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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
SPACE WEATHER
Current conditions
Solar wind
speed: 434.0 km/sec
density: 2.2 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 2246 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: A0
2245 UT Sep10
24-hr: A0
2245 UT Sep10
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2245 UT
Daily Sun: 10 Sep 08
There sun is blank--no sunspots. Credit: SOHO/MDI
Sunspot number: 0
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 09 Sept. 2008
Far side of the Sun:
This holographic image reveals no sunspots on the far side of the sun. Image credit: SOHO/MDI
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 1 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 1
quiet
explanation | more data
Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/POES
What is the auroral oval?
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 4.0 nT
Bz: 1.1 nT north
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 Sept. 13th. Credit: Hinode X-ray Telescope
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2008 Sep 10 2201 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: 2008 Sep 10 2201 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
10 %
05 %
MINOR
01 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
15 %
10 %
MINOR
01 %
01 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
What's up in Space
September 10, 2008
AURORA ALERTS: Did you miss the Northern Lights of August 9th? Next time get a wake-up call from Space Weather PHONE.  

NAKED-EYE GRB: Scientists are beginning to unravel the mystery of an extraordinary gamma-ray burst on March 19, 2008, which was visible to the naked eye. It turns out the explosion was aimed directly at Earth: full story.

FIREBALL OUTBURST: Yesterday, Sept. 9th, a surprising flurry of bright fireballs lit up the skies of North America. "Our SENTINEL all-sky camera picked up 25 bright meteors in a shower that began at 0620 UT and lasted approximately 4 hours," reports NASA astronomer Bill Cooke of the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. This video "frame-stack" shows the outburst at a glance:

"Most appear to have a radiant near Perseus (3.3h, +43o), leading us to hypothesize an outburst of the September Perseids," says Cooke. The September Perseids come from an unknown comet and typically produce no more than a handful of dim meteors per hour when the shower peaks on Sept. 8th and 9th. This is the first time they have been caught bursting in this fashion. Most of the meteors recorded by the NASA camera were magnitude -2 or brighter, i.e., as bright as Jupiter or Venus.

Ongoing analyses of this outburst may reveal the orbit of the meteoroids, the location of the parent comet (if a comet is indeed the parent), and whether more outbursts are in the offing. Stay tuned for updates.

September Perseid Photo Gallery
[Science@NASA: Lunar Meteors] [Meteor Alerts]

HIGH ART: What do Vincent van Gogh and raindrops have in common? Both make great self-portraits. Here is van Gogh's. And here is the raindrops':

Young Sophie Friedman took the picture just after her father, astrophotographer Alan Friedman, drove their car through a rainstorm in Buffalo, New York. It shows the view through the sunroof. In the full-sized image, look carefully at the raindrops. Each one acts as a tiny lens forming an image of the raincloud above. It is water picturing itself.

"I've been wondering what to call this shot," says Alan. "Now I know." Self Portraits.

Bonus: What else do Vincent van Gogh and raindrops have in common? They both make great pictures of clouds.

       
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 September 10, 2008 , there were 979 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Sept. 2008 Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Mag.
Size
2003 WT153
Sept. 7
5.8 LD
23
11 m
1996 HW1
Sept. 12
53 LD
12
3.7 km
2003 SW130
Sept. 19
8.6 LD
23
7 m
1998 UO1
Sept. 26
25 LD
18
2.0 km
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.
Essential 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 and Heliospheric Observatory
  Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO.
STEREO
  3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory
Daily Sunspot Summaries
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Current Solar Images
  from the National Solar Data Analysis Center
Science Central
  a one-stop hub for all things scientific
  more links...
   
©2008, SpaceWeather.com -- This site is penned daily by Dr. Tony Phillips.
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