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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
 
Solar wind
speed: 364.5 km/sec
density: 13.1 protons/cm3
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2345 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: A2
1752 UT Jul24
24-hr: B1
1732 UT Jul24
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2350 UT
Daily Sun: 24 Jul 20
Quiet sunspot AR2767 is a member of new Solar Cycle 25. Credit: SDO/HMI

Sunspot number: 11
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 24 Jul 2020

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
2020 total: 153 days (74%)
2019 total: 281 days (77%)
2018 total: 221 days (61%)
2017 total: 104 days (28%)
2016 total: 32 days (9%)
2015 total: 0 days (0%)
2014 total: 1 day (<1%)
2013 total: 0 days (0%)
2012 total: 0 days (0%)
2011 total: 2 days (<1%)
2010 total: 51 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)
2008 total: 268 days (73%)
2007 total: 152 days (42%)
2006 total: 70 days (19%)

Updated 24 Jul 2020


Thermosphere Climate Index
today: 2.48
x1010 W Cold
Max: 49.4
x1010 W Hot (10/1957)
Min: 2.05
x1010 W Cold (02/2009)
explanation | more data: gfx, txt
Updated 24 Jul 2020

The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 70 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 24 Jul 2020

Cosmic Rays Solar minimum is underway. The sun's magnetic field is weak, allowing extra cosmic rays into the solar system. Neutron counts from the University of Oulu's Sodankyla Geophysical Observatory show that cosmic rays reaching Earth in 2020 are near a Space Age peak.

Oulu Neutron Counts

Percentages of the Space Age average:
today: +10.2% Very High
48-hr change: +0.5%
Max: +11.7% Very High
(12/2009)
Min: -32.1% Very Low (06/1991)
explanation | more data
Updated 24 Jul 2020 @ 1600 UT

Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/Ovation
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 2 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 3
quiet
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 9.0 nT
Bz: -7.6 nT south
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2345 UT
Coronal Holes: 24 Jul 20

Solar wind flowing from this equatorial coronal hole could reach Earth on July 24-25.
Credit: SDO/AIA

Noctilucent Clouds NLC season is underway. NASA's AIM spacecraft detected a blue cloud over the north pole on May 17th--one of the earliest starts in the spacecraft's14 year history. Check here for daily images from AIM.
Switch view: Europe, USA, Asia, Polar
Updated at:
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2020 Jul 24 2200 UTC
FLARE
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
CLASS M
01 %
01 %
CLASS X
01 %
01 %
Geomagnetic Storms:
Probabilities for significant disturbances in Earth's magnetic field are given for three activity levels: active, minor storm, severe storm
Updated at: 2020 Jul 24 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
35 %
15 %
MINOR
15 %
05 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
10 %
15 %
MINOR
25 %
25 %
SEVERE
50 %
20 %
 
Friday, Jul. 24, 2020
What's up in space
       
 

Safe aurora tours: Thinking of a visit to Norway? Marianne's Heaven on Earth Aurora Tours has a 7-seater minivan for families who don't require social distancing. See the Northern Lights or take a scenic day tour. Book here

 

GEOMAGNETIC UNREST IS HAPPENING: Earth's polar magnetic field is quivering on July 24th as our planet enters an unsettled stream of solar wind. The stream *might* contain the remains of a slow-moving CME that left the sun on July 19th--or the CME might arrive later. Either way, high-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras and STEVE. Aurora alerts: SMS Text.

SOLAR CYCLE 25 SUNSPOT: Sunspot AR2767 is turning to face Earth. Earlier today, Martin Wise of Trenton, Florida, photographed the active region in high resolution:

"I captured AR2767 with a resolution of 0.2 arcseconds per pixel," says Wise. His image shows the sunspot's primary dark core (itself about the size of Earth), surrounded by a sea of boiling granules.

Sunspot AR2797 is a member of new Solar Cycle 25. We know because its magnetic polarity is reversed compared to sunspots from old Solar Cycle 24. See Hale's Law for more information. So far AR2767 is quiet and seems to pose little threat for strong flares. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text.

Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

CLOSE ENCOUNTER WITH COMET NEOWISE: Yesterday, July 23rd, Comet NEOWISE (C/2020 F3) made its closest approach to Earth--only 0.63 AU (103 million km) away. Harlan Thomas of Alberta, Canada, photographed the encounter through a sea of green airglow:

"I drove 240 miles from my home in Calgary to find clear skies for this special night," says Thomas. "The comet was visible to the naked eye, barely, so I started taking pictures. That's when the airglow appeared. It was so thick, it started to overwhelm the comet!"

Airglow looks like the aurora borealis, but it is not. The luminous haze is created by a complex assortment of chemical reactions in the upper atmosphere. These reactions get started during daylight hours when the atmosphere is bathed in strong UV radiation from the sun. At night we see the afterglow, colored green by oxygen atoms 90-100 km high and red by hydroxyl ions 86-87 km high. Thomas's photo captured both.

After today, Comet NEOWISE will recede from Earth, starting its long journey back to the outer reaches of the Solar System. The comet won't vanish right away. It'll remain a borderline naked-eye object for another week or so and an easy target for digital cameras well into August. Sky maps: July 22, 23, 24.

Realtime Comet NEOWISE Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

A GIFT FOR STAR WARS FANS: A good bounty hunter will go just about anywhere. On Jun 13, 2020, the Mandalorian hitched a ride to the stratosphere onboard an Earth to Sky Calculus cosmic ray balloon. Here he is, floating 113,189 feet above the Sierra Nevada mountains of central California:

You can have him for $114.95. The students of Earth to Sky are selling Mandalorian bobbleheads to raise money for their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each figurine comes with a greeting card showing the bounty hunter in flight and telling the story of his journey to the edge of space and back again. They make great gifts for Star Wars fans.

Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All sales support hands-on STEM education


Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

  All Sky Fireball Network
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 July 24, 2020, the network reported 11 fireballs.
(10 sporadics, 1 alpha Capricornid)

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]

  Near Earth Asteroids
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 July 24, 2020 there were 2037 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Velocity (km/s)
Diameter (m)
2016 DY30
2020-Jul-19
9 LD
15.1
3
2020 OD
2020-Jul-19
8.6 LD
6.2
60
2020 OM
2020-Jul-19
8.3 LD
9.5
15
2020 ME3
2020-Jul-19
14.8 LD
4.6
24
2020 OB
2020-Jul-20
18.8 LD
26.5
66
2020 OL1
2020-Jul-20
7.8 LD
8
36
2020 OF
2020-Jul-20
8.7 LD
31.6
65
2002 BF25
2020-Jul-21
9.4 LD
6.8
129
2020 NO
2020-Jul-22
2 LD
7.6
17
2020 OG1
2020-Jul-23
10.4 LD
11.5
41
2020 OH3
2020-Jul-23
5.1 LD
17.7
42
2020 ON
2020-Jul-23
13.6 LD
17.4
64
2020 ND
2020-Jul-24
14.5 LD
13.6
178
2020 NN
2020-Jul-25
16.3 LD
10.1
43
2020 OO1
2020-Jul-27
1.7 LD
7.3
18
2020 NZ
2020-Jul-28
8.2 LD
7.8
29
2020 OE2
2020-Jul-28
4.5 LD
2.9
13
2020 MX3
2020-Jul-29
9.4 LD
8.5
65
2018 PY7
2020-Jul-31
8.9 LD
9.5
16
2007 RF1
2020-Jul-31
10.7 LD
5
21
2020 OC1
2020-Jul-31
9.6 LD
4
17
2020 OO2
2020-Aug-01
14.9 LD
7.8
29
2018 BD
2020-Aug-03
7.6 LD
9.4
3
2020 OG3
2020-Aug-04
7.1 LD
6
17
2009 PQ1
2020-Aug-05
10.8 LD
13.5
112
2020 FA1
2020-Aug-23
18.4 LD
1.9
20
2016 AH164
2020-Aug-26
15.7 LD
5.6
4
2011 ES4
2020-Sep-01
0.3 LD
8.2
30
465824
2020-Sep-06
19.4 LD
14
162
2012 RM15
2020-Sep-12
14.9 LD
9.8
45
2017 US
2020-Sep-13
17.3 LD
5.9
21
2014 QJ33
2020-Sep-18
11.5 LD
8.3
65
2017 SL16
2020-Sep-20
8.9 LD
6.4
25
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.
  Cosmic Rays in the Atmosphere

SOMETHING NEW! We have developed a new predictive model of aviation radiation. It's called E-RAD--short for Empirical RADiation model. We are constantly flying radiation sensors onboard airplanes over the US and and around the world, so far collecting more than 22,000 gps-tagged radiation measurements. Using this unique dataset, we can predict the dosage on any flight over the USA with an error no worse than 15%.

E-RAD lets us do something new: Every day we monitor approximately 1400 flights criss-crossing the 10 busiest routes in the continental USA. Typically, this includes more than 80,000 passengers per day. E-RAD calculates the radiation exposure for every single flight.

The Hot Flights Table is a daily summary of these calculations. It shows the 5 charter flights with the highest dose rates; the 5 commercial flights with the highest dose rates; 5 commercial flights with near-average dose rates; and the 5 commercial flights with the lowest dose rates. Passengers typically experience dose rates that are 20 to 70 times higher than natural radiation at sea level.

To measure radiation on airplanes, we use the same sensors we fly to the stratosphere onboard Earth to Sky Calculus cosmic ray balloons: neutron bubble chambers and X-ray/gamma-ray Geiger tubes sensitive to energies between 10 keV and 20 MeV. These energies span the range of medical X-ray machines and airport security scanners.

Column definitions: (1) The flight number; (2) The maximum dose rate during the flight, expressed in units of natural radiation at sea level; (3) The maximum altitude of the plane in feet above sea level; (4) Departure city; (5) Arrival city; (6) Duration of the flight.

SPACE WEATHER BALLOON DATA: Approximately 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 radiation sensors that detect cosmic rays, a surprisingly "down to Earth" form of space weather. Cosmic rays can seed clouds, trigger lightning, and penetrate commercial airplanes. Furthermore, there are studies ( #1, #2, #3, #4) linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death in the general population. Our latest measurements show that cosmic rays are intensifying, with an increase of more than 18% since 2015:

The data points in the graph above 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 Reneger and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.

En route to the stratosphere, our sensors also pass through aviation altitudes:

In this plot, dose rates are expessed as multiples of sea level. For instance, we see that boarding a plane that flies at 25,000 feet exposes passengers to dose rates ~10x higher than sea level. At 40,000 feet, the multiplier is closer to 50x.

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.

Why are cosmic rays intensifying? The main reason is the sun. Solar storm clouds such as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) sweep aside cosmic rays when they pass by Earth. During Solar Maximum, CMEs are abundant and cosmic rays are held at bay. Now, however, the solar cycle is swinging toward Solar Minimum, allowing cosmic rays to return. Another reason could be the weakening of Earth's magnetic field, which helps protect us from deep-space radiation.

  Essential web links
NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center
  The official U.S. government space weather bureau
Atmospheric Optics
  The first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena.
Solar Dynamics Observatory
  Researchers call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO is the most advanced solar observatory ever.
STEREO
  3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory
Solar and Heliospheric Observatory
  Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO.
Daily Sunspot Summaries
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
NOAA 27-Day Space Weather Forecasts
  fun to read, but should be taken with a grain of salt! Forecasts looking ahead more than a few days are often wrong.
Aurora 30 min forecast
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather

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