SPACE WEATHER IN NEW ZEALAND: Today the staff of Spaceweather.com is flying to New Zealand. Because of this long trip, our web page may be updated for slowly than usual for the next 24 hours. Sorry for the inconvenience! Working with a team of students from Earth to Sky Calculus, we will be launching cosmic ray balloons to the stratosphere and measuring radiation in airplanes flying around the southern hemisphere. Stay tuned for results.
'FROZEN LIGHTNING' OVER SCOTLAND: Last night, observers in Scotland witnessed a magnificent apparition of noctilucent clouds (NLCs). "It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. The strange and ethereal clouds resembled frozen lightning," says Giuseppe Petricca, who took this pictre from the Isle of Lewis:
The widely-observed clouds over Scotland were remarkable for their intensity and fine rippling structure. NASA's AIM spacecraft in Earth orbit saw them, too, and confirmed that NLCs forming at the edge of space are now spilling out of the Arctic into Europe and Canada.
"Structures that seem never-changing, created at temperatures below one hundred degrees below zero, using meteor dust as seed, of a color that goes from the pure white to the electric blue, forged an almost otherworldly view, above the eternal sunset of these latitudes--an experience that will be impossible to forget!" says Petricca.
Summer is the season for noctilucent clouds. NLCs form when summertime wisps of water vapor rise to the top of Earth's atmosphere and wrap themselves around specks of "meteor smoke." High-altitude winds in the mesosphere gather the resulting crystals into strange electric-blue forms in the night sky. The first full night of northern summer is on June 21st, so stay tuned for more!
Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery
ONE RING TO RULE THE STRATOSPHERE: Today, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus are flying from California to New Zealand to launch a trio of cosmic ray balloons over Earth's 8th continent. To get ready, on June 12th they launched a ring of power to the stratosphere. Here it is floating 33 km above the Sierra Nevada mountains of central California:
You can have one for $119.95. The students are selling these Tolkien-inspired rings as a fundraiser for their trip. They are made of golden-colored tungsten and inscribed with the authentic Mordor script of the One Ring.
Buy one now, and we will fly it again for you over Hobbiton, located in the North Island of New Zealand where our cosmic ray balloons will be released. Just note "Please fly it again!" in the comments section at checkout.
Each golden ring comes with a greeting card showing the ring in flight and telling the story of its journey to the edge of space. Sales support the Earth to Sky Calculus cosmic ray ballooning program and hands-on STEM research.
Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All proceeds support hands-on STEM education
Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery