| | Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica Credit: NOAA/Ovation Planetary K-index Now: Kp= 2 quiet 24-hr max: Kp= 2 quiet explanation | more data Interplanetary Mag. Field Btotal: 8.0 nT Bz: 2.8 nT north more data: ACE, DSCOVR Updated: Today at 2349 UT Coronal Holes: 22 May 18 Solar wind flowing from the indicated coronal hole could brush against Earth's magnetic field on May 23rd. Credit: SDO/AIA Noctilucent Clouds Our connection with NASA's AIM spacecraft has been restored! New images from AIM show that the southern season for noctilucent clouds (NLCs) is underway. Come back to this spot every day to see AIM's "daily daisy," which reveals the dance of electric-blue NLCs around the Antarctic Circle.. Switch view: Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctic Peninsula, East Antarctica, Polar Updated at: 02-07-2018 17:55:05 SPACE WEATHER NOAA Forecasts | | Updated at: 2018 May 22 2200 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: 2018 May 22 2200 UTC Mid-latitudes | 0-24 hr | 24-48 hr | ACTIVE | 30 % | 30 % | MINOR | 10 % | 10 % | SEVERE | 01 % | 01 % | High latitudes | 0-24 hr | 24-48 hr | ACTIVE | 15 % | 15 % | MINOR | 30 % | 30 % | SEVERE | 40 % | 40 % | | | | | | | | | | | | All-inclusive Northern Lights trips in Tromsø, Norway. Small groups, big experiences! Highly qualified guides ensure unique and unforgettable adventures with a personal touch. Visit Explore the Arctic | | | CHANCE OF MINOR STORMS: NOAA forecasters say there is a 40% chance of minor geomagnetic storms on May 23rd when a stream of solar wind grazes Earth's magnetic field. The gaseous material is flowing from a northern hole in the sun's atmosphere. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras. Indeed, in Antarctica the light show has already begun. Free: Aurora Alerts. SOMETHING FLARE-Y THIS WAY COMES: Just behind the sun's eastern limb, a new sunspot has formed and it is crackling with solar flares. The sun's rotation is about to turn the active region toward Earth. In this image from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, we can already see the sunspot's plasma-filled magnetic canopy peeking over the edge: On May 22nd, the approaching sunspot produced a B8-class solar flare--almost C-class. Such relatively weak flares would never be mentioned during Solar Max, but any flare is remarkable during the current period of deepening Solar Minimum. In the next day or so, the underlying sunspot will be revealed, and we shall see if it has potential for even stronger explosions. Free: Solar Flare Alerts. RARE ANTI-SOLAR ARCS: Yesterday, May 21st, Pål Tengesdal boarded a plane at the Gardermoen Oslo Airport in Norway and took off. Minutes later he saw something strange out the window. "There was a bright luminous «X» in the clouds," he says. "I photographed it using my iPhone 7." "The phenomenon was visible for less than 2 minutes," says Tengesdal. "As we moved out of the clouds it faded away." Tengesdal witnessed a rare type of ice halo called "anti-solar region arcs." To see them, you have to stare directly away from the sun, looking down into icy clouds where subhorizon reflections from the faces of ice crystals create these strange arcs. Tengesdal's seat in the plane was, for 2 brief minutes, the perfect viewing location. "I was seated on the side of the plane diametrically opposite the sun," he explains. "This put the plane's shadow in the diamond-shaped center of the «X» (e.g., the anti-solar point). Clouds floated in a thin layer below the plane." Anti-solar region arcs are bright but elusive, requiring a passenger to be seated in just the right spot, looking in just the right direction, at precisely the right moment as the plane ascends above icy clouds. Rare, indeed. Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery BASEBALLS IN THE STRATOSPHERE: Father's day is less than a month away. To get ready, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus have been launching baseballs to the edge of space. These unique balls traveled to the stratosphere onboard cosmic ray balloons and returned to Earth ready to be given as far-out gifts to Dad: You can have one for $129.95. So far we have flown baseballs for the Dodgers, Red Sox, Giants, Angels, and Padres. If your home team is not on that list, let us know and we will fly it for you. Dad-satisfaction guaranteed. Each baseball comes with a greeting card showing the ball in flight and telling the story of its journey to the stratosphere. All sales support atmospheric cosmic ray monitoring and hands-on STEM education. Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store All proceeds support hands-on STEM education 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 May. 22, 2018, the network reported 8 fireballs. (8 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] 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 May 22, 2018 there were 1907 potentially hazardous asteroids. | Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters: Asteroid | Date(UT) | Miss Distance | Velocity (km/s) | Diameter (m) | 2018 JC | 2018-May-17 | 17.7 LD | 9.3 | 75 | 2018 GL1 | 2018-May-18 | 14.3 LD | 5.2 | 69 | 2018 KN | 2018-May-19 | 11 LD | 7.5 | 27 | 2018 JL2 | 2018-May-19 | 10.9 LD | 13.5 | 40 | 2018 KQ | 2018-May-19 | 8.7 LD | 7.7 | 11 | 2018 JG1 | 2018-May-20 | 5.3 LD | 8.3 | 45 | 2018 KK | 2018-May-21 | 12.1 LD | 9.1 | 32 | 2018 KF1 | 2018-May-21 | 2.2 LD | 8.6 | 26 | 2018 KS | 2018-May-22 | 2.1 LD | 7.7 | 9 | 2018 JK | 2018-May-22 | 16.3 LD | 12.5 | 81 | 2018 KW1 | 2018-May-23 | 0.4 LD | 7.3 | 4 | 2018 JG2 | 2018-May-25 | 18.4 LD | 6.9 | 61 | 2018 JK3 | 2018-May-27 | 19.7 LD | 21.8 | 170 | 2018 KR | 2018-May-28 | 15.7 LD | 4 | 18 | 68347 | 2018-May-29 | 9.5 LD | 13.3 | 389 | 2013 LE7 | 2018-May-31 | 17.8 LD | 1.7 | 12 | 2018 KE1 | 2018-Jun-01 | 10.8 LD | 16.2 | 32 | 2018 EJ4 | 2018-Jun-10 | 5.6 LD | 6.2 | 195 | 2015 DP155 | 2018-Jun-11 | 9 LD | 4.4 | 170 | 2017 YE5 | 2018-Jun-21 | 15.6 LD | 15.5 | 513 | 467309 | 2018-Jun-23 | 17.9 LD | 14 | 355 | 441987 | 2018-Jun-24 | 7.3 LD | 12.6 | 178 | 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. | The official U.S. government space weather bureau | | The first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena. | | Researchers call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO is the most advanced solar observatory ever. | | 3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory | | Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO. | | from the NOAA Space Environment Center | | fun to read, but should be taken with a grain of salt! Forecasts looking ahead more than a few days are often wrong. | | from the NOAA Space Environment Center | | the underlying science of space weather | | Reviews here can help you to pick up best memory foam mattresses. | | These links help Spaceweather.com stay online. Thank you to our supporters! | | | | | | | | | | | | ©2017 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved. This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips. | |