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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

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Science news and information about the Sun-Earth environment.

SPACE WEATHER
Current
Conditions

Solar Wind
speed: 374.0 km/s
density:
5.1 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2246 UT


X-ray Solar Flares

6-hr max:
B2 2005 UT Aug24
24-hr: B2 2005 UT Aug24
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2245 UT

Daily Sun: 24 Aug '06

Sunspot 905 has developed a beta-gamma magenetic field that harbors energy for M-class solar flares. Credit: SOHO/MDI


Sunspot Number: 22
What is the sunspot number?
Updated: 23 Aug 2006

Far Side of the Sun

This holographic image reveals no large sunspots on the far side of the sun. Image credit: SOHO/MDI

Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 5.4 nT
Bz:
1.1 nT south
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2247 UT

Coronal Holes:

A solar wind stream flowing from the indicated coronal hole should reach Earth on or about August 28th. Credit: NOAA GOES-13.


SPACE WEATHER
NOAA
Forecasts

Solar Flares: Probabilities for a medium-sized (M-class) or a major (X-class) solar flare during the next 24/48 hours are tabulated below.
Updated at 2006 Aug 24 2203 UTC
FLARE 0-24 hr 24-48 hr
CLASS M 05 % 05 %
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 2006 Aug 24 2203 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 20 % 20 %
MINOR 05 % 05 %
SEVERE 01 % 01 %

High latitudes
0-24 hr 24-48 hr
ACTIVE 30 % 35 %
MINOR 10 % 10 %
SEVERE 01 % 01 %

What's Up in Space -- 24 Aug 2006
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Did you miss the aurora surprise of August 7th? Next time get a wake-up call: Spaceweather PHONE.

METEOR MYSTERY: In 1967, NASA's Mariner 4 spacecraft was hit by a surprising flurry of meteoroids--a shower more intense than any Leonid meteor storm. Where did the meteoroids come from? It's been a mystery for 40 years. Now, astronomers may have found a solution. Get the full story from Science@NASA.

PLUTO DECLARED A DWARF PLANET: Today at the International Astronomical Union (IAU) General Assembly in Prague, astronomers decided that the Solar System has eight planets, and Pluto is not one of them. Instead, Pluto is a "dwarf planet."

To be a planet, the assembly ruled, a world must meet three criteria:

(1) It must have enough mass and gravity to gather itself into a ball.

(2) It must orbit the sun.

(3) It must reign supreme in its own orbit, having "cleared the neighborhood" of other competing bodies.

So, e.g., mighty Jupiter, which circles the sun supreme in its own orbit, is a planet--no adjective required. Pluto, on the other hand, shares the outer solar system with thousands of Pluto-like objects. Because it has not "cleared its own neighborhood," it is a dwarf planet.

This decision clarifies the vocabulary of planetary astronomy while simultaneously upturning 76 years of "Pluto is a planet" pop-culture. Will non-specialists heed Pluto's demotion? That remains to be seen. Meanwhile, according to the IAU, the Solar System has eight planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune; and three dwarf planets: Ceres, Pluto and 2003 UB313.

IAU Press Release

IMPACT MOON: In only 30 hours of observing, astronomers at the Marshall Space Flight Center have recently photographed seven explosions of light on the Moon. Each one, they believe, was caused by a meteoroid falling from the sky and hitting the ground. (continued below)


Above: Candidate meteoroid impact sites. [details]

The flashes seen by the Marshall group ranged in brightness from 7th to 9th magnitude, which means they were invisible to the human eye, but easy targets for backyard telescopes. Amateur astronomers are thus invited to join the hunt.

FAQ: The Moon has no oxygen to support fires or explosions. So what causes these flashes of light?

Answer: The source of the light is not combustion, which would require oxygen, but rather the simple heating of rocks and soil at the impact site. Even small meteoroids carry a lot of kinetic energy because they travel so fast, some in excess of 100,000 mph. When they hit the ground, all that kinetic energy gets converted into thermal energy. Rocks and soil are heated to such high temperatures that they glow--hence the flash of light.



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 24 Aug 2006 there were 801 known Potentially
Hazardous Asteroids

August 2006 Earth-asteroid encounters
ASTEROID

 DATE
(UT)

MISS DISTANCE

MAG.

 SIZE
2006 ON1

Aug 20

16.6 LD

18

230 m
Notes: LD is a "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.

Essential Web Links

NOAA Space Environment Center -- The official U.S. government bureau for real-time monitoring of solar and geophysical events, research in solar-terrestrial physics, and forecasting solar and geophysical disturbances.

Atmospheric Optics -- the first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena. See also Snow Crystals.

Solar and Heliospheric Observatory -- Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO. (European Mirror Site)

Daily Sunspot Summaries -- from the NOAA Space Environment Center.

Current Solar Images --a gallery of up-to-date solar pictures from the National Solar Data Analysis Center at the Goddard Space Flight Center. See also the GOES-12 Solar X-ray Imager.

Recent Solar Events -- a nice summary of current solar conditions from lmsal.com.

SOHO Farside Images of the Sun from SWAN and MDI.

The Latest SOHO Coronagraph Images -- from the Naval Research Lab

List of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids -- from the Harvard Minor Planet Center.

Observable Comets -- from the Harvard Minor Planet Center.

What is the Interplanetary Magnetic Field? -- A lucid answer from the University of Michigan. See also the Anatomy of Earth's Magnetosphere.

Real-time Solar Wind Data -- from NASA's ACE spacecraft. How powerful are solar wind gusts? Read this story from Science@NASA.

More Real-time Solar Wind Data -- from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory Proton Monitor.

Lists of Coronal Mass Ejections -- from 1998 to 2001

Mirages: Mirages in Finland; An Introduction to Mirages;

NOAA Solar Flare and Sunspot Data: 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999; 2000; 2001; 2002; 2003; 2004; 2005; Jan-Mar 2006;

Space Audio Streams: (University of Florida) 20 MHz radio emissions from Jupiter: #1, #2, #3, #4; (NASA/Marshall) INSPIRE: #1; (Stan Nelson of Roswell, New Mexico) meteor radar: #1, #2;

Recent International Astronomical Union Circulars

GLOSSARY | SPACE WEATHER TUTORIAL

This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips: email


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