SATELLITE
FLYBYS APP: Turn your iPhone or iPod into
a field-tested satellite tracker! Spaceweather.com presents
the Satellite Flybys
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LIFTOFF! Space
shuttle Endeavour left Earth this morning at 4:14 am EST,
beginning a 13-day mission to the ISS. A bone-rattling roar
was heard for miles around as the shuttle lifted off Pad 39A
in the final night launch of NASA's shuttle program. With
only four shuttle missions left after this one, Endeavour
delivered a beautiful parting shot. Launch photos:
#1,
#2,
#3,
#4,
#5,
#6,
#7,
#8.
RADIO-ACTIVE SUNSPOT:
Behemoth sunspot 1045 is crackling with M-class
solar flares--and that's not all. "There have been many
loud shortwave radio bursts over the past two days,"
reports amateur radio astronomer Thomas Ashcraft of New Mexico.
"Some of the bursts have completely saturated my receivers."
Just
listen to the sounds coming from the loudspeakers in his
observatory. (continued below)
Image credit: Alan Friedman of Buffalo, New
York [details]
The roaring sounds you just heard were mainly
Type
III radio bursts, caused by beams of electrons streaming
through the sun's outer atmosphere. Sunspot 1045 appears poised
to explosively accelerate more electrons in the days ahead
as the flare-show continues. Ham radio operators, point your
Yagis
toward the sun!
more images: from
Mike Borman of Evansville, Indiana; from
Rogerio Marcon of Campinas Brasil; from
Pete Lawrence of Selsey, West Sussex, UK; from
Stefano Sello of Pisa, Italy; from
James Kevin Ty of Manila, Philippines; from
John Stetson of Portland, Maine; from
Steve Riegel of Sanata Maria, CA; from
Jo Dahlmans of Ulestraten, The Netherlands;
NORTHERN LIGHTS: "As
the solar wind swept over our planet tonight (Feb. 7th), the
silent winter landscape with its heavy snow-clad trees made
me feel that our place in the solar system must be among the
most beautiful," says Fredrik Broms of Kvaløya, Norway.
He used a Nikon
D3 to record the otherworldly scene:
Photo details:
Nikon D3, Nikkor 20mm f72.8, 800 ISO, 10-15 sec
Arctic sky watchers should be
alert for more auroras in the nights ahead. Sunspot 1045
hurled a CME toward Earth on Feb. 7th and it is due to arrive
(along with an unrelated solar wind stream) on Feb. 9th to
10th. NOAA forecasters estimate a 30% chance of high-latitude
geomagnetic actvity.
February
Northern Lights Gallery
[previous Februarys: 2009,
2008, 2007,
2006, 2004,
2003, 2002]
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