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MASSPIKE FIREBALL:
Last night a meteoroid of unknown size hit
Earth's atmosphere over New England. Its bright, blue-green disintegration
startled motorists driving along the Massachusetts Turnpike and
surrounding areas: eye-witness
accounts.
SOLAR ECLIPSE:
Oh to be in Borneo! On Monday, Jan. 26th, inhabitants of that heavily
forested island will witness the sunset of a lifetime. Just as the
sun descends into the waves of the Indian Ocean, the Moon will pass
in front of the sun--dead center--covering 93% of the solar disk.
The ensemble will form a stunning "ring of fire," something
like this:
A Pacific annular eclipse in Jan. 1992. Photo credit:
Dennis Mammana
Similar sunset rings will appear over the nearby islands
of Java and Sumatra: map.
Astronomers call such an event an "annular eclipse."
Elsewhere, the Moon will pass off-center producing
crescent suns of varying depth over south Africa, Madagascar, Australia,
southern parts of India and southeast Asia. Sky watchers in those
places should attend to the ground: crescent sunbeams will dapple
the earth beneath leafy trees and garden latticework. Stay tuned
for photos! Related links:
EXPLORE THE SUNSPOT
CYCLE: Were you born under an active sun
or a quiet sun? To find out, enter your birth date in the sunspot
plotter:
The red curve traces monthly-averaged sunspot numbers tabulated
by the Solar Influences Data Center in Belgium. Data points go all
the way back to 1755, so you can investigate the relationship between
solar activity and many historical events: Do stocks
crash during solar minimum? Did NASA send astronauts to the Moon
during Solar Max? How do sunspots affect the length of mini-skirts?
If you find any interesting coincidences, be sure to tell
the webmaster.
Permanent Link: Sunspot
Plotter
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