You are viewing the page for Feb. 10, 2017
  Select another date:
<<back forward>>
SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
 
Solar wind
speed: 443.1 km/sec
density: 4.7 protons/cm3
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 0001 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: B1
1858 UT Feb10
24-hr: B1
1858 UT Feb10
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2300 UT
Daily Sun: 10 Feb 17
The rapid growth of AR2635 has stalled, and it is no longer crackling with minor solar flares. Credit: SDO/HMI

Sunspot number: 15
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 10 Feb 2017

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
2017 total: 11 days (26%)
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%)

Updated 10 Feb 2017


The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 73 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 10 Feb 2017

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: 4.7 nT
Bz: -1.6 nT south
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 0001 UT
Coronal Holes: 10 Feb 17

A stream of solar wind flowing from the indicated coronal hole will probably sail northof Earth this weekend, having little effect on our planet's magnetic field. Credit: NASA/SDO.
Noctilucent Clouds The southern season for noctilucent clouds began on Nov. 17, 2016. Come back to this spot every day to see the "daily daisy" from NASA's AIM spacecraft, which is monitoring the dance of electric-blue around the Antarctic Circle.
Switch view: Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctic Peninsula, East Antarctica, Polar
Updated at: 02-10-2017 16:55:03
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2017 Feb 10 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: 2017 Feb 10 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
05 %
05 %
MINOR
01 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
15 %
15 %
MINOR
15 %
15 %
SEVERE
05 %
05 %
 
Friday, Feb. 10, 2017
What's up in space
       
 

Marianne's Arctic Xpress supports World Cancer Day by donating 50% of the price paid on all bookings Feb. 3-5 to cancer research. Arctic clothing and semi-pro cameras included. Groups of 2 to 8 welcome. Book Now

 

WEEKEND COMET FLYBY: This weekend, Comet 45P/Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova will fly by Earth only 7.4 million miles away--the 8th-closest comet flyby of the Space Age. The small comet is invisible to the naked eye, but its emerald-green atmosphere can be seen in small telescopes. Monitor the photo gallery for sightings. Sky maps: Feb. 10, 11, 12.

HOW WILL TONIGHT'S LUNAR ECLIPSE LOOK? There's a lunar eclipse tonight, Feb. 10th, when the Moon spends almost 4 hours skimming through the shadow of Earth. If you've seen a lunar eclipse before, you might be expecting the Moon to turn red--the color of our planet's inner shadow. But no. The eclipsed Moon will look more like this:

Matt Wastell of Brisbane, Australia, took this picture during a similar lunar eclipse in April 2005.  Earth's shadow darkens the upper left quadrant of the Moon, producing a gradient of luminosity across the lunar disk.  Overall, the Moon remains silvery gray.

Tonight's eclipse is "penumbral."  In other words, the Moon will pass through the pale outskirts of our planet's shadow (the penumbra) rather than directly through its red core (the umbra). Graphic artist Larry Koehn has created an excellent animation of the event.

The best time to look is Friday night around 07:44 p.m. Eastern Time (00:44 UT Saturday).  That's the time of maximum coverage when Earth's shadow creates a clear gradient of light and shadow across the lunar disk. Check out this global visibility map to see if you are in the eclipse zone:


According to folklore, a full Moon in February is called the "Snow Moon."  For northerners, it often feels like the brightest Moon of the year as moonlight glistens off the white landscape. For a while on Friday night, the Snow Moon won't seem quite so bright.

Realtime Lunar Eclipse Photo Gallery

FUNNEL CLOUD: Note to photographers: When you see a funnel cloud reaching down out of a stormy sky, the correct response is usually Run! Brazilian photographer Helio C. Vital made a different choice. Click! He snapped this picture on Feb. 7th from Rio de Janeiro:

"The cloud appeared about a half hour before sunset," says Vital. "It was part of a thunderstorm cell that was approaching, announcing the arrival of a new weather system that would bring rain to the city several hours later."

Meteorologists call this type of cloud a "tuba" -- a swirling mass of moist air that can hang down from an active thunderstorm.  A tuba that touches the ground gets a new name: tornado.  "Fortunately, in spite of its threatening appearance, this tuba did not reach the ground and no damage was reported," says Vital.

Click! was the correct choice after all.

Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery

Realtime Comet Photo Gallery


Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery


  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 Feb. 10, 2017, the network reported 13 fireballs.
(13 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]

  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 February 10, 2017 there were 1773 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Size
2017 BM93
Feb 8
3.4 LD
21 m
2017 BM3
Feb 8
12.5 LD
108 m
2017 BP30
Feb 9
14.7 LD
25 m
2014 DV110
Feb 10
9.8 LD
45 m
2015 QR3
Feb 12
13.1 LD
31 m
2017 BK32
Feb 12
10.6 LD
26 m
2017 BW
Feb 17
4.6 LD
88 m
2013 WT67
Feb 17
44.2 LD
1.1 km
2017 BY93
Feb 23
2.4 LD
102 m
1992 FE
Feb 24
13.1 LD
275 m
2017 CP1
Feb 24
3.6 LD
52 m
1998 QK56
Feb 24
53 LD
1.2 km
2017 BM123
Feb 27
12.5 LD
81 m
2012 DR32
Mar 2
2.7 LD
52 m
1998 SL36
Mar 16
8.3 LD
390 m
2015 TC25
Mar 26
7.6 LD
6 m
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 12% 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.

  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
IQ Option trading: Find the best binary options brokers and signals from binaryoptionrobotinfo.com
  a proud supporter of science education and Spaceweather.com
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather
Houston SEO Expert
Hunting Optics Guide
   
RGE founder and Chairman Sukanto Tanoto
   
Guide for best car parts at prettymotors.com
   
ilovememorycards.com -- a blog about memory cards
   
Chicago SEO Expert
   
Buy real active Instagram followers
  sponsored link
Only the best social media jobs in the United States
  sponsored link
Search Kelowna Real Estate Listings & Homes for Sale easily.
   
SEO Hosting and SEO Hero!
   
Du kan læse mere om ægget stol på 122design.com
   
Get a discount when buying products online from awesomecoupons.org
   
Beautyz for top beauty products reviews and their buying guides
   
Need protection from UV radiation? Check out roofing In Grand Rapids MI
   
You can find where to buy botox online at DoctorMedica.
   
Spaceweather.com welcomes two supporters of science communication: SEO Phoenix AZ and CRAS, the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences.
  These links help Spaceweather.com stay online. Thank you to our supporters!
  more links...
©2016 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved. This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips.
©2019 Spaceweather.com. All rights reserved.