Earth-facing sunspot 1356 has developed a “beta-gamma” magnetic field that harbors energy for M-class solar flares. NOAA forecasters estimate a 30% chance of such an eruption during the next 24 hours.A bright Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) is seen in the latest Lasco
A possible filament eruption in the northwest quadrant on Sunday has generated a slow moving Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). You can watch the STEREO Ahead COR2 movie below and it looks like a portion of this cloud may be Earth directed. Stay tuned for more
If communication with Russia’s troubled Phobos-Grunt is not established by November 21, the window for a trajectory to the Martian moon Phobos, will close, experts say. But Russian space expert Igor Lisov suggested that Phobos-Grunt could be sent to orbit the Moon
On November 25th the Moon will pass in front of the sun, slightly off-center, producing a partial solar eclipse visible from Antarctica, Tasmania, and parts of South Africa and New Zealand. Maximum coverage occurs about 100 miles off the coast of Antarctica where the su
According to the International Meteor Organization, this year’s Leonid meteor shower peaked on Nov. 18th with a maximum rate of ~18 meteors per hour. That’s not many (especially compared to the Leonid storms of a decade ago), but sometimes just one Leonid can be
Phobos-Grunt is the first Russian-led interplanetary mission since the failed Mars 96. The spacecraft is also carrying the Chinese Mars orbiter Yinghuo-1 and the tiny Living Interplanetary Flight Experiment funded by the Planetary Society.Lift-off occurred
Earth is passing through the debris field of Comet Tempel-Tuttle, parent of the annual Leonid meteor shower. Barring a direct hit by a filament of dust, which forecasters consider unlikely, this year’s shower should be mild. Peak rates of 10 to 20 meteors per hour are
A magnetic prominence dancing along the sun’s southeastern limb became unstable on Nov. 15th and slowly erupted. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded the coronal mass ejection (CME), which unfolded over a period of thirteen hours: The eruption hurled a cloud
A pair of M-Class flares took place on Tuesday morning. The first one registered M1.2 and was centered around Sunspot 1348 which is located near the northwest limb. The second event at 12:43 UTC peaked at M1.9 and was located around Sunspot 1346 in the southern
Phobos-Grunt, the Russian interplanetary mission is coming back little to early. Following a successful launch from Russia’s Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and the subsequent separation of the Phobos-Grunt probe from its booster rocket on Wednesday morning, its
