Keith Strong@drkstrong
7h

CME WATCH - 2023.03.09: All is relatively quiet with a few minor CMEs  from various areas of the Sun but then near the end there is a massive explosion off the entire west limb!

Keith Strong@drkstrong
7h

Here comes Mercury! the bright object in the bottom right (SW) is Mercury making its way behind the Sun from being a morning star to becoming an evening star. Remember last month Saturn passed behind the Sun but it moved left to right but Mercury is moving the other way! Why?

Keith Strong@drkstrong

CME WATCH - 2023.03.10: A very active couple of days. It starts with the huge CME we saw late yesterday off the west limb, followed by a couple of minor ones off the SW and NE limbs respectively. A large bubble CME off the W limb followed by another huge event off the SW limb.

Keith Strong@drkstrong
18h

TWO-RIBBON FLARE: The source of that large CME was a two-ribbon flare in the SW part of the Sun. The dark band across the image is a dense, cool (50K) filament above the solar surface. It becomes active and erupts. In doing so, it leaves two bright ribbons that slowly spread.

Keith Strong
@drkstrong
·
18h
THE 2-RIBBON FLARE - PART 2:  The bright ribbons are the foot points of an arcade of magnetic loops formed as the original coronal loops that were blown open by the CME reconnect and conduct heat towards the solar surface. You can see the new loops in this hotter channel (2.4MK).

Space Weather Watch@spacewxwatch

CME UPDATE:
Yesterday, the Sun launched a filament eruption off the western limb resulting in a wide CME which is expected to graze Earth. Given the complexity of the eruption, there's quite a bit of uncertainty in timing; NOAA and NASA simulations of the event agree about the grazing aspect of the CME but have not yet come to a consensus about the arrival time. Earliest arrival time would be earlier in the Zulu day Tuesday, March 14th with arrival time possibly as late as March 15th. Periods of active geomagnetic activity or minor storming is expected with any arrival.

Keith Strong@drkstrong
8h

THE SUN TODAY: 

1) SSN down to 135 and will likely drop further as we are losing 3 regions over the west limb in the next day or two.
2) No significant flares in the last day.
3) No new regions immediately behind the west limb.
4) Only one new region emerging (white).
5) 10 CMEs.

Keith Strong@drkstrong
8h

SPECTACULAR ERUPTION OFF THE NE LIMB OF THE SUN:  We see a large filament start rise, become unstable and explode away from the Sun. But note at its southern end, falling plasma crashes into the surface causing wide-spread heating. Note its massive size, compare to Earth (inset).

SpaceWeatherNews
Look at the earth scale to understand just how enormous today's solar eruption was, how dense the plasma CME was, and how lucky we are it was not aimed at earth. https://pic.twitter.com/lK9gCS5WFq

Keith Strong
@drkstrong
·
32m
THE SUN TODAY: Getting quieter
1) SunSpot Number down again to 115.
2) No significant flares in the last day
3) No significant new regions just behind the E limb
4) Lots of sunspot regions but all small and mostly decaying. Total sunspot area <700 millionths.
5) 12 CMEs yesterday

Keith Strong@drkstrong
6h

CORONAL MASS EJECTION PASSES EARTH TODAY. A CME ejected from the Sun a day or so ago will brush past Earth at 22:00 UT. In the upper panel you can see that its eastern edge just hits us (green dot - left frame) & passes just below us (middle). The impact will not be great (right)

Keith Strong@drkstrong
3h

CME WATCH - 2023.03.14: We start where we left off yesterday with the halo CME (see earlier tweet). Then another big eruption off the Northwest limb which was the C3 flare and the origin of the protons we see as "snow". Otherwise, quiet with some minor activity off the West Limb.

Keith Strong@drkstrong
3m

4TH HOTTEST FEBRUARY ON RECORD. Antarctic sea ice at its lowest seasonal extent on record and the Arctic was the 3rd lowest. Meanwhile globally, it was the 6th warmest arboreal winter on record (Dec 2022 - Feb 2023).