Uptick in solar activity, SDO HMI/AIA data distribution center under emergency repairs
Image credit: SOHO Lasco C3
Solar activity is picking up again. After M3.5 on December 19 at 23:19 UTC and M1.6 on December 20 at 11:57 UTC Sun unleashed more M-class flares today and it looks like it's going to continue.
Today, Region 1928 (S18W55, Ekc/beta-gamma) produced M1.9 at 08:11 UTC, M1.1 at 08:37 UTC and M3.3 at 15:12 UTC. This region is located near the west limb and will soon become farside region.
But, at 14:38 UTC today Region 1934 (S15E45, Dac/beta-gamma) located in southeast quadrant erupted with M1.6 solar flare. This region is growing both in size and magnetic complexity and is rotating into more geoeffective position.
Other regions on the visible disk were stable or in decay in last 24 hours (December 22, 12:30 UTC). No Earth-directed coronal mass ejection (CMEs) were observed.
NOAA SWPC forecasters estimated 40% chance for M-class, and 10% chance for X-class solar flares in next 72 hours.
Image below shows positions of sunspots on visible disk on December 21, 2013.
Image courtesy SDO/HMI via SolarHam
The geomagnetic field was quiet in last 24 hours and it is expected to stay like that in next three days.
SDO HMI/AIA under emergency repairs
Unfortunately, the SDO HMI/AIA data distribution system is undergoing some emergency repairs, and image updates from sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov have been suspended until they are complete.
SDO personnel are diagnosing the problem and it is not clear how long the outage will last. Data from SDO/EVE, including SAM images, will continue to be available during the outage.
I'm a dedicated researcher, journalist, and editor at The Watchers. With over 20 years of experience in the media industry, I specialize in hard science news, focusing on extreme weather, seismic and volcanic activity, space weather, and astronomy, including near-Earth objects and planetary defense strategies. You can reach me at teo /at/ watchers.news.
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