1~14~11~~Space Weather Update~ M Class Solar Flare~

Lia's picture

M-FLARE: Today at 1318 UT, Earth-orbiting satellites detected an M1-class solar flare (SDO movie). The source is a new sunspot emerging over the sun's northeastern limb.

 

RE-THINKING AN ALIEN WORLD: A distant super-Earth named "55 Cancri e" is wetter and weirder than astronomers thought possible. The discovery has researchers re-thinking the nature of alien worlds. [full story] [video]

 

CORONAL HOLE: NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory is monitoring a dark gash in the sun's atmosphere--a coronal hole. It's the dark vertical feature in this extreme UV image taken on Jan. 13th:

 

Coronal holes are places where the sun's magnetic field opens up and allows the solar wind to escape. This yawning hole is about 120,000 km wide and more than a million km long. Solar wind flowing from its UV-dark abyss will reach Earth on Jan. 16th or 17th, possibly sparking auroras for high-latitude sky watchers.

 

FRIDAY THE 13TH AURORAS: Who says Friday the 13th is unlucky? Just look how the day began in Tromsø, Norway:

 

 

"Friday the 13th started very luckily indeed!" says photographer Antony Spencer. "We enjoyed an incredible display of auroras for five hours. The lights were so bright, even the snow turned green."

 

The auroras were sparked by the onset of a solar wind stream (~550 km/s), which reached Earth during the early hours of Jan. 13th. More geomagnetic activity is possible tonight as the solar wind continues to blow. Aurora alerts: text, voice.

 


Solar wind
speed: 391.5 km/sec
density: 2.6 protons/cm3

explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 1526 UT


X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: M1
1318 UT Jan14
24-hr: M1 1318 UT Jan14
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 1500 UT



Daily Sun: 14 Jan 12



All of these sunspots are quiet. The chance of flares today is low. Credit: SDO/HMI

Category: