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FARSIDE SUNSPOTS SEEN FROM MARS: NASA's Mars Perseverence rover looks at the sun once a day to check the air for dust. Today's image reveals two sunspots on the farside of the sun. Because the rover's sun photos are low resolution, only large dark sunspots are detectable. These big farside spots will turn toward Earth late next week. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text
THE SUN'S MAGNETIC POLES ARE DISAPPEARING: The sun is about to lose something important: Its magnetic poles.
Recent measurements by NASA's Solar Dynamic Observatory reveal a rapid weakening of magnetic fields in the polar regions of the sun. North and south magnetic poles are on the verge of disappearing. This will lead to a complete reversal of the sun's global magnetic field perhaps before the end of the year.
An artist's concept of the sun's dipolar magnetic field. Credit: NSF/AURA/NSO.
If this were happening on Earth, there were be widespread alarm. Past reversals of our planet's magnetic field have been linked to calamities ranging from sudden climate change to the extinction of Neanderthals. On the sun, it's not so bad.
"In fact, it's routine," says Todd Hoeksema, a solar physicist at Stanford University. "This happens every 11 years (more or less) when we're on the verge of Solar Maximum."
Vanishing poles and magnetic reversals have been observed around Solar Max in every single solar cycle since astronomers learned to measure magnetic fields on the sun. Hoeksema is the director of Stanford's Wilcox Solar Observatory (WSO), that is observing its fifth reversal since 1980.
The last five polar field reversals observed at the Wilcox Solar Observatory (inset)
"One thing we have learned from these decades of data is that no two polar field reversals are alike," he says.
Sometimes the transition is swift, taking only a few months for the poles to vanish and reappear on opposite ends of the sun. Sometimes it takes years, leaving the sun without magnetic poles for an extended period of time.
"Even more strange," says Hoeksema, "sometimes one pole switches before the other, leaving both poles with the same polarity for a while."
Indeed, such a scenario could be playing out now. The sun's south magnetic pole has almost completely vanished, but the north magnetic pole is still hanging on, albeit barely.
How does all this effect us on Earth? One way we feel solar field reversals is via the heliospheric current sheet:
An artist's concept of the heliospheric current sheet.
The sun is surrounded by a wavy ring of electricity that the solar wind pulls and stretches all the way out to the edge of the Solar System. This structure is a part of the sun's magnetosphere. During field reversals, the current sheet becomes extra wavy and highly tilted. As the sun spins, we dip in and out of the steepening undulations. Passages from one side to another can cause geomagnetic storms and auroras.
Most of all, the vanishing of the poles means we're on the verge of Solar Maximum. Solar Cycle 25 is shaping up to be stronger than forecasters expected, and its peak could be relatively intense. Stay tuned for updates!
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IRIDESCENT BLACK PEARL PENDANT: It came from Tahiti--and now it's been to the edge of space. On Aug. 29, 2023, this genuine Black Tahitian South Sea Cultured Pearl flew to the stratosphere onboard an Earth to Sky Calculus cosmic ray balloon, soaring 119,010 feet above the Sierra Nevada mountains of central California:
You can have it for $199.95. The 9 mm pearl has a lovely iridescent sheen that hints at a South Sea rainbow when held in sunlight. Its surface is so smooth, it reflected a tiny image of the Sierra from an altitude of 119,101 feet!
The students of Earth to Sky are selling space pendants to support their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each one comes with a greeting card showing the pendant in flight and telling the story of its trip to the stratosphere and back again.
Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All sales support hands-on STEM education
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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 Oct 06, 2023, the network reported 12 fireballs.
(12 sporadics)
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 October 6, 2023 there were 2349 potentially hazardous asteroids.
 |
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters: | Asteroid | Date(UT) | Miss Distance | Velocity (km/s) | Diameter (m) |
| 2023 SY2 | 2023-Oct-01 | 9.1 LD | 9.9 | 21 |
| 2023 TJ | 2023-Oct-01 | 4.7 LD | 23.2 | 33 |
| 2023 TS | 2023-Oct-02 | 2.3 LD | 17.7 | 13 |
| 2023 TB | 2023-Oct-02 | 2.6 LD | 13.3 | 16 |
| 2023 TH | 2023-Oct-03 | 3.9 LD | 8 | 14 |
| 349507 | 2023-Oct-03 | 16.5 LD | 21 | 696 |
| 2023 TY | 2023-Oct-03 | 0.5 LD | 13.1 | 5 |
| 2022 FX1 | 2023-Oct-04 | 20 LD | 9.9 | 25 |
| 2023 TC | 2023-Oct-04 | 2.2 LD | 7.4 | 18 |
| 2023 SN6 | 2023-Oct-04 | 12.6 LD | 8.5 | 27 |
| 2019 QO5 | 2023-Oct-05 | 19.9 LD | 9.4 | 61 |
| 2023 RF10 | 2023-Oct-05 | 15.8 LD | 5.8 | 27 |
| 2023 QC8 | 2023-Oct-05 | 15.8 LD | 6.3 | 39 |
| 2023 TD | 2023-Oct-05 | 2.4 LD | 8 | 14 |
| 2023 TU | 2023-Oct-06 | 6.1 LD | 8.2 | 9 |
| 2023 TG | 2023-Oct-06 | 1.8 LD | 7.2 | 8 |
| 2023 TQ | 2023-Oct-06 | 5.9 LD | 13.2 | 26 |
| 2022 TD | 2023-Oct-07 | 8.9 LD | 9.4 | 10 |
| 2023 RR29 | 2023-Oct-07 | 9.2 LD | 8.1 | 37 |
| 2023 TB1 | 2023-Oct-07 | 0.7 LD | 9.4 | 5 |
| 2023 TK | 2023-Oct-07 | 5.8 LD | 4.9 | 14 |
| 2023 TX | 2023-Oct-07 | 1.5 LD | 7 | 4 |
| 2023 SA1 | 2023-Oct-08 | 17.9 LD | 5.9 | 26 |
| 2023 TA1 | 2023-Oct-08 | 9.3 LD | 8.4 | 18 |
| 2018 ER1 | 2023-Oct-08 | 12.5 LD | 5.3 | 27 |
| 2023 TL | 2023-Oct-09 | 8.3 LD | 13.9 | 44 |
| 2023 TW | 2023-Oct-09 | 2.1 LD | 7.7 | 13 |
| 2023 TR | 2023-Oct-09 | 4.1 LD | 7.4 | 22 |
| 2023 TO | 2023-Oct-10 | 3.8 LD | 10.7 | 20 |
| 2023 TE | 2023-Oct-11 | 4.3 LD | 5.6 | 15 |
| 2022 UX1 | 2023-Oct-11 | 3.1 LD | 8.6 | 9 |
| 2023 RD11 | 2023-Oct-11 | 12.8 LD | 9.5 | 40 |
| 2015 KW120 | 2023-Oct-12 | 18.2 LD | 13 | 22 |
| 2023 TC1 | 2023-Oct-13 | 10.5 LD | 8.1 | 14 |
| 2021 NT14 | 2023-Oct-13 | 18.6 LD | 8.6 | 254 |
| 2011 GA | 2023-Oct-15 | 6.8 LD | 16.6 | 230 |
| 2007 SQ6 | 2023-Oct-15 | 19.4 LD | 6.5 | 130 |
| 2019 UZ3 | 2023-Oct-16 | 9.6 LD | 8.3 | 14 |
| 1998 HH49 | 2023-Oct-17 | 3.1 LD | 14.8 | 193 |
| 2022 UO10 | 2023-Oct-19 | 7.8 LD | 9.8 | 16 |
| 2020 UR | 2023-Oct-20 | 5.8 LD | 12.9 | 9 |
| 2020 FM6 | 2023-Oct-23 | 15.5 LD | 15.9 | 149 |
| 2019 HH4 | 2023-Oct-24 | 13.3 LD | 20 | 365 |
| 2023 RA4 | 2023-Oct-24 | 8.4 LD | 3.9 | 46 |
| 2021 SZ4 | 2023-Oct-26 | 14 LD | 30 | 287 |
| 302169 | 2023-Oct-26 | 12.7 LD | 25.7 | 374 |
| 525229 | 2023-Oct-30 | 10.6 LD | 17.4 | 200 |
| 2013 UV3 | 2023-Nov-01 | 14.7 LD | 15.4 | 16 |
| 2016 WY | 2023-Nov-02 | 9.1 LD | 3.9 | 5 |
| 363505 | 2023-Nov-02 | 13.7 LD | 8 | 709 |
| 2022 JF | 2023-Nov-03 | 15.2 LD | 17.2 | 39 |
| 2023 QP8 | 2023-Nov-03 | 17.1 LD | 8.8 | 174 |
| 2016 VW2 | 2023-Nov-03 | 10.1 LD | 8.1 | 20 |
| 2019 UH7 | 2023-Nov-04 | 9.9 LD | 5.9 | 11 |
| 2014 BA3 | 2023-Nov-13 | 15.7 LD | 2.7 | 8 |
| 2021 TN3 | 2023-Nov-15 | 17 LD | 6.3 | 31 |
| 2019 VL5 | 2023-Nov-16 | 8.5 LD | 8.2 | 24 |
| 2019 LB1 | 2023-Nov-18 | 15.8 LD | 4.2 | 14 |
| 2016 DK1 | 2023-Nov-19 | 5.3 LD | 6.8 | 11 |
| 2022 VR1 | 2023-Nov-19 | 8.1 LD | 6.1 | 39 |
| 2019 UT6 | 2023-Nov-24 | 9 LD | 13.2 | 141 |
| 2019 CZ2 | 2023-Nov-25 | 2.8 LD | 5.8 | 43 |
| 2013 UB3 | 2023-Nov-27 | 18.5 LD | 5.4 | 25 |
| 1998 WB2 | 2023-Dec-03 | 11 LD | 14.2 | 151 |
| 2013 VX4 | 2023-Dec-04 | 5.1 LD | 6.6 | 59 |
Notes: LD means "Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256 AU. | | Cosmic Rays in the Atmosphere |
SPACE WEATHER BALLOON DATA: Almost once a week, Spaceweather.com and the students of Earth to Sky Calculus fly space weather balloons to the stratosphere over California. These balloons are equipped with sensors that detect secondary cosmic rays, a form of radiation from space that can penetrate all the way down to Earth's surface. Our monitoring program has been underway without interruption for 7 years, resulting in a unique dataset of in situ atmospheric measurements.
Latest results (July 2022): Atmospheric radiation is decreasing in 2022. Our latest measurements in July 2022 registered a 6-year low:
What's going on? Ironically, the radiation drop is caused by increasing solar activity. Solar Cycle 25 has roared to life faster than forecasters expected. The sun's strengthening and increasingly tangled magnetic field repels cosmic rays from deep space. In addition, solar coronal mass ejections (CMEs) sweep aside cosmic rays, causing sharp reductions called "Forbush Decreases." The two effects blend together to bring daily radiation levels down.
.Who cares? Cosmic rays are a surprisingly "down to Earth" form of space weather. They can alter the chemistry of the atmosphere, trigger lightning, and penetrate commercial airplanes. According to a study from the Harvard T.H. Chan school of public health, crews of aircraft have higher rates of cancer than the general population. The researchers listed cosmic rays, irregular sleep habits, and chemical contaminants as leading risk factors. A number of controversial studies (#1, #2, #3, #4) go even further, linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death.
Technical notes: The radiation sensors onboard our helium balloons detect X-rays and gamma-rays in the energy range 10 keV to 20 MeV. These energies span the range of medical X-ray machines and airport security scanners.
Data points in the graph labeled "Stratospheric Radiation" correspond to the peak of the Regener-Pfotzer maximum, which lies about 67,000 feet above central California. When cosmic rays crash into Earth's atmosphere, they produce a spray of secondary particles that is most intense at the entrance to the stratosphere. Physicists Eric Regener and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.
| | 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. |
| | information about sunspots based on the latest NOAA/USAF Active Region Summary |
| | current counts of failed and deployed Starlink satellites from Jonathan's Space Page |
| | Authoritative predictions of space junk and satellite re-entries |
| | from the NOAA Space Environment Center |
| | fun to read, but should be taken with a grain of salt! Forecasts looking ahead more than a few days are often wrong. |
| | from the NOAA Space Environment Center |
| | the underlying science of space weather |
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