Space Weather

[thelufias]

Earthskys Meteor Shower Guide

[thelufias]

A plan to create artificial meteors

[sidherose]

That link doesn't appear to go where it should.

???

Nothing like fake flaming balls of death to get the crowd excited. Then when they really come you can be Chicken Little.

[Jherrith]

A VISITOR FROM BEYOND THE KUIPER BELT: Comet Iwamoto (C/2018 Y1) is coming. On Feb. 12th and 13th, the dirty snowball will make a rare visit to the inner solar system, passing by our planet only 0.3 AU (45 million km) away. Here it is, approaching Earth on Feb. 7th from the constellation Virgo:



Amateur astronomer Michael Jäger made the 41-minute movie at his private observatory in Jauerling, Austria. At the time, Comet Iwamoto was crossing the celestial equator, so there are many streaks in the movie from geostationary satellites. (Update: A new movie from Jäger shows even more satellites including one satellite flare.)

Discovered in Dec. 2018 by Japanese amateur astronomer Masayuki Iwamoto, this comet is a visitor from beyond the Kuiper Belt. It comes from the realm of Extreme Trans-Neptunian Objects (ETNOs) more than 5 times as far from the sun as Pluto. This means it could be a relative of other ETNOS such as Sedna, 2012 VP113 ("Biden"), and 2015 TG387 ("Goblin").
Comet Iwamoto doesn't visit us very often. Following a highly elliptical 1371-year orbit, its last passage through the inner solar system was around 648 AD (unrecorded), and its next won't happen until 3390 AD. Therefore, if you want to see the comet, now is the time to look.





Above: Click to view an interactive 3D orbit of Comet Iwamoto, courtesy of NASA/JPL

Shining with an astronomical magnitude of +6.5, the comet is invisible to the unaided eye. Nevertheless, it will be an easy target for backyard telescopes in the nights ahead as it glides through the constellation Leo the Lion high in the midnight sky. If you have a GOTO telescope, use this ephemeris to point your optics--and submit your images here.

[thelufias]

That link doesn't appear to go where it should.

???

Nothing like fake flaming balls of death to get the crowd excited. Then when they really come you can be Chicken Little.

My Bad....Hand and Brain aren't working together.  Fixed now.....

[sidherose]

Dirty snowballs......... Tuesday and Wednesday.

[sidherose]

Thanks for fixing that TL!  I still think it's crazy but that's just me.

I don't know if we're going to be able to see that comet from our side of the world if its in Virgo. Maybe close to sunrise.

[Jherrith]

THE SOLAR WIND IS HERE:


Earth's polar magnetic field is unsettled today, Feb. 14th, as our planet passes through a stream of solar wind blowing faster than 500 km/s. The gaseous material is coming from a southern hole in the sun's atmosphere. Arctic sky watchers should be alert for auroras.

[Jherrith]

BIG ACTIVITY ON THE SUN: A gigantic filament of plasma is dancing along the northwestern edge of the sun, rising more than 150,000 km above the solar surface. How large is that? It's fully 1/10th of the sun's diameter and almost a dozen times taller than our entire planet. Click to view a 2-day movie from NASA's Solar Dynamic Observatory:

Plasma Burst

This is called a "hedgerow prominence." Hot glowing plasma inside the structure is held aloft by unstable magnetic fields. If the magnetic support collapses, plasma can fall back to the solar surface, exploding in a Hyder flare--a type of solar flare that can occur with no underlying sunspot.

NASA and Japanese space telescopes have taken high resolution images of similar prominences and seen some amazing things such as (1) tadpole-shaped plumes that float up from the base of the prominence; (2) narrow streams of plasma that descend from the top like waterfalls; and (3) swirls and vortices that resemble van Gogh's Starry Night.

[dRaCX]

THE SOLAR WIND IS HERE:


Earth's polar magnetic field is unsettled today, Feb. 14th, as our planet passes through a stream of solar wind blowing faster than 500 km/s. The gaseous material is coming from a southern hole in the sun's atmosphere. Arctic sky watchers should be alert for auroras.

Sorry dude! It was the pork rinds, it'll pass in a few days.