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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
 
Solar wind
speed: 338.3 km/sec
density: 4.9 protons/cm3
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2345 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: A1
1951 UT Jul19
24-hr: A1
1558 UT Jul19
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2350 UT
Daily Sun: 19 Jul 20
The sun is blank--no sunspots. Credit: SDO/HMI

Sunspot number: 0
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 19 Jul 2020

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 8 days
2020 total: 151 days (75%)
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 19 Jul 2020


Thermosphere Climate Index
today: 2.53
x1010 W Cold
Max: 49.4
x1010 W Hot (10/1957)
Min: 2.05
x1010 W Cold (02/2009)
explanation | more data: gfx, txt
Updated 19 Jul 2020

The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 68 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 19 Jul 2020

Cosmic Rays Solar minimum is underway. The sun's magnetic field is weak, allowing extra cosmic rays into the solar system. Neutron counts from the University of Oulu's Sodankyla Geophysical Observatory show that cosmic rays reaching Earth in 2020 are near a Space Age peak.

Oulu Neutron Counts

Percentages of the Space Age average:
today: +9.0% High
48-hr change: -0.1%
Max: +11.7% Very High
(12/2009)
Min: -32.1% Very Low (06/1991)
explanation | more data
Updated 19 Jul 2020 @ 1600 UT

Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/Ovation
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 1 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 2
quiet
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 4.5 nT
Bz: 1.3 nT north
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2345 UT
Coronal Holes: 19 Jul 20

Solar wind flowing from these coronal holes could reach Earth on July 21-24, with the strongest flows expected on July 23-24.
Credit: SDO/AIA

Noctilucent Clouds NLC season is underway. NASA's AIM spacecraft detected a blue cloud over the north pole on May 17th--one of the earliest starts in the spacecraft's14 year history. Check here for daily images from AIM.
Switch view: Europe, USA, Asia, Polar
Updated at:
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2020 Jul 19 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: 2020 Jul 19 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
10 %
10 %
 
Sunday, Jul. 19, 2020
What's up in space
       
 

Never miss another geomagnetic storm. Sign up for Space Weather Alerts and you'll receive a text message when auroras appear in your area. Aurora tour guides and professional astronomers use this service. Now you can, too!

 

SOLAR WIND, INCOMING: A stream of solar wind might hit Earth's magnetic field on July 23-24. The gaseous material is flowing from an equatorial hole in the sun's atmosphere. It's not a major hole, but the emerging gas might be enough to spark high-latitude auroras when it reaches Earth later this week. Aurora alerts: SMS Text.

NOCTILUCENT CLOUDS SWALLOW COMET NEOWISE: There's a comet in this image. Can you find it? "Yesterday we had the brightest display of noctilucent clouds (NLCs) that I have ever witnessed, and fading Comet NEOWISE was hard to find in the bright night sky here up in the north," reports photographer Peter Rosén of Stockholm, Sweden.

"Comet NEOWISE is no longer stealing the show, but the display of NLCs was out of this world!" he says.

NLCs are Earth's highest clouds. Seeded by meteoroids, they float at the edge of space 83 km above the ground. The clouds form during summer when wisps of water vapor rise up to the mesosphere, allowing water to crystallize around specks of meteor smoke.

Often NLCs begin to fade in the second half of July, but this year they are still going strong--likely boosted by record cold temperatures in the mesosphere. High latitude sky watchers should remain alert for electric-blue.

Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

3 1/2 MINUTES WITH COMET NEOWISE: Comet NEOWISE is beginning to dim. Many observers, especially in cities, are having trouble finding the comet in the evening sky. Nevertheless, it is there. Yesterday, James W. Young pointed his camera just below the Big Dipper and let it stare for 3 1/2 minutes. This is what it saw

"A 30 degree ion tail!" he exclaims. "I shot the comet from southeast Washington State near Deep River. This is a 3 1/2 minute exposure (ISO 400) using my Canon 1Dx Mark II camera with a 50 mm lens at f/2.8 on a Losmandy tracker."

Although the comet is fading, it is still a marvelous sight through binoculars and an easy target for high-end digital cameras. People in dark-sky sites can see the tail with the naked eye. It looks like a narrow cloud-like smudge in the evening twilight tipped by a star-like nucleus of 3rd magnitude. Take a look! Sky maps: July 18, 19, 20.

Realtime Comet NEOWISE Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

ARCTIC WOLF PENDANT: This wolf glows in the dark--and it's been to space. The students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched this special pendant to the stratosphere on April 15, 2020, on board a high-altitude cosmic ray balloon. The payload of radiation sensors (and lupine jewelry) traveled 107,611 feet above Earth's surface:

You can have it for $99.95. The students are selling these pendants to support their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each one comes with a greeting card showing the wolf in flight and describing its journey to the stratosphere and back again.

Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All sales support hands-on STEM education


Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
Free:
Spaceweather.com Newsletter

  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 July 19, 2020, the network reported 6 fireballs.
(6 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 July 19, 2020 there were 2037 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Velocity (km/s)
Diameter (m)
2020 MQ2
2020-Jul-14
17.1 LD
8.3
44
2020 NM
2020-Jul-16
10.6 LD
5.7
20
2020 MX
2020-Jul-17
15 LD
5.3
53
2016 DY30
2020-Jul-19
9 LD
15.1
3
2020 OD
2020-Jul-19
8.6 LD
6.2
60
2020 ME3
2020-Jul-19
14.8 LD
4.6
24
2020 OB
2020-Jul-20
18.8 LD
26.5
66
2020 OF
2020-Jul-20
8.6 LD
31.6
62
2002 BF25
2020-Jul-21
9.4 LD
6.8
129
2020 NO
2020-Jul-22
2 LD
7.6
16
2020 ND
2020-Jul-24
14.5 LD
13.6
157
2020 NN
2020-Jul-25
16.3 LD
10.1
47
2020 NZ
2020-Jul-28
8.2 LD
7.8
29
2020 MX3
2020-Jul-29
9.4 LD
8.5
67
2018 PY7
2020-Jul-31
8.9 LD
9.5
16
2007 RF1
2020-Jul-31
10.7 LD
5
21
2018 BD
2020-Aug-03
7.6 LD
9.4
3
2009 PQ1
2020-Aug-05
10.8 LD
13.5
112
2020 FA1
2020-Aug-23
18.4 LD
1.9
20
2016 AH164
2020-Aug-26
15.7 LD
5.6
4
2011 ES4
2020-Sep-01
0.3 LD
8.2
30
465824
2020-Sep-06
19.4 LD
14
162
2012 RM15
2020-Sep-12
14.9 LD
9.8
45
2017 US
2020-Sep-13
17.3 LD
5.9
21
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

SOMETHING NEW! We have developed a new predictive model of aviation radiation. It's called E-RAD--short for Empirical RADiation model. We are constantly flying radiation sensors onboard airplanes over the US and and around the world, so far collecting more than 22,000 gps-tagged radiation measurements. Using this unique dataset, we can predict the dosage on any flight over the USA with an error no worse than 15%.

E-RAD lets us do something new: Every day we monitor approximately 1400 flights criss-crossing the 10 busiest routes in the continental USA. Typically, this includes more than 80,000 passengers per day. E-RAD calculates the radiation exposure for every single flight.

The Hot Flights Table is a daily summary of these calculations. It shows the 5 charter flights with the highest dose rates; the 5 commercial flights with the highest dose rates; 5 commercial flights with near-average dose rates; and the 5 commercial flights with the lowest dose rates. Passengers typically experience dose rates that are 20 to 70 times higher than natural radiation at sea level.

To measure radiation on airplanes, we use the same sensors we fly to the stratosphere onboard Earth to Sky Calculus cosmic ray balloons: neutron bubble chambers and X-ray/gamma-ray Geiger tubes sensitive to energies between 10 keV and 20 MeV. These energies span the range of medical X-ray machines and airport security scanners.

Column definitions: (1) The flight number; (2) The maximum dose rate during the flight, expressed in units of natural radiation at sea level; (3) The maximum altitude of the plane in feet above sea level; (4) Departure city; (5) Arrival city; (6) Duration of the flight.

SPACE WEATHER BALLOON DATA: 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 18% since 2015:

The data points in the graph above 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 Reneger and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.

En route to the stratosphere, our sensors also pass through aviation altitudes:

In this plot, 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.

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.

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.

  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
NOAA 27-Day Space Weather Forecasts
  fun to read, but should be taken with a grain of salt! Forecasts looking ahead more than a few days are often wrong.
Aurora 30 min forecast
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather

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