From Spaceweather.com
NASA’s STEREO-B spacecraft is monitoring an active region hidden behind the sun’s eastern limb.
On May 5th, it produced an impressive coronal mass ejection (movie) and a burst of Type II radio emissions caused by a shock wave plowing through the sun’s outer atmosphere. STEREO-B’s extreme UV telescope captured this image during the explosion:
Activity continued apace on May 6th with at least two more eruptions. Furthermore, recent UV images from STEREO-B reveal not just one but two active regions: image below.
At the root of all this activity is probably a complex of sunspots. The region is not yet visible from Earth, but the sun is turning it toward us for a better view. Readers with solar telescopes should keep an eye on sun’s northeastern limb for an emergence on May 7th or 8th.
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Place your bets on whether the sunspots a) exist and if so b) are SC23 or c) SC24 polarity.
Checking through the SOHO images, there is a nice big coronal hole near dead centre (aren’t these supposed to disappear before the next solar cycle begins?) but nothing on the northeast limb – at least so far.
The magnetogram is very quiet as well.
It strikes me that we do not know very much about the physics behind these solar eruptions. Perhaps this one event will help. I’m still struggling with how to characterize the C 23 spot from last week. Now they are saying that this will be a complex of C 24 spots. What does that mean?
OT:
I understand from friends in Juneau and from published sources that the Mendenhall Glacier increased ice mass over the last two years. Please consider posting weather data about the Juneau region similar to your post of Chico. As much as we love Chico, it is not building glaciers.
Cycle 24, from the latitude.
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And I’ll want to know if these biggies are still on Livingston’s decline curve.
I can’t comment on the sunspots but the WOW factor of the CME cannot be underestimated by this humble archaeologist.
Such raw power.
Its easier to see stuff like this when the sun is quiet, and from an angle.. but I doubt you will be seeing a sunspot out of the deal.. images for today that I can find have no spots so far.
ps.. anyone else seeing Ads by google in the story above?
It means PolicyGuy, that solar cycles have alternately magnetically polarized sunspots. So if the polarization is one way SC – 23, another – SC24.
The magnetogram will enable you to tell them apart.
That cooks it.
We’ll see a spot for sure now. It’s been discussed on WUWT.
I read a piece on Wired Science about this yesterday. It speculated on the size of the event and how it might put an end to speculation of global cooling. The area in question might not be visible until Friday. We’ll see by the weekend.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/tag/sunspot/
One word – “awsome”!
http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/3250/cme20090505v1.gif
OT:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/05/05/mafia_wind_biz/
Mafia-busting Italian magistrates have launched a major investigation into crooked windfarm projects in Sicily, according to reports. It is suggested that large sums in government support have been collected for wind power stations which in many cases produce no electricity.
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My question:
And how is this different from any other wind power project?
OT but relevant to solar is a post on Jennifer Marohasy’s blog covering the work of Dr Miskolczi. It suggests heat radiated from sun is the driver of our climate together with the distance of the earth from the sun.
See:
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/05/the-climatically-saturated-greenhouse-effect/
John A (23:55:25) :
Place your bets on whether the sunspots a) exist and if so b) are SC23 or c) SC24 polarity.
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Neither – It’s just a couple of solar zits – should clear up in no time.
Judging from the Magnetogram’s appearance of cold polished granite, I’d say this one turns out just like the other one. They look all big & bad out there on Stereo Behind but when they roll into view they are either dead or dying.
Might get a nice white-light faculae or two out of them.
Not getting my hopes up, the movie is all too familiar.
Anthony.Came across this article today .Sorry about posting it here-not really a comment. couldn’t find a normal contact method. http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=325899798635675&kw=al,gore
Reply: You might at least have tried posting in a relevant thread. ~ charles the moderator
Its very sobering to see the sun in action, CMEs put our petty concerns down here into perspective I think and still learned people suggest the sun is a minor driver of climate.
The question is how big does a CME pointing in our direction have to be to cause us real harm? the odd burp we can handle with just the nice visual effects of the northern lights but a very very powerful CME might just put back in the dark ages or worse, I wonder what the chances are of a really big CME?
An interesting article by James A Marusek on the two alternative paths that the next solar cycle may go down. http://personals.galaxyinternet.net/tunga/Signpost.pdf
A direct CME hit on Earth would be catastrophic for the industrialised countries with energy, international communications and transport systems brought to a dead stop for possibly months until the systems could be brought back on line.
That would mean the loss of sewerage systems, water systems, fuel supplies and therefore no food supplies as the 4 day long stockpile of food in the major cities ran out.
No food resupplies as all transport will have stopped because of no fuel.
Gas supplies would cease after a few days as the computer controlled systems failed.
Stored refrigerated food would spoil after about 4 days.
No road signal lights and traffic chaos for any traffic still moving.
No central government or even state government co-ordination as most government systems will have also broken down.
Medical systems would be back to a 100 years ago without power after their fuel for the back up generators ran out.
There would also be the possibility of massive losses of electronically recorded or coded information, most of which would be irreplaceable.
And much more!
Nobody talks about a direct hit from a massive CME but it would make all the claims on the effects of global warming look like a teddy bears picnic!
At over 1.4 million kilometers (869,919 miles) wide, the Sun contains 99.86 percent of the mass of the entire solar system: well over a million Earths could fit inside its bulk. The total energy radiated by the Sun averages 383 billion trillion kilowatts, the equivalent of the energy generated by 100 billion tons of TNT exploding each and every second yet still learned people suggest the sun is a minor driver of climate compared to CO2.
I read an article or comment that CMEs were more frequent in the 19th century during periods of lower sunspot numbers. Is this true? Is this one of Leif Svaalgard’s indicators that the sun was more active in the 19th than said?
I do know that some of the largest CMEs observed were in the 19th.
ROM 3:23:30
Yeah, that’s the one. Apparently it was being approved as I was typing my previous comment.
ROM (03:23:30) :
You just aren’t reading the right blog. Check out http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/25/compared-to-the-suns-power-we-are-a-fly-speck-on-an-elephants-butt/
Perhaps this activity offers a chance to test the converse of the Watts Effect. Where we know that posts about a quiet sun are often followed by reports of a new sunspeck, then it may be that reports of an active region are followed by a blank sun.
BTW, http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_igr/512/ is stale and has a 05/06 01:41 timestamp, but http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_mag/512/ (the magnetic field image) is 05/07 04:53 and is remarkably quiet.
PaulHClark (02:54:51) :
OT but relevant to solar is a post on Jennifer Marohasy’s blog covering the work of Dr Miskolczi. It suggests heat radiated from sun is the driver of our climate together with the distance of the earth from the sun.
See:
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/05/the-climatically-saturated-greenhouse-effect/
PaulClark,
Here is a short video that explains the theory clearly:
http://heliogenic.blogspot.com/2009/05/miklos-zagoni-explains-miskolczis.html
AGW is dead.