Solar and Aurora Activity Chat

[Mountain Snow]

Yes there is a significant earthbound cme from another M class flare, it will arrive late tomorrow or early Wednesday, and there is further cme activity today I've still to look at, there may be more opportunities on Wednesday and Thursday night from any of today's cme activity.

Spot on, ill keep my eyes peeled!

[Matty M]

http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/wingkp/wingkp_15m_24h.gif

[Crepuscular Ray]

The post at the top of the page has the link's you are referring to.

[frogesque]

Just looked out. It's a bit cloudy but I'm pretty sure there's some 'green fog' to the NNW. Very bad light pollution here and I wasn't fully dark adapted. Going for another look in a wee while!

[lfcdude]

Just looked out. It's a bit cloudy but I'm pretty sure there's some 'green fog' to the NNW. Very bad light pollution here and I wasn't fully dark adapted. Going for another look in a wee while!

Its not far away from you the green has really expanded in the last hour

[GeorgeWX]

Just looked out. It's a bit cloudy but I'm pretty sure there's some 'green fog' to the NNW. Very bad light pollution here and I wasn't fully dark adapted. Going for another look in a wee while!

Remember to fill up yer flask!

According to the current magnetometer reading the aurora should be at least 60 or 70 degrees above the horizon in fife.

I'd say that we have a deviation of roughly 100nT at the moment, aurora should be visible anywhere free of cloud and LP as far south as the Midlands and possibly even further south during sub-storm activity. I won't be in the slightest bit surprised if there are aurora sightings tonight in Holland, Germany and France.

Gutted that I'm stuck under cloud but fingers crossed the incoming HP improves things a bit for Tuesday and Wednesday.

lfcdude, the map you posted shows proton flux, it has little to do with auroral activity. During strong flares earth gets bathed in energetic proton's travelling at the speed of light taking (i think) around 8 minutes to travel from sun to earth. That particular map illustrates the spread of activity on the sunlit side of earth.

This vid shows how that map dances.

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EhbuY-ctNM&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

Good luck to anyone going for a look

Edited September 26, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[yamkin]

VERY URGENT................Geomagnetic Storms IS AT SCALE STAGE G4 WHICH IS SEVERE

Power systems: possible widespread voltage control problems and some protective systems will mistakenly trip out key assets from the grid.

Spacecraft operations: may experience surface charging and tracking problems, corrections may be needed for orientation problems.

Other systems: induced pipeline currents affect preventive measures, HF radio propagation sporadic, satellite navigation degraded for hours, low-frequency radio navigation disrupted, and aurora has been seen as low as Alabama and northern California (typically 45° geomagnetic lat.)**.

[GeorgeWX]

Calm yourself down man, the one bit of the text you failed to mention is the frequency of occurance during an eleven year solar cycle. For anyone interested it's on average about 100 times per cycle, the last time was just a few weeks ago!

Yamkin I know you're chomping at the bit for the world to end, but it won't happen during this geo-storm I'm afraid.

Edited September 26, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[yamkin]

Calm yourself down man, the one bit of the text you failed to mention is the frequency of occurance during an eleven year solar cycle. For anyone interested it's on average about 100 times per cycle, the last time was just a few weeks ago!

Yamkin I know you're chomping at the bit for the world to end, but it won't happen during this geo-storm I'm afraid.

I report as I see it and I can tell you now, I have never and will never say the world is going to end.

[frogesque]

Unless the end of the world can produce some decent clear skies then I'm not interested! Totally clouded out here!

[lfcdude]

clouded over gone foggy, still if it ever makes it this far south being in countryside il be in a good place,

[NorthNorfolkWeather]

VERY URGENT................Geomagnetic Storms IS AT SCALE STAGE G4 WHICH IS SEVERE

Power systems: possible widespread voltage control problems and some protective systems will mistakenly trip out key assets from the grid.

Spacecraft operations: may experience surface charging and tracking problems, corrections may be needed for orientation problems.

Other systems: induced pipeline currents affect preventive measures, HF radio propagation sporadic, satellite navigation degraded for hours, low-frequency radio navigation disrupted, and aurora has been seen as low as Alabama and northern California (typically 45° geomagnetic lat.)**.

Hi Yamkin,

It is true that a high incidence of flux due to a CME can cause powerline problems, it's much less likely in Europe compared to the continent of North America as our runs of line are considerably shorter and the length is needed to create the inducted power surge. the national boundaries in Europe tend to prvrnt very long runs of power cables

Most of the other tings you mention are true, but this isn't a biggie

[lfcdude]

Hi Yamkin,

It is true that a high incidence of flux due to a CME can cause powerline problems, it's much less likely in Europe compared to the continent of North America as our runs of line are considerably shorter and the length is needed to create the inducted power surge. the national boundaries in Europe tend to prvrnt very long runs of power cables

Most of the other tings you mention are true, but this isn't a biggie

Yepp north america... 75 k with out power...... there really need to update there systems.. anyways anyone see the rock that caused a fire streak across Argentina and killed 1? was thinking of making a topic on that

[Crepuscular Ray]

Yepp north america... 75 k with out power...... there really need to update there systems.. anyways anyone see the rock that caused a fire streak across Argentina and killed 1? was thinking of making a topic on that

There is already a thread on the Argentine event, and it turns out that it was a gas cannister that exploded, shot up into the air and then fell back down.

[kar999]

VERY URGENT................Geomagnetic Storms IS AT SCALE STAGE G4 WHICH IS SEVERE

I think to time to really worry is when either your telephone self-combusts or your @r$e is on fire. But then you wouldn't be able to post on here because chances are your broadband connection would have failed as your telephone exchange blows up!

There was nothing .. repeat nothing unusual or overly spectacular or unduly worrying about last nights stong storm. If your profile age is correct you will have uexperienced 4 solar maxima with dozens upon dozens of solar storms as strong or stronger than last nights. Some will have caused some disruption (like the Quebec power outage) but that is rare and most just give us a great Aurora show and Radio Hams amazing tropospheric radio conditons!

Edit: I see some good pictures from Northumberland on spaceweather.com. I had clear skies for a while but nothing visible at 23:30 for me... better luck next time.

Edited September 27, 2011 by kar999

[GeorgeWX]

Cme effects are subsiding, the solar wind speed remains above 550km/h suggesting there is still a little influence coming from the cme passage. the Bz component of the magnetic field has been pointing northward since 11am, a condition that suppreses the geomagnetic field.

Another cme is expected to arrive in the next 12 hours, the sooner the better for another chance of severe storming.

The cme that is expected to pass soon is slower and less dense than the one that struck yesterday, A period of minor storming is likely. I don't expect another storm where the planetery kp returns 2 periods (6 hours in total) of kp8, but a sharp burst of major to severe geomagnetic activity can't be ruled out especially if the cme arrives whilst still under the influence of yesterday's cme (i.e very soon).

Solar activity has reduced to lower levels in the last 24 hours, The background x-ray flux is around B7 level. Sunspot 1302 is maintaining is size and covers a huge area of 950 millionths, but has settled down. There is real potential for this region to become volatile again if the trailing spots can merge further with the largest spot in the region. M-class flaring is likely in the coming 24 hours despite the fact things appear to be getting quieter, X-class flaring is possible.

Here's some pics of last night's storm taken from spaceweather.

Horncastle, Lincolnshire

Isle of Lewis

Dunfermline

And taking top spot for most southerly sighting, this pic taken in the Czech Republic (50N)

Edited September 27, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[Aaron]

Aurora at Grimsby on our local news today.

Will have to keep my eyes peeled tonight.. or tomorrow night.. living on the outskirts, light pollution is much lower.

Y'know, this is the type of thing I'd stay awake all night for, how I didn't know about this is beyond me, never seen the northern lights before..

Edited September 27, 2011 by Aaron

[frogesque]

Some beautiful pics from around the country George

A bit peeved that I missed out considering the photo from Dunfermline - only about 15 miles from me!

[Snowyowl9]

Some beautiful pics from around the country George

Agreed they are very nice pics still waiting to see here still 8 years maybe tonight.

http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/pmap/pmapN.html

[GeorgeWX]

Agreed they are very nice pics still waiting to see here still 8 years maybe tonight.

Well you never know. It's quite clear we are still under existing cme effects, the solar wind remains around 550km/h compared to a 'pre-cme' speed of around 350km/h, The overall magnetic field isn't powerful, but does hold enough energy for minor storming provided the bz component maintains a southward orientation. We are still waiting for the next expected cme to arrive, it should pass in the next 6-12 hours, there is one other cme around 12 hours behind the first that is expected to pass earth. Both of these cme's are slow and faint when comparing to the M7 flare cme that struck us yesterday but sufficent enough for geomagnetic storming.

Just had a little look at the magnetometer, it seems we have entered a spell of minor storming (k5) in the last hour or so.

Same rules apply as before regarding the relation between the southerly extent of the aurora and magnetic field deviation on the magnetometer. Black line below blue line.

Edited September 27, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[weatherobsuk]

So worth going out or not..I understand the dynamics behind CMEs and K indexes, however when it comes to determining the best observational data interpretation i'm clueless to what transpires best here in the UK, given most of whats out in the public domain is either unreliable or for something else unrelated to aurora activity.

[GeorgeWX]

So worth going out or not..I understand the dynamics behind CMEs and K indexes, however when it comes to determining the best observational data interpretation i'm clueless to what transpires best here in the UK, given most of whats out in the public domain is either unreliable or for something else unrelated to aurora activity.

ok using just a uk based magnetometer, the sort of conditions required to see aurora from your location is different depending on how far south you are.

The blue wavey line represents what a typical quiet day should be like, the black line represents actual conditions for the last 24 hours, and the graph updates every 15 minutes. When the black line spikes abruptly and moves away from the blue 'average' then this indicates the geomagnetic field is unsettled. Now in order for auroral activity to shift south, the horizontal component of our magnetic field needs to weaken, and it often does this during geomagnetic storms.

So when the black line drops below the blue average, the aurora is further south than usual.

A downward deviation (from the average blue line) of -30nT and aurora may be visible on the horizon in the highlands, a deviation of -50nt and aurora may be visible across northern England and northern Ireland, -75nT the aurora may be seen across the midlands, south Wales and eire, also the aurora may be overhead for highlanders. When the deviation is -100nT+ then all uk locations should be able to see aurora with Scotland and northern england possibly seeing overhead displays.

When the black line is above the blue line and jumping around like it is at the moment, then auroral activity will be highly active around the poles but not over the uk.

Edited September 27, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[weatherobsuk]

Thanks George that makes sense. Was trying to make heads and tails using the magnetosphere simulator, the Aurora Oval charts and satellite data feeds I was 'uming & aahing' at, yet hadn't a clue what I was looking for. That clears things up moreso now although I guess it still doesn't beat getting a flight to Iceland or Norway and practically being guarantee'd to see the lights first hand.

[GeorgeWX]

Thanks George that makes sense. Was trying to make heads and tails using the magnetosphere simulator, the Aurora Oval charts and satellite data feeds I was 'uming & aahing' at, yet hadn't a clue what I was looking for. That clears things up moreso now although I guess it still doesn't beat getting a flight to Iceland or Norway and practically being guarantee'd to see the lights first hand.

There's loads of different data and maps out there all of it visually stimulating, but unfortunately all of it is either outdated or just not reliable enough. A lot of the short term aurora forecasts as well as the nict magnetosphere simulation are based on ace satellite data which is just too unreliable to paint an accurate picture, in particular the wind density reading which is quite an important perimeter.

For that reason using the magnetometer is the best way to be confident that something has happened or is happening in the skies around you. The deviation threshold's I mention are not scientifically backed in any way, these are numbers derived from my own observations of aurorae since becoming interested in the subject.

Not a fan of the Mail but they have published an article featuring a pic of the aurora seen from Buckinghamshire. It gives a sense of how bright it was, managing to punch through the light pollution.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2042428/Best-auroras-seen-Britain-thanks-huge-solar-flares.html

Edited September 28, 2011 by GeorgeWX

[Aaron]

Darn.. can't believe I missed it..