Planetary K-index
Now: Kp=
1.00 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 1.67 quiet explanation | more
data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 5.2
nT
Bz: 1.1
nT north
more data: ACE, DSCOVR Updated: Today at 0940 UT
Coronal Holes: 11 Aug 26
There are no significant equatorial coronal holes on the Earthside of the sun.Credit: NASA/SDO | more data
Spotless Days Current Stretch: 0 days
2026 total: 3 days (1%)
2025 total: 0 days (0%)
2024 total: 0 days (0%)
2023 total: 0 days (0%)
2022 total: 1 day (<1%)
2021 total: 64 days (18%)
2020 total: 208 days (57%)
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 11 Aug 2026
Thermosphere Climate Index
today: 15.51x1010W Neutral
Max: 49.4x1010 W Hot (10/1957)
Min: 2.05x1010 W Cold (02/2009) explanation | more data:gfx, txt
Updated 10 Aug 2026
Geomagnetic Storms: Probabilities for significant
disturbances in Earth's magnetic field are given for three activity levels: active, minor
storm, severe
storm
Updated at: 2026 Aug 10 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24
hr
24-48
hr
ACTIVE
15
%
35
%
MINOR
05
%
25
%
SEVERE
01
%
05
%
High latitudes
0-24
hr
24-48
hr
ACTIVE
15
%
10
%
MINOR
20
%
30
%
SEVERE
15
%
55
%
Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2026
What's up in space
This is an AI Free Zone: AI writing is everywhere -- except here. Spaceweather.com is written 100% by Dr. Tony Phillips, a carbon-based lifeform with 30 yrs of forecasting experience. If you find a mistake, rest assured it was made by a real human being.
GEOMAGNETIC STORM WATCH (G1/G2): A new NOAA forecast model predicts that a CME will hit Earth on Aug. 12th. The impact could produce a G1 or G2-class geomagnetic storm with high-latitude auroras during the Perseid meteor shower. CME impact alerts:SMS Text
THE BEST PERSEID SHOWER IN YEARS: Why is this year's Perseid meteor shower so good? Two words: New. Moon. When the shower peaks on the night of Aug. 12-13, there won't be a single photon of moonlight to spoil the show.
The shower is already underway. Sky cameras operated by NASA and others have detected more than a dozen fireballs every night this week. Here's one over Puerto Rico:
"This very bright Perseid fireball appeared just after midnight on Aug. 10th," says photographer Frankie Lucena.
When the shower peaks, meteor rates will multiply 10-fold, with as many as 100 sightings every hour ranging from faint streaks to exploding fireballs.
The source of the shower is giant comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. Its nucleus is 26 km wide--more than twice the size of the object that wiped out the dinosaurs. Every 133 years it swings through the inner solar system, laying down a fresh ribbon of dust for Earth to plow through each August.
To see the show, get away from city lights and look up during the hours between local midnight and dawn. That is when the shower's radiant in the constellation Perseus climbs high overhead. Give your eyes 30 minutes to adapt to the darkness, then start counting.
This year, you'll need both hands.
RARE 'POINT METEOR': The Perseid meteor shower is underway, but this was no Perseid. On Aug. 9th, Dan Bush's night-sky camera in Albany, Missouri, recorded a rare 'point meteor':
"This was a first for me in my 45 years of meteor watching," says Bush. "This meteor was coming directly at me! Notice how the meteor doesn't appear to be moving in any direction except straight at the camera."
This is by definition a 'point meteor': A rare visual phenomenon where a meteor appears as a stationary flash instead of a long streak. The path of the disintegrating meteoroid is, by chance, aligned perfectly with the observer.
"It came from the constellation Aquarius and was about as bright as a quarter Moon," says Bush.
It's origin in Aquarius probably means this was a 'sporadic' meteor--a random meteoroid not associated with any organized comet debris stream like the Perseids.
CAMPO DEL CIELO METEORITE PENDANT: This meteorite came from space. We sent it back again. The students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched it to the stratosphere onboard a cosmic ray research balloon, more than 109,620 feet above the Sierra Nevada near Bishop, CA:
You can have it for $349.95. Encased in a sterling silver cage, this is a genuine iron-nickel Campo del Cielo meteorite from Argentina. It landed on Earth 4,000 to 5,000 years ago, and made the return trip on Aug. 1, 2026. This pendant comes with a Certificate of Authenticity and a greeting card showing the jewelry in flight.
The students are selling space pendants to pay the helium bill for their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each one comes with a greeting card showing the jewelry in flight and telling the story of its trip to the stratosphere and back again.
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 August 10, 2026, the network reported 42 fireballs.
(29 sporadics, 13 Perseids)
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 August 11, 2026 there were 2349 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Notes: LD means
"Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance
between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256
AU.
Cosmic Rays in the Atmosphere
SPACE WEATHER BALLOON DATA: Almost 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 sensors that detect secondary cosmic rays, a form of radiation from space that can penetrate all the way down to Earth's surface. Our monitoring program has been underway without interruption for 10 years, resulting in a unique dataset of in situ atmospheric measurements.
Latest results (Nov. 2024): Atmospheric radiation is sharply decreasing in 2024. Our latest measurements in November registered a 10-year low:
What's going on? Ironically, the radiation drop is caused by increasing solar activity. Solar Cycle 25 has roared to life faster than forecasters expected. The sun's strengthening and increasingly tangled magnetic field repels cosmic rays from deep space. In addition, solar coronal mass ejections (CMEs) sweep aside cosmic rays, causing sharp reductions called "Forbush Decreases." The two effects blend together to bring daily radiation levels down.
.Who cares? Cosmic rays are a surprisingly "down to Earth" form of space weather. They can alter the chemistry of the atmosphere, trigger lightning, and penetrate commercial airplanes. According to a study from the Harvard T.H. Chan school of public health, crews of aircraft have higher rates of cancer than the general population. The researchers listed cosmic rays, irregular sleep habits, and chemical contaminants as leading risk factors. A number of controversial studies (#1, #2, #3, #4) go even further, linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death.
Technical notes: 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.
Data points in the graph labeled "Stratospheric Radiation" 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 Regener and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.
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