Metallic photos of the sun by renowned photographer Greg Piepol bring together the best of art and science. Buy one or a whole set. They make a stellar gift. |
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SUBSIDING
STORM: Last night, Nov. 13/14,
Northern Lights spilled across the Canadian border
into the United States during a moderately strong
(Kp=6) geomagnetic storm. Spotters report naked-eye
auroras over Minnesota,
Michigan,
the
Dakotas, Wisconsin,
Vermont,
Connecticut
and, just barely, Colorado
and Kansas.
The storm, which is subsiding
now, flared up as Earth passed through the wake
of a CME that swept past our planet on Nov. 13th.
Aurora alerts:
text,
voice.
Satellite
data show that some of the intense auroral bands
were located over Northern Europe. Photographer
Ole C. Salomonsen sends this picture from Tromsø,
Norway:
"Tonight was a spectacular night,"
says Salomonsen. "This for sure was the strongest
auroras so far this season. The magnetograms at
the University of Tromsø went bananas! Tromsø is
a city of about 70,000, so it has a lot of light
pollution; even so, the auroras were clearly visible
standing in the middle of the city. It was just
sick!"
"Once a year the Arctic cathedral
in Tromsø is lit in blue to put focus on diabetes.
This was the first night it was lit blue this year,
and man was I lucky to get one of the strongest
outbreaks I have ever seen just above it. This was
just a mindblowing visual and astronomical experience.
I came home with almost 500GB of photos."
More auroras could be in tthe offing.
NOAA forecasters estimate a 25% chance of strong
geomagnetic storms during the next 24 hours.
Aurora
alerts: text,
voice.
Realtime
Aurora Photo Gallery
SOLAR
ECLIPSE FOR BREAKFAST: What do
you do when the Moon covers the sun just after sunrise?
Have a solar eclipse for breakfast! Janne Pyykkö
sends these pictures of people "eating"
yesterday's sunrise total eclipse over Queensland,
Australia:
Credits: from top-left to bottom-right
are Saul Lehtonen (model Johanna Hoffrén), Johanna
Hoffrén (model Saul Lehtonen), Ville Nikula (model
Mikael Holappa), Anna Snellman (model Otto Snellman).
"Our Finnish team of 45 eclipse
chasers watched the total solar eclipse from the
dry desert 150 km north-west of Cairns, Australia,"
explains Pyykkö. "I organized a project to
catch photos where people are eating the total solar
eclipse; there was no strict guidance about the
choice of camera or overall arrangements. Quite
a few of us took the challenge. Here
is a behind-the-scenes shot that describes the idea."
Browse the photo gallery for more
images:
Realtime
Eclipse Photo Gallery
Realtime
Space Weather Photo Gallery
Realtime
Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
[previous years: 2003,
2004,
2005,
2006,
2007,
2008,
2009,
2011]
