| | Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica Credit: NOAA/Ovation Planetary K-index Now: Kp= 3 quiet 24-hr max: Kp= 5 storm explanation | more data Interplanetary Mag. Field Btotal: 4.0 nT Bz: -3.3 nT south more data: ACE, DSCOVR Updated: Today at 2349 UT Coronal Holes: 01 Jun 18 Earth is entering a stream of solar wind flowing from this broad coronal hole. Credit: SDO/AIA Noctilucent Clouds The season for northern noctilucent clouds is beginning now. Check here daily for the latest images from NASA's AIM spacecraft. Switch view: Europe, USA, Asia, Polar Updated at: 06-01-2018 22:55:03 SPACE WEATHER NOAA Forecasts | | Updated at: 2018 Jun 01 2300 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: 2018 Jun 01 2300 UTC Mid-latitudes | 0-24 hr | 24-48 hr | ACTIVE | 35 % | 30 % | MINOR | 25 % | 15 % | SEVERE | 10 % | 05 % | High latitudes | 0-24 hr | 24-48 hr | ACTIVE | 10 % | 10 % | MINOR | 25 % | 25 % | SEVERE | 60 % | 45 % | | | | | | | | | | | | All-inclusive Northern Lights trips in Tromsø, Norway. Small groups, big experiences! Highly qualified guides ensure unique and unforgettable adventures with a personal touch. Visit Explore the Arctic | | | GEOMAGNETIC STORMS: Minor G1-class geomagnetic storms are disturbing Earth's polar magnetic field today as a fast-moving stream of solar wind swirls around our planet. The gaseous material is flowing from an equatorial hole in the sun's atmosphere. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras, especially in the southern hemisphere where autumn darkness favors visibility. Free: Aurora Alerts. 'STEVE' SPOTTED IN CANADA: Last night as Earth was entering a stream of high-speed solar wind, hot currents of plasma began to flow through the upper atmosphere. When this happens, STEVE appears. Matthew Wheeler saw the purple ribbon of light from Robson Valley, British Columbia: "It was visible to the naked eye despite bright moonlight," says Wheeler, who, on darker nights, has taken some incredible videos of the STEVE phenomenon. This particular stream of solar wind has a knack for summoning STEVE. One solar rotation ago, in early May, the same stream lashed Earth's magnetic field. STEVE was then sighted not only in Canada (its usual habitat) but also in multiple US states. Bright moonlight this time is making the mysterious ribbon more difficult to see, and will probably reduce the number of sightings. Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery NOCTILUCENT CLOUDS SEEN FROM THE GROUND: Only a few days after NASA's AIM spacecraft began to see noctilucent clouds (NLCs) forming over Earth's northern hemisphere, people on the ground are beginning to see them, too. "They are back!" reports Ruslan Merzlyakov of Hjørring, Denmark. "I saw the NLCs during the early hours of May 31st." In this picture, they are silvery ripples beaming through the orange glow of sunrise: Early-season sightings of NLCs are always like this--faint and silvery, with a rippling structure that distinguishes them from ordinary clouds. They may not remain faint for long. Previous data from AIM have shown that NLCs are like a great "geophysical light bulb." They turn on every year in late spring, reaching almost full intensity over a period of 5 to 10 days. Soon the silvery ripples Merzlyakov spotted should intensify and spread, forming electric-blue waves that glow deep into the night. What are NLCs? You can think of them as frosted meteoroids. Noctilucent clouds form when summertime wisps of water vapor waft up to the top of Earth's atmosphere and crystallize around specks of meteor smoke. The resulting swarms of tiny ice crystals glow electric blue when struck by high altitude sunlight. Realtime NLC Photo Gallery A FATHER'S DAY GIFT FROM SPACE: Father's Day is this month. Are you thinking of buying Dad a tie? We have something even better. A space tie: To support their cosmic ray ballooning program, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus have flown a payload of psychedelic blue bow ties to the stratosphere, 29 km (91,000 feet) above Earth's surface. You can have one for $79.95. Each bow tie comes with a unique gift card showing the neckwear floating at the top of Earth's atmosphere. The interior of the card tells the story of the flight and confirms that this gift has been to the edge of space and back again. All proceeds support high-altitude balloon launches and student space weather research. Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store All proceeds support hands-on STEM education Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery 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 Jun. 1, 2018, the network reported 82 fireballs. (81 sporadics, 1) 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 June 1, 2018 there were 1912 potentially hazardous asteroids. | Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters: Asteroid | Date(UT) | Miss Distance | Velocity (km/s) | Diameter (m) | 2018 JK3 | 2018-May-27 | 19.7 LD | 21.8 | 166 | 2018 KR | 2018-May-28 | 15.7 LD | 4 | 19 | 68347 | 2018-May-29 | 9.5 LD | 13.3 | 389 | 2018 KN2 | 2018-May-29 | 6.1 LD | 8 | 28 | 2013 LE7 | 2018-May-31 | 17.8 LD | 1.7 | 12 | 2018 KE1 | 2018-Jun-01 | 10.8 LD | 16.2 | 33 | 2018 EJ4 | 2018-Jun-10 | 5.6 LD | 6.2 | 195 | 2015 DP155 | 2018-Jun-11 | 9 LD | 4.4 | 170 | 2018 KC3 | 2018-Jun-19 | 14.5 LD | 8.8 | 90 | 2017 YE5 | 2018-Jun-21 | 15.6 LD | 15.5 | 513 | 467309 | 2018-Jun-23 | 17.9 LD | 14 | 355 | 441987 | 2018-Jun-24 | 7.3 LD | 12.6 | 178 | 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 | Readers, thank you for your patience while we continue to develop this new section of Spaceweather.com. We've been working to streamline our data reduction, allowing us to post results from balloon flights much more rapidly, and we have developed a new data product, shown here: This plot displays radiation measurements not only in the stratosphere, but also at aviation altitudes. 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. These measurements are made by our usual cosmic ray payload as it passes through aviation altitudes en route to the stratosphere over California. What is this all about? 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 13% since 2015: 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. 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. The data points in the graph above correspond to the peak of the Reneger-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. | 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 | | 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 | | Reviews here can help you to pick up best memory foam mattresses. | | These links help Spaceweather.com stay online. Thank you to our supporters! | | | | | | | | | | | | ©2017 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved. This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips. | |