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GLOBAL ERUPTION ROCKS THE SUN: A global eruption on the sun has shattered old ideas about solar activity. Researchers presented their surprising findings at a press conference yesterday at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco. Get the full story from Science@NASA.
GEMINID METEOR SHOWER: The Geminid meteor shower is peaking now. According to the International Meteor Organization, rates under ideally dark skies are topping 80 Geminids per hour. If it's dark where you live, go outside and look up. If not, try listening to the Geminids on Space Weather Radio.
Last night in the Hekla area of Iceland, the skies were anything but dark, but the Geminids made an appearance anyway:
"I went out for Geminids and got Northern Lights as a bonus," says photographer Borkur Hrolfsson.
more images: from David Harvey of Kitt Peak National Observatory, Arizona; from Guillaume Cannat of Mont Aigoual, France; from Greg Stablein of Memphis, TN; from Brian Klimowski of Flagstaff, AZ; from James Champagne of Madera Canyon, Arizona; from David Blanchard of Flagstaff, Arizona; from Sylvain Weiller of Saint Rémy lès Chevreuse, France; from James Beauchamp of Oklahoma City, OK; from Marsha Adams of Sedona, Arizona; from David Rosenkrantz of Usery Pass, Arizona; from Steve & Donna O'Meara of Mauna Loa, Hawaii; from Antonio Finazzi of Chiuduno (BG) Italy;
MAGNETIC ERUPTION : Earlier today around 1530 UT, a filament of magnetism lifted up from the surface of the sun and--snap!--erupted. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded the action:
Click to play a 3MB animation
The blast produced an hours-long C2-class solar flare and hurled a magnificent CME into space: SOHO movie. The expanding cloud is not heading directly toward Earth, but it might deliver a glancing blow to our planet's magnetic field two or three days hence. Stay tuned for a more refined analysis later today.
November 2010 Aurora Gallery
[previous Novembers: 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001, 2000]
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 December 14, 2010 there were 1167 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 |