PERIGEE "SUPER MOON" ON MAY 5-6: Get ready for moonlight! The full Moon of May 5-6, 2012, is a perigee moon, as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than other full moons of 2012. [video] [full story]
VENUS IS NOT ALONE: When the sun sets tonight, go outside and look west. The Evening Star, Venus, is not alone. Second-magnitude star El Nath is less than a degree away. Marek Nikodem photographed the pair on May 2nd from the countryside near Niedźwiady, Poland:
The planet and the star are converging. At closest approach on May 6th, they will be 0.8 degrees apart, a gap so small you can hide it behind the outstreched tip of your index finger.
If you have a telescope, point it at Venus. The planet is at its brightest for all of 2012, and backyard optics easily resolve it into a 27% crescent. Swing over to El Nath for a different experience. The star, which lies 130 light years away, is a pinprick of light unresolved by the most powerful telescopes on Earth.
more images: from John Chumack of Dayton, Ohio; from Gene Taylor near Skyline Arch in Arches National Park, Utah; from Andrea Aletti of Varese, Italy; from Luis Argerich of Buenos Aires, Argentina; from Mariusz Rudziński of Mirostowice Dolne, Poland; from Carlos Rosatti of San Jose, Uruguay;
Solar wind
speed: 320.5 km/sec
density: 3.1 protons/cm3
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 1656 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: C1 1550 UT May04
24-hr: C1 1550 UT May04
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 1700 UT
Daily Sun: 04 May 12
Sunspot 1469 has a beta-gamma magnetic field that harbors energy for M-class solar flares. Credit: SDO/HMI
Sunspot number: 107
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 03 May 2012
Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 0 days
2012 total: 0 days (0%)
2011 total: 2 days (<1%)
2010 total: 51 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)
Since 2004: 821 days
Typical Solar Min: 486 days
Updated 03 May 2012
The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 114 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 03 May 2012
Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/POES
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 1 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 3 quiet
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 7.4 nT
Bz: 1.3 nT north
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at 1656 UT
Coronal Holes: 04 May 12
Solar wind flowing from this coronal hole should reach Earth on May 9-10. Credit: SDO/AIA.
