SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

Solar wind
speed: 406.7 km/sec
density: 6.31 protons/cm³
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 0844 UT

X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: C1 1646 UT Nov20
24-hr: C2 1004 UT Nov20
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2050 UT

Daily Sun: 20 Nov 25

Expand: labels | no labels
A new and potentially large sunspot is emerging at the circled location. Credit: NASA/SDO

Sunspot number: 60
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 20 Nov 2025

Current Auroral Oval:

Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/Ovation

Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 2.33 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 2.33 quiet
explanation | more data

Interplanetary Mag. Field
B_total: 12.58 nT
B_z: -3.18 nT south
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 0846 UT

Coronal Holes: 20 Nov 25

A coronal hole is emerging over the sun's southeastern limb. Credit: NASA/SDO | more data

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
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 20 Nov 2025

Thermosphere Climate Index
today: 22.61x10¹⁰ W Warm
Max: 49.4x10¹⁰ W Hot (10/1957)
Min: 2.05x10¹⁰ W Cold (02/2009)
explanation | more data: gfx, txt
Updated 19 Nov 2025

The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 123 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 20 Nov 2025

Cosmic Rays Solar Cycle 25 is near its peak, and this is reflected in the number of cosmic rays entering Earth's atmosphere. Neutron counts from the University of Oulu's Sodankyla Geophysical Observatory show that cosmic rays reaching Earth are slowly declining--a result of the yin-yang relationship between the solar cycle and cosmic rays.

Oulu Neutron Counts
Percentages of the Space Age average:
today: -9.3%Very Low
48-hr change: +2.1%
Max: +11.7% Very High (12/2009)
Min: -32.1% Very Low (06/1991)
explanation | more data
Updated 20 Nov 2025 @ 0700 UT

SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts

Updated at: 2025 Nov 19 2200 UTC

FLARE	0-24 hr	24-48 hr
CLASS M	15 %	15 %
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: 2025 Nov 19 2200 UTC

Mid-latitudes

	0-24 hr	24-48 hr
ACTIVE	35 %	35 %
MINOR	15 %	15 %
SEVERE	01 %	01 %

High latitudes

	0-24 hr	24-48 hr
ACTIVE	10 %	10 %
MINOR	25 %	25 %
SEVERE	50 %	50 %


		Thursday, Nov. 20, 2025
	What's up in space	Thursday, Nov. 20, 2025

This is an AI Free Zone: Text created by Large Language Models is spreading across the Internet. It's well-written, but frequently inaccurate. If you find a mistake on Spaceweather.com, rest assured it was made by a real human being.

NASA'S IMAGES OF COMET 3I/ATLAS: Spoiler alert: You won't be impressed. On Nov. 19th, NASA released long-awaited images of interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS taken by spacecraft near Mars and elsewhere. Their publication had been delayed for more than a month by the US government shutdown. NASA's cameras revealed the comet to be a fuzzy blob. Photos being taken now by amateur astronomers on Earth are far more informative.

GLOWING RED RING OVER ITALY: For a few milliseconds on Nov 17th, an enormous ring of red light appeared in the sky over central Italy. Valter Binotto photographed it from the small town of Possagno in the foothills of the Italian Alps:

This is an "ELVE"--short for Emissions of Light and Very Low Frequency Perturbations due to Electromagnetic Pulse Sources. It's a rare species of sprite discovered in 1990 by cameras onboard the space shuttle. ELVEs hover about 100 km above the ground, and this one is about 360 km in diameter.

"The ELVE was generated by a powerful negative lightning strike in a storm in Vernazza about 300 km south of me," says Binotto. One bolt was so strong (-303 kilo-ampères), it generated an intense electromagnetic pulse (EMP). The red ring marks the spot where the EMP hit Earth's ionosphere. For comparison, normal lightning bolts carry only 10 to 30 kilo-ampères of current.

Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery
Free: Spaceweather.com Newsletter

SASQUATCH SANTA CHRISTMAS ORNAMENT: No Christmas tree is complete without one: The Sasquatch Santa Ornament. The students of Earth to Sky Calculus flew it to the stratosphere on Nov. 16th.

You can have it for $98.95. Hand-sculpted in the USA, this humorous ornament shows the hairy elf relaxing with a mug of hot chocolate after a busy night of Christmas deliveries. Its durable polyresin construction makes it lightweight enough to hang on any tree but sturdy enough to last for many Christmases to come.

The students of Earth to Sky Calculus are selling space ornaments to support their cosmic ray balloning program. Each one comes with a greeting card showing the ornament in flight and telling the story of its journey to the edge of space.

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

Realtime Space Weather 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 Nov 19, 2025, the network reported 31 fireballs.
(21 sporadics, 5 Leonids, 4 Northern Taurids, 1 omicron Eridanid)

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 November 20, 2025 there were 2349 potentially hazardous asteroids.

Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:

Asteroid	Date(UT)	Miss Distance	Velocity (km/s)	Diameter (m)
2025 VT4	2025-Nov-15	7.1 LD	7.2	10
2025 VB5	2025-Nov-15	16.6 LD	8.7	17
2025 VT3	2025-Nov-15	3 LD	7.6	14
2025 VQ2	2025-Nov-15	3.3 LD	5.8	10
2025 VN1	2025-Nov-16	4.6 LD	10.7	20
2025 WK	2025-Nov-16	11.1 LD	4.9	14
2025 VW3	2025-Nov-16	1.5 LD	14	10
2022 FG4	2025-Nov-16	14.1 LD	21.4	105
2025 WC	2025-Nov-17	0.3 LD	10.2	5
2025 VG5	2025-Nov-17	15.5 LD	4.7	16
2025 VC4	2025-Nov-18	5.2 LD	10	13
2025 VP1	2025-Nov-18	1.5 LD	8.2	12
3361	2025-Nov-19	14.8 LD	9.1	439
2025 VO2	2025-Nov-19	14.7 LD	5.7	22
2025 VK2	2025-Nov-19	8.1 LD	15.1	22
2025 VZ6	2025-Nov-19	2.2 LD	8.7	7
2013 NJ4	2025-Nov-20	12.6 LD	6.4	12
2025 VO5	2025-Nov-20	12.2 LD	13.8	24
2025 VW4	2025-Nov-21	8.6 LD	4.7	19
2025 VE2	2025-Nov-21	13.8 LD	1.7	14
2025 VO1	2025-Nov-21	2.6 LD	9.3	17
2025 WA	2025-Nov-21	7.8 LD	7.9	37
2025 VM5	2025-Nov-22	2.8 LD	4.5	14
2025 VB6	2025-Nov-22	16.3 LD	14.6	31
2025 VF5	2025-Nov-23	3.1 LD	7.8	15
2025 VA7	2025-Nov-23	5.1 LD	11.7	10
516155	2025-Nov-24	12.5 LD	16.7	338
2025 VL6	2025-Nov-24	2.5 LD	14.5	12
2025 VY4	2025-Nov-24	12.6 LD	7.7	42
2020 WM	2025-Nov-24	17.4 LD	11.8	36
2025 VP2	2025-Nov-25	6.6 LD	8.5	49
2019 UT6	2025-Nov-25	6.2 LD	12.6	146
2021 WR	2025-Nov-26	12 LD	9.4	31
2018 WG2	2025-Nov-27	13.5 LD	7.5	3
2007 VM184	2025-Dec-01	13.1 LD	20	219
2025 WG	2025-Dec-02	5.1 LD	7.2	18
2018 WC2	2025-Dec-03	9.8 LD	8.9	36
2025 UF10	2025-Dec-04	14.5 LD	13.1	132
2025 VE6	2025-Dec-04	6.3 LD	5.2	24
2021 JE1	2025-Dec-08	13.5 LD	7.1	16
2019 XN3	2025-Dec-10	5.7 LD	3.6	15
1999 SF10	2025-Dec-10	8.2 LD	4.4	46
2016 YH	2025-Dec-13	6.8 LD	8.9	28
2025 TZ	2025-Dec-15	17.8 LD	6.2	53
2015 XX168	2025-Dec-18	4.7 LD	11.6	27
2010 WR7	2025-Dec-20	19.4 LD	8.3	71
2021 AB1	2025-Dec-28	10.2 LD	12.3	16
2019 AU	2025-Dec-30	19.3 LD	2.8	16
2024 AV2	2025-Dec-30	17.9 LD	7	17
2014 AF16	2026-Jan-04	9 LD	9.6	34
2023 XM15	2026-Jan-07	15.2 LD	6.9	51
2022 GR3	2026-Jan-12	14.5 LD	12.9	9
2022 OB5	2026-Jan-14	1.7 LD	2.2	6
2025 BL	2026-Jan-17	4.7 LD	6.9	28
2004 MO3	2026-Jan-17	17 LD	10.2	129
2011 AM37	2026-Jan-17	19.8 LD	5.1	4

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.

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.

SolarMonitor.org

information about sunspots based on the latest NOAA/USAF Active Region Summary

Starlink Satellite Statistics

current counts of failed and deployed Starlink satellites from Jonathan's Space Page. See also, all satellite statistics.

The Aerospace Corporation

Authoritative predictions of space junk and satellite re-entries

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

Live Aurora Webcam

from Lights over Lapland

Heliophysics

the underlying science of space weather

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