was built," says Young. "What a sight!"
Tonight, Endeavour will be removed from the jumbo jet using an elaborate set of cranes and wind restraints. It will be placed on a special transportation system and moved into a United Airlines hangar, where it will remain for several weeks while final preparations for its transport and display at the California Science Center are completed.
Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery
AUTUMN LIGHTS: Northern autumn is only one day away--and that means it's aurora season. For reasons researchers don't fully understand, the days around equinoxes are the best times to see Northern Lights. Right on cue, the Arctic Circle is glowing. Tom Eklund sends this picture taken last night from Akaa, Finland:
"This was one nice auroral event--maybe the best display so far during this solar cycle!" says Eklund. "The vivid green belts with their pink lower edges were breaktaking."
The show's not over--not by a long shot. NOAA forecasters estimate a 30% to 35% chance of strong polar geomagnetic storms for the next three nights as a series of solar wind streams gently buffet Earth's magnetic field. Aurora alerts: text, voice.
Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery
DISAPPEARING ASTEROID: More than a week after amateur astronomers witnessed an explosion in the cloudtops of Jupiter more powerful than an atomic bomb, no debris has appeared at the blast site. "I took a picture of Jupiter on Sept. 15th using the same telescope that I used to observe the brilliant fireball flash above Jupiter's clouds on the morning of Sept. 10th," reports Dan Petersen of Racine, Wisconsin, the man who saw the explosion first. "This photo shows that five days after the explosion there was still no signature debris cloud near 'ground zero.'"
The absense of debris suggests that the source of the explosion, probably an asteroid, was small. Studies show that Jupiter is a frequent target for 10-meter class space rock, and this is almost certainly another example of Jupiter getting hit. The giant planet absorbed the explosion and swallowed the remains of the asteroid whole.
Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
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