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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: 471.2 km/s
density:
5.0 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2246 UT

X-ray Solar Flares

6-hr max:
A4 1740 UT Mar29
24-hr: B1 0540 UT Mar29
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2245 UT

Daily Sun: 29 Mar '05

Sunspot 745 poses no threat for strong solar flares. Credit: SOHO/MDI


Sunspot Number: 15
What is the sunspot number?
Updated: 28 Mar 2005

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: 5.3 nT
Bz:
1.8 nT north
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2247 UT

Coronal Holes:

A solar wind stream flowing from this coronal hole could reach Earth on or about April 4th. Image credit: NOAA's Solar X-ray Imager.


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 2005 Mar 28 2213 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 2005 Mar 28 2213 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 15 % 15 %
MINOR 05 % 05 %
SEVERE 01 % 01 %

High latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 20 % 20 %
MINOR 05 % 05 %
SEVERE 01 % 01 %

What's Up in Space -- 29 Mar 2005
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QUIET SUN: The sun is almost blank today. Solar activity should remain low with no solar flares and no auroras.

SPRING SUNRISE: Days are getting warmer. The sun is rising earlier. Birds are singing in the morning. It must be spring! On March 25th, Gary Palmer of Los Angeles snapped this picture at "sunrise with a big bird showing a little bird how to fly (detail)."

The sky around the sun is black. Why? Palmer took the picture using an "H-alpha" filter tuned to the red glow of solar hydrogen. There's none of that in Earth's atmosphere. H-alpha filters produce lovely images of the sun; this one shows dark filaments snaking across the sun's surface and flame-like prominences shooting over the limb.

INSIDE A RAINBOW: Photographer Brian Whittaker of Birmingham, UK, was mystified on March 24th looking at "about brightest rainbow that I had ever seen," he says. The inside of the rainbow was bright, the outside much darker. "I had to invert a section to prove to myself that it wasn't an optical illusion."

Atmospheric optics expert Les Cowley explains the mystery:

"Rainbows are disks of light rather than narrow rings. Millions of raindrops in the sky opposite the sun form rainbows by reflecting sunbeams back to us through a whole range of angles. Each disk brightens sharply towards its edge and is centered on the same point directly opposite the sun. The red disk is largest and violet the smallest. We see rainbow colors where the disk-edges do not quite overlap. Inside the disks, all colors overlap to form white light, which makes the sky inside the rainbow bright. "



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 are on a collision course with our planet, although astronomers are finding new ones all the time.

On 29 Mar 2005 there were 681 known Potentially
Hazardous Asteroids

Mar.-Apr. 2005 Earth-asteroid encounters
ASTEROID

 DATE (UT)

 MISS DISTANCE

 MAG.
2005 FN

Mar. 18

0.4 LD

 14
2005 FA

Mar. 19

2.3 LD

 17
2005 ER70

Mar. 19

9.2 LD

 19
2005 EU2

Apr. 5

6.2 LD

 18
2005 EE169

Apr. 6

5.9 LD

 18
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

The Sun from Earth -- daily images of our star 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.

Aurora Forecast --from the University of Alaska's Geophysical Institute

Daily Solar Flare and Sunspot Data -- from the NOAA Space Environment Center.

Lists of Coronal Mass Ejections -- from 1998 to 2001

What is an Iridium flare? See also Photographing Satellites by Brian Webb.

Vandenberg AFB missile launch schedule.

What is an Astronomical Unit, or AU?

Mirages: Mirages in Finland; An Introduction to Mirages;

NOAA Solar Flare and Sunspot Data: 1999; 2000; 2001; 2002; 2003; Jan-Mar., 2004;

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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