CONTINUED CHANCE OF FLARES: So far this week, sunspot 3981 has produced more than 20 M-class solar flares, including two that almost reached category X. The activity is likely to continue today. The sunspot retains a delta-class magnetic field that harbors energy for frequent explosions. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text.
GIANT UNCONTROLED ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY EXPERIMENT: What goes up, must come down--which could be a problem when you're launching thousands of satellites. Since 2018, SpaceX has placed more than 7,000 Starlink satellites into Earth orbit, and now they are starting to come down. In January alone, more than 120 Starlinks deorbited.
"The sustained rate of daily reentries is unprecedented," says Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard Center for Astrophysics who tracks satellites. "They are retiring and incinerating about 4 or 5 Starlinks every day."
Planners have long known this would happen. First generation (Gen1) Starlink satellites are being retired to make way for newer models. "More than 500 of the 4700 Gen1 Starlinks have now reentered," says McDowell.
When Starlinks reenter, they disintegrate before hitting the ground, adding metallic vapors to the atmosphere. A study published in 2023 found evidence of the lingering devris. In February 2023, NASA flew a WB-57 aircraft 60,000 feet over Alaska to collect aerosols. 10% of the particles contained aluminum and other metals from the "burn-up" of satellites.
Right: NASA's WB-57 high altitude airplane. [more]
What we're observing is a giant uncontrolled experiment in atmospheric chemistry. The demise of just one Gen1 Starlink satellite produces about 30 kilograms (66 pounds) of aluminum oxide, a compound that eats away at the ozone layer. A new study finds these oxides have increased 8-fold between 2016 and 2022, and the recent surge is increasing the pollution even more.
On the bright side, each reentry produces a beautiful fireball--and the odds are increasing that you'll see one. Visit the Aerospace Corporation for reentry predictions, and submit your photos here.
A NEW CORONAGRAPH FOR SPACE WEATHER FORECASTING: Picture this: A giant CME is heading straight for Earth, but no one knows it's coming. Forecasters have long worried about such a scenario. Our best early warning system for CMEs is a coronagraph onboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), which was launched in Dec. 1995. How long can such an ancient spacecraft last?
We can stop worrying. Yesterday, NOAA unveiled realtime data from its replacement, the CCOR-1 solar coronagraph onboard GOES-19.
This is a sample movie from Feb. 6th. At the top, a farside CME billows away from the sun's north pole. Near the bottom, starlike Mercury approaches the sun for a superior conjunction on Feb 9th. The full-resolution movie is quite beautiful.
Using an occulting disk to block the glare of the sun, CCOR-1 delivers uninterrupted monitoring of CMEs with a new image every 15 minutes. On April 4th, GOES-19 will be fully operational, and NOAA will begin using CCOR-1 for regular CME forecasts.
SOHO, meanwhile, will continue monitoring the sun as it has done for 30 years. This incredible spacecraft has discovered more than 5000 sungrazing comets and helped forecasters predict hundreds of strong geomagnetic storms. Long may it live.
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24K SPACE ROSE FOR VALENTINE'S DAY: On Jan. 24, 2025, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched a cosmic ray balloon to the stratosphere. This 24K Space Rose went along for the ride:
You can have it for $127.75. At the apex of the flight, the gold-dipped and gilded bloom was 115,823 feet above the Sierra Nevada mountains of central California, touching the edge of space. It comes with a greeting card showing the flower in flight, and telling the story of its journey to the stratosphere and back again.
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