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ST. PATRICK'S DAY
GEOMAGNETIC STORM: The strongest
geomagnetic storm of the current solar cycle is subsiding.
Last night, March 17-18, the polar tempest sparked
bright auroras around the Arctic Circle, creating
scenes like this one over Kiruna, Sweden:

"I've never seen purples as deep
as this before!" says Oliver Wright, who was up
all night taking pictures. "I drove home during
dawn and now have to sleep--the life of a happy
aurora photographer."
The subsiding storm got started
during the early hours of March 17th when a
fast-moving CME hit Earth's magnetic field. At
first, the CME's impact had little effect,
producing no more than a minor G1-class
(Kp=5)
magnetic disturbance. As Earth moved into the
CME's strongly-magnetized wake, however, the storm
intensified until it became a G4-class
(Kp=8)
event. For more than 9 hours, it was the strongest
geomagnetic storm of the current solar cycle. The
glow of Northern Lights was seen as far south as
Kansas and Virginia.
Realtime
Aurora Photo
Gallery
Geomagnetic storms do more than
just produce auroras. Amateur radio operators
noticed strong disruptions to long-distance
communications. David Hassall (WA5DJJ) of
Las Cruces, New Mexico, sends this report:
"Shortly after the CME hit on March 17th, we
experienced strong disruptions on the 10 meter (30
MHz) band. [Pictured below] is a screenshot of 200
mW transmissions on the path between Las Cruces,
New Mexico and Northland, New Zealand as received
by ZL2IK."

"The signal disruption happened
on this radio path at 04:46 UTC (about 15 minutes
after the CME arrived) and shifted the frequency
of mine and other signals which were traversing
that path. We are always studying the effects of
solar events on our tiny signals and from this
screenshot you see that they can be quite dynamic.
Signals from England on this screenshot were
affected differently than the ones from the
USA."
SPACE YEAST:
On March 17th, Spaceweather.com
and the students of Earth
to Sky Calculus flew a Space Weather Buoy into
the geomagnetic storm to measure the effect of the
CME's impact on cosmic rays in the stratosphere.
Along with radiation detectors and other sensors,
the payload carried some hitchhikers--brewer's and
baker's yeast:

During their ascent to the
stratosphere, the yeast experienced temperatures
as low as -60 C, air pressures only 1% of sea
level, and cosmic ray dose rates 40 times
Earth-normal.
What can you do with Space Yeast?
Bake space bread, brew space beer, or whip up any
recipe that calls for yeast. Also, teachers and
homeschoolers can conduct some cool classroom
experiments.
If you would like a packet of
space yeast, you can have one by making a donation
of $49.95 to Earth to Sky Calculus. Every flown
packet of baker's yeast comes with a control
packet that remained behind on Earth during the
flight, so you can conduct a properly-controlled
scientific experiment. All proceeds support
student space weather research. Contact Dr.
Tony Phillips to place your order.
Realtime
Space Weather
Photo Gallery
Realtime
Comet Photo
Gallery
Every night, a
network of NASA
all-sky cameras scans
the skies above the United
States for meteoritic fireballs. Automated
software
maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office
calculates their
orbits, velocity, penetration depth
in Earth's atmosphere and many
other characteristics.
Daily results are presented here on
Spaceweather.com.
On Mar. 18, 2015, the network reported
0 fireballs.
(0
sporadics)
In this diagram of the inner solar
system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a
single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded
by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue). [Larger
image] [movies]
Potentially Hazardous
Asteroids (
PHAs)
are space rocks
larger than approximately 100m that
can come closer to Earth than 0.05
AU. None of the
known PHAs is on a collision course with our
planet, although
astronomers are finding
new
ones all the
time.
On
March 18, 2015
there were
potentially
hazardous asteroids.
Notes: LD means
"Lunar Distance." 1 LD
= 384,401 km, the distance
between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals
0.00256 AU. MAG is
the visual magnitude of the asteroid on
the date of closest
approach.
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The
official
U.S. government space weather
bureau |
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The
first place
to look for information about sundogs,
pillars, rainbows and
related phenomena. |
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Researchers
call it a
"Hubble for the sun." SDO
is the most advanced solar
observatory ever. |
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3D
views of the
sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial
Relations
Observatory |
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Realtime
and archival
images of the Sun from
SOHO. |
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from
the NOAA
Space Environment Center |
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the
underlying
science of space weather |