100 DAYS WITHOUT SUNSPOTS: 2020 is not even 5 months old. Already there have been 100 days without sunspots. This is a sign that Solar Minimum is underway. So far this year, the sun has been blank 76% of the time, a rate surpassed only once before in the Space Age. Last year, 2019, the sun was blank 77% of the time. Two consecutive years of record-setting spotlessness adds up to a very deep Solar Minimum, indeed. Aurora alerts: SMS Text.
FIREBALL PARALLAX: Strange but true: The three fireballs in the image below are all the same meteor. During last month's Lyrid meteor shower, an unusually big piece of Comet Thatcher disintegrated in Earth's atmosphere over Slovakia. Three photographers located in three different towns photographed the fireball, and one of them, Tomas Slovinsky, combined the three photos into a single image:
"This composite image beautifully illustrates the effect of parallax on the apparent position of the meteor," says Slovinsky. "The three fireballs were photographed from Zilina (shortest one), Zbojska, and Kosice (longer one) - all with different paths and lengths on the sky."
Using the three images, the team of photographers was able to reconstruct the physical path of the meteor through the atmosphere, and they found a surprise. "While ordinary meteors disintegrate 60-90km above the ground, this one started to burn much higher: 121km above the ground," says Slovinsky. "We believe this is due to the meteor's high speed, which we measured to be 27km/s (60,000 mph)."
Thanks to Tomas Slovinsky, Robert Barsa, and Pavol Kostolny for sharing this unusual observation!
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CRYSTAL MOON BALL IN THE STRATOSPHERE: On Star Wars Day ("May the 4th be with you"), the students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched an array of cosmic ray sensors to the stratosphere. They do this every week or so to monitor increasing levels of atmospheric radiation. This crystal Moon ball went along for the ride:
You can have it for $129.95. The students are selling these far-out balls to support their cosmic ray ballooning program.
Each one comes with an LED base that turns the laser-etched crystaline Moon a beautiful shade of purple, blue, green or yellow. It makes a great night light. Also included is a greeting card showing the crystal ball in flight and telling the story of its journey to the edge of space and back again.
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