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IS LIGHTNING A FORM OF SPACE WEATHER? A new study published in today's edition of the Environmental Research Letters finds that lightning rates over Europe are modulated by the solar wind. The results contradict some previous studies, and the physical mechanism linking lightning and solar wind is uncertain. Nevertheless, the research appears credible and worthy of follow-up with global studies beyond Europe. Read the full report. Solar wind alerts: text, voice
JAPANESE SPYSAT TRANSITS 花 MOON: Last night, May 14th, a Japanese spy satellite passed over Brazil. Leonardo Caldas of Brasilia saw it backlit by the full Moon. Click to view the split-second transit:
"Looking at Calsky, I noticed a possible transit of a satellite called IGS 7A," says Caldas. "I set my Canon SX50 HS digital camera to film at the predicted time--and there it was!" The dark silhouette of the satellite zipped across the Moon in only 0.48 seconds.
"IGS 7A is a Japanese reconnaissance satellite, launched from Tanegashima on Dec. 12, 2011," explains Caldas. "It is a member of Japan's Information Gathering Satellite (IGS) system whose primary mission is to provide early warning of impending hostile launches."
UPDATE: Some readers wonder if Caldas caught a spysat or something else such as a bat or bird. Longtime satellite photographer Thierry Legault says "I am doubtful that this is the IGS 7A. It's a question of size. The object is too large to be IGS or any other satellite except the ISS. On some images, the larger dimension spans about 9 pixels. Compared to the size of the Moon, this represents 24 arc seconds. Converted to linear dimension at the supposed distance of IGS (480 km), this represents 57 meters, more than five times larger than the actual satellite. Also, the size and shape of the object changes in successive images. This is typical of a bird or a bat. Although Calsky calculates the transit elements as if the orbital data were perfectly known, it also mentions 'orbit source: amateur observers.' Data collected by amateurs are good enough to predict a passage in the night sky, but not accurate enough (by far!) to calculate the place where a transit will be visible."
Spysat or Batsat? Whatever it is, something crossed the Moon. Good catch on the part of Leonardo Caldas.
Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery
PINK PLANET AT SUNSET: The Pink Planet is back. After an absence of more than 3 months, Mercury is emerging from the glare of the sun and making itself visible again in the evening sky. Giuseppe Petricca sends this picture taken last night in the Peligna Valley of central Italy,
"We had a wonderful sunset with beautiful twilight colors," says Petricca. "In the middle of my photographic session I remembered that Mercury would be visible, and indeed it was. It was the only bright dot shining through the twilight."
Mercury is mostly gray, not pink, but many observers perceive it as pink because of the surrounding rosy glow of sunset. Look west at sunset. What color do you see?
The view will improve in the evenings ahead. Mercury is heading for its best apparition of 2014 on May 25th when it willl be a full 23 degrees from the sun. Keep an eye on the sunset--and Mercury; it's a nice way to end the day.
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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. 13, 2014, the network reported 7 fireballs.
(5 sporadics, 1 eta Lyrid, 1 eta Aquariid)
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 15, 2014 there were potentially hazardous asteroids.
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. | 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 |
| the underlying science of space weather |