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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
 
Solar wind
speed: 457.9 km/sec
density: 1.1 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2340 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: C1
1942 UT Nov11
24-hr: C4
0724 UT Nov11
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2300 UT
Daily Sun: 11 Nov 10
New sunspot 1123 is crackling with C-class solar flares. Credit: SDO/HMI. 2-day movie: 9 MB mpg
Sunspot number: 55
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 10 Nov 2010

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
2010 total: 45 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)
Since 2004: 813 days
Typical Solar Min: 486 days

Updated 10 Nov 2010


The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 86 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 10 Nov 2010

Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/POES
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 2 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 4
unsettled
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 6.8 nT
Bz: 5.2 nT south
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2346 UT
Coronal Holes: 11 Nov 10
There are no large coronal holes on the Earth-facing side of the sun. Credit: SDO/AIA.
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2010 Nov 11 2200 UTC
FLARE
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
CLASS M
25 %
25 %
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: 2010 Nov 11 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
15 %
10 %
MINOR
01 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
20 %
15 %
MINOR
01 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
 
Thursday, Nov. 11, 2010
What's up in space
 

ON SALE NOW: The David H. Levy Comet Hunter -- offering the clearest views of Comet Hartley 2.

 

SPACE STATION RADAR ECHO: Tonight, Nov. 11th, the International Space Station (ISS) will fly through the US Air Force's Space Surveillance Radar beam over Texas. The echo will be broadcast live on Space Weather Radio. Tune in at 8:12 pm CST (02:12 UT on Nov. 12th) and listen for at least a full minute. Because the ISS is traveling at 17,000 mph, the echo sounds Doppler-shifted like the whistle of a moving train: recent example.

JUPITER'S MISSING STRIPE, RETURNING? Earlier this year when Jupiter's great South Equatorial Belt (SEB) vanished, researchers urged amateur astronomers to be alert for its eventual return. The SEB had come and gone before, they noted, and the revival was something to behold. Alert: It might be happening now. After months of quiet in Jupiter's south equatorial zone, a white plume is surging through the cloudtops where the SEB should be. Christopher Go of the Philippines took this picture on Nov. 9th:

It might not look like much, but this is how a revival of the SEB begins--a small disturbance in the upper atmosphere heralds a much larger profusion of spots and swirls bursting forth around the whole circumference of the giant planet. Amid the confusion, Jupiter's vast brown stripe emerges.

Subsequent observations by astronomers in the United States, Japan, and the Philippines not only confirm the plume, but also show it brightening rapidly. Indeed, as Nov. 11th unfolds, it is the single brightest spot on Jupiter in wavebands ranging from infrared to ultraviolet.

"This plume is so energetic that we can confidently expect it to develop into the SEB Revival," says John Rogers, director of the Jupiter section of the British Astronomical Association. "The SEB Revival is usually spectacular, so we can expect impressive and rapidly changing disturbances over the next 3 months."

Experienced planetary photographers are encouraged to monitor developments. If events proceed apace, the Revival could become visible to novices using small backyard telescopes, so stay tuned.

CRACKLING SUNSPOTS: Sunspot complex 1121-1123 crackling with C-class solar flares, producing more than five such eruptions in the past 24 hours. With so much activity going on, it is easy to catch the region in mid-flare, as Michael Buxton did this morning from his backyard observatory in Ocean Beach, California:

"I set up my scope and right away saw that AR1121 had unleashed a C-class flare," says Buxton. "This image shows the flare in hydrogen alpha light (the red glow of solar hydrogen) at 1754 UT just after it peaked in xray output."

Readers with solar telescopes are encouraged to monitor developments.

more images: from S. Carland and J. Stetson of South Portland, Maine


October 2010 Aurora Gallery
[previous Octobers: 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001]

  Near Earth Asteroids
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 November 11, 2010 there were 1164potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Mag.
Size
2010 TQ19
Oct 8
9.6 LD
18
37 m
2010 TS19
Oct 10
3.7 LD
18
31 m
2010 TD54
Oct 12
0.1 LD
14
7 m
2010 TB54
Oct 13
6.1 LD
20
19 m
1999 VO6
Oct 14
34.3 LD
16
1.8 km
2010 TK
Oct 16
4.5 LD
18
37 m
1998 TU3
Oct 17
69.1 LD
13
5.2 km
2010 TG19
Oct 22
1.1 LD
15
70 m
1998 MQ
Oct 23
77.7 LD
15
1.9 km
2007 RU17
Oct 29
39.2 LD
15
1.1 km
2003 UV11
Oct 30
5 LD
12
595 m
3838 Epona
Nov 7
76.8 LD
14
3.4 km
2005 QY151
Nov 16
77.7 LD
17
1.3 km
2008 KT
Nov 23
5.6 LD
21
10 m
2002 EZ16
Nov 30
73.9 LD
16
1.0 km
2000 JH5
Dec 7
47 LD
-
1.5 km
2010 JL33
Dec 9
16.6 LD
13
1.3 km
2008 EA32
Jan 7
76.5 LD
-
2.1 km
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.
  Essential web links
NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center
  The official U.S. government space weather bureau
Atmospheric Optics
  The first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena.
Solar Dynamics Observatory
  Researchers call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO is the most advanced solar observatory ever.
STEREO
  3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory
Solar and Heliospheric Observatory
  Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO.
Daily Sunspot Summaries
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather
Science Central
   
  more links...
 
 
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