Spaceweather.com writes: (link mine)
The CME launched toward Earth by the July 12th X-flare has not yet arrived. However, we are still within the forecast window set by analysts at the Goddard Space Weather Lab. The cloud should hit at 09:17 UT plus or minus 7 hours on Saturday, July 14th. Weekend auroras are likely.
In the meantime, you can check the WUWT Solar Reference page and watch the data from the satellites, the CME should announce its arrival prominently.
Well, I think that UTC 1600 has passed (0900 + 7 = 1600?). 17 minutes to go. … …
Heard some ‘waves’ of white noise (an elevated broad-spectrum ‘noise’ whose intensity or amplitude changed on the scale as measured in seconds) on 10m (about 28.124 MHz) roughly an hour ago now … not sure what that was directly indicative of though …
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ZAP!!!!!
OMG did the CME just vaporize James Hansen and his flunky Gavin?!!!
Then I awoke much saddened. The dream was over.
About the difference is CME ‘strength’ between NASA and NOAA:
NASA is forced to exaggerate stories about killer flares to get a little more funding for starving soft-money scientists.
What was exaggerated to get the funding shifted from the SCSC to the Space Scuttle and ISS-Blackhole One?
I recognize this comment as a blatant hijack that may rightfully disappear down that same Schwarzes Loch.
Geomagnetic field is starting to move
http://flux.phys.uit.no/cgi-bin/plotgeodata.cgi?Last24&site=tro2a&
Plus or minus seven hours, why such a wide band on something with so much energy? Is the signature saturated in the sun?
Yes it is starting to move in response to the increasing charge as the plasma ejection (charged particles) are accelerated towards the Earth.
The flare was almost pointing at the Earth when it erupted but thanks to the Sun’s speedy rotation and the conservation of momentum during the 2 days it took to get this far out we’ll see no effect.
I like to monitor the “dashboard” entitled “ACE Real Time Solar Wind Pages” on
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/SWN/.
When Magnetic Field Bz Component goes south by a large magnitude, things begin to get interesting. You can also see the “gustiness” of the solar wind from this widget.
It is definitly here. The Aural Oval is very thick and red, winds have been hovering around the 600 mark, and the Bz has been down around -10
Oulu Neutron count dropping sharply the last 4 hours.
Some of the image links on your Solar Reference page are broken.
vukcevic says:
July 14, 2012 at 10:48 am
Geomagnetic field is starting to move
Under the normal definition of the Geomagnetic Field there is no movement. The field in the ring current several earth radii away is increasing and we see that as added to the Geomagnetic Filed to yield the combined observed field at the surface [including several other second order effects].
FergalR says:
July 14, 2012 at 11:50 am
The flare was almost pointing at the Earth when it erupted but thanks to the Sun’s speedy rotation and the conservation of momentum during the 2 days it took to get this far out we’ll see no effect.,
Leif Svalgaard:
Thank you for entering the conversatino. A couple of questions please.
1. As I understand it, a CME is (more or less) a directional mass of light/plasma/energy/particles: beginning radially from a fixed spot on the sun, continuing a (relatively short while) then diminishing. .
If so, then we’d see the light 8 minutes delay – immediately, regardless of CME latitude and longitude. But, the light would arrive at earth’s orbit, faster particles next, slower ones later, but all would follow that initial trajectory from the sun. A nheutral particle would speed radially away from the sun – but would be spiral out. But each charged particle would be twisted and spiral, however, due to the sun’s rotation during the eruption and the sun’s magnetic and electrical fields right?.
So, then we’d only be hit by what little particles actually intercept the earth’s orbit at the specific point of earth’s plane if and only if those particles tracked radially and orbitally away from the sun at the right rate and the right “vertical” speed to hit the moving earth, right?
If so, how does this prediction match both the pulse and the direction and the duration: A the travel time for particles differs from those of the light/emf energy in time, path, and “spin” (shape) of the outgassing mass. That is, if we “see” the outline of the CME at the edge of the sun when it is at maximum, then it would be “aimed” 90 degrees from the earth’s current path when it is ejected. Two days later when the particles cross earth’s orbit, the earth hasn’t moved much in its orbit, so the CME mass still is “aimed” where the earth was 90 days previously. So, why is the CME a threat – unless it projects its particles in a direction to actually intercept our current position in orbit? (Or, are all CME’s a threat because they “throw a long spiral” of particles that cross all of the earth’s orbital positions simultaneously?
2. Are CME’s (number, average intensity of each CME, maximum intensity of individual intensities), directly proportional to the sunspot cycle? To a positive of negative sunspot cycle, or to a inverse of the sunspot cycle count? (More sunspots = same, less, or more) CME’s?
RACookPE1978 says:
July 14, 2012 at 8:44 pm
A neutral particle would speed radially away from the sun – but would be spiral out. But each charged particle would be twisted and spiral, however, due to the sun’s rotation during the eruption and the sun’s magnetic and electrical fields right?
No, the CME particles as all solar wind stream radially away from the Sun [this we can directly observe], simple because the kinetic energy of the ordinary particles is MUCH larger than that of the magnetic field. Near the surface of the Sun, it is the other way around, so there is a point [called the Alfven point] where the energies are equal. This is only about 10 solar radii out.
Or, are all CME’s a threat because they “throw a long spiral” of particles that cross all of the earth’s orbital positions simultaneously?
The CME particles do not follow a spiral path out from the Sun. They reach the Earth radially after one to four days [depending on their lift-off speed], during which time the Earth has barely moved at all. The spiral you often hear about is the magnetic field lines. On its way to the Earth, the CME site on the Sun is rotating with the Sun. Since the magnetic field is frozen into the solar wind plasma the field lines are wound by the rotation into a spiral, which at the Earth makes a 45 degree angle with the radial direction, but which much further out in the heliosphere actually is wound up to 20 times around the Sun.
2. Are CME’s (number, average intensity of each CME, maximum intensity of individual intensities), directly proportional to the sunspot cycle?
Pretty much as far as number is concerned [more sunspots, more CMEs], but the ‘intensity’ of each individual CME does not depend on the solar cycle as the intensity is determined by local conditions at the site where the CME comes from.
Just in case video compilation has not been shown already
Estimated planetary K-index (Kp) is now 6, with high latitude K-index at 7. (Last line. -1’s denote future estimates)
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ftpdir/indices/DGD.txt
The Canadian magnetometer chain is showing a flurry of magnetic activity (arranged so that the topmost chart is furthest North):
http://geomag.nrcan.gc.ca/data-donnee/plt/ssp-1-eng.php
Nothing remarkable that we haven’t seen in the recent past, but the Earth is definitely in “magnetic storm” condition due to the CME from the X-flare.
😐
@Norman Page
> Oulu Neutron count dropping sharply the last 4 hours.
Ditto Moscow Neutron count …
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/
http://cr0.izmiran.rssi.ru/mosc/main.htm
… thus demonstrating the solar wind protecting us from the galactic cosmic rays.
Then what protects us from the solar wind?
The Earth’s magnetic field, whose dipole moment points North, thus opposing the magnetic field in the solar wind Bz component, which usually points North also. But when Bz dips South, the resulting connection admits solar wind into the Earth’s magnetosphere and can cause great mischief.
In the last few hours Bz in the far Northern Europe has ‘collapsed’ which is unusual for mid-daylight time
http://flux.phys.uit.no/cgi-bin/plotgeodata.cgi?Last24&site=tro2a&
John Day says:
July 15, 2012 at 4:43 am
Nothing remarkable that we haven’t seen in the recent past, but the Earth is definitely in “magnetic storm” condition due to the CME from the X-flare.
And that is due to the large southward fields at the ‘backside’ of the CME. Just shows how unpredictable these things are.
vukcevic says:
July 15, 2012 at 6:24 am
In the last few hours Bz in the far Northern Europe has ‘collapsed’ which is unusual for mid-daylight time
The ring current that causes an increase in Z [don’t use Bz as that is confusing with its use for the IMF, and Z is the correct name for the vertical component] is not mostly concentrated on the night side and its effect simply decreases when the station moves onto the day side.
Leif Svalgaard says:
July 15, 2012 at 8:33 am
The ring current that causes an increase in Z [don’t use Bz as that is confusing with its use for the IMF, and Z is the correct name for the vertical component] is mostly concentrated on the night side
There was a little ‘not’ there that shouldn’t be there.
Yes Sir, it will be Z .
Incredible aurora last night here in NE MN. Big green curtains, ebbing and flowing with bright pulses covering the whole northern sky, even directly overhead. The one thing that caught my attention was the very rapid pulsing (like a strobe light) of the aurora over the top of the curtains. Energy waves coming in from the north were intense. They would slow down from time to time, but for the most part, very energetic. Humidity was up, so they were slightly obscured from the haze, so not the most ideal viewing, but good enough. To bad a weather front is coming in, because it looks like a good show is very probable tonight.
@John Day
> Nothing remarkable that we haven’t seen in the recent past …
Perhaps my comment needs to be revised. The storm has now been sustained (mostly) at Kp=5 & 6 for over 24 hours. Solar wind Bz is still negative, so looks like storm will persist for awhile longer.
Is this going to set a record for SC24 “longest geomagnetic storm”?
> Is this going to set a record for SC24 “longest geomagnetic storm”?
… and if so, will the CAGW crowd claim another “extreme weather” catastrophe?
😐
Playing the Field: Geomagnetic Storms and the Stock Market
Atlanta Federal Reserve 2003
http://www.oss.cc/library/Solar_Flares.pdf
Current SSN score up for July (15) on SIDC count is about 90, so the SSN final for July will be definitely above 45, but more likely high 60s or low 70s, since there is blank sun ahead.
Tom in Texas says:
July 15, 2012 at 7:40 pm
……
In far northern latitudes, strong solar storms ‘can affect’ electrical brain patterns.
Dr.S. occasionally recalls his experience from his visit to the USSR and the ‘lunatic index’ of solar activity (lot of it elsewhere too).
@me
> Is this going to set a record …. ?
No. The storm is over and didn’t last as long as the March 2012 storm.
http://hirweb.nict.go.jp/sedoss/solact3/do?d=2012%2c03%2c07
(Scroll to bottom to see K-index time-line)
Long ago, I stopped visiting some interesting places like Bonneville Dam, on the Columbia, or the Grand Coulee Dam.
I just don’t want to be near one of those places, when one of those solar flares hits, and welds the brushes of one of those monstrous Siemens alternators, and freezes up the turbine, sending a huge tidal wave, back up the tube tunnel and blowing up the dam. That would flood half of Northern Oregon, or Eastern Washington, and I don’t want to be there when that happens.
But living in the Bay area, near Moffett Field and the three local commercial airports, is almost as dangerous; with the likelihood of all those jet planes dropping out of the sky with seized up engines, and burned out flight controls.
We need to go back to some safe alternatives, like kerosene lamps, that simply blow out the flame, when the sun gose ape.