Space stuff

[Zombie]

Space weather update

"Yesterday, Jan. 7th, an X1-class explosion in the sunspot's magnetic canopy hurled a coronal mass ejection [CME] in our direction. Sky watchers should be alert for auroras on Jan. 9th when the cloud arrives. NOAA forecasters estimate a 60% chance of strong geomagnetic storms"



"The X1-flare that hurled the CME toward Earth also accelerated a swarm of high-energy protons in our direction... The source of all this activity is AR1944, one of the biggest sunspots of the past decade. The sprawling active region is more than 200,000 km wide and contains dozens of dark cores. Its primary core, all by itself, is large enough to swallow Earth three times over. To set the scale of the behemoth, Karzaman Ahmad inserted a picture of Earth in the corner of this picture he took on Jan. 7th from the Langkawi National Observatory in Malaysia:"



This mass of highly charged particles is travelling towards us at around 8m kph and is due to impact Earth's upper atmosphere around 8.00am GMT tomorrow. Due to the intensity auroras may be visible at lower latitudes during darkness for a day or so and Canada and parts of northern USA may be well placed to see it. Also auroras may be visible across parts of Northern Europe and possibly southern parts of the UK tomorrow night.

Because of this "Orbital Sciences Corp. scrubbed today's launch of the company's first resupply mission to the International Space Station due to an unusually high level of radiation following yesterday's solar flare. A launch at 1:10 p.m. EST Thursday is still being considered, but no decision has been made."

http://spaceweather.com/
http://www.nasa.gov/


 

[Bill W]

Hopefully, this will merely be a light shone in the night sky and won't disrupt communication or the electrical grid.  The satellites are probably the most at risk, but this could pose a disruption to our daily lives. 

[Graeme]

It's unlikely to be at the Carrington Event level, but a solar storm of similar magnitude is just a matter of time.

 

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that there will be an Aurora Australis, because I've never seen one I live far enough out of town that it might be visible if there's one at my latitude.

[wildone]

Here is the Aurora Borealis viewing map for tonight compliments of the University of Alaska

 

[Mann Ramblings]

Meh... it's still WAY beyond my viewing range. Looks the people of Canada are getting a good show. Someone should take a good video of it and share for those of us underprivileged children.

[Zombie]

"Northern Lights aurora borealis sightings could be even clearer in UK tonight"

"US organisation the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted an 85 per cent chance of activity tonight."

"head for higher ground away from urban areas to avoid light pollution and look for somewhere with a good view of the northern horizon."

"Weather conditions will be key this evening, with clear skies needed to be able to see the lights."

"This year's first significant Northern Lights can be seen in parts of Scotland, northern Scandinavia, southern Wales and parts of southern England on 10 January."

"The initial structure of this CME has been relatively weak in strength, but that said, it generally takes on the order of 24 hours or more for the full event to transpire and stronger storming is certainly still possible,"

"We're not sure how strong the storm will be but if it follows predictions there's a good chance of seeing it southern Britain,"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/10563240/Northern-Lights-aurora-borealis-sightings-could-be-even-clearer-in-UK-tonight.html
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/northern-lights-2014-where-watch-aurora-borealis-uk-1431735