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For those interested in scientific accuracy, there is a little bit of misinformation in the statement:

...Voyager 1, now some 8.4 billion miles (90 AUs) from the sun, has left the solar system and entered interstellar space by reaching the heliopause.

What scientists are speculating is that Voyager 1 has reached termination shock, which is the where the solar wind first meets interstellar plasma.

Heliopause is the outer boundary of the solar wind. This Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) from June 24, 2002 provides a nice graphically illustrated explanation of Heliopause and Terminal Shock.

It will take a number of years more for Voyager 1 to reach heliopause. Voyager 1 is currently about 90 AUs away. Heliopause is speculated to exist at 110 to 150 AUs.

For those interested in scientific accuracy, there is a little bit of misinformation in the statement:

...Voyager 1, now some 8.4 billion miles (90 AUs) from the sun, has left the solar system and entered interstellar space by reaching the heliopause.

What scientists are speculating is that Voyager 1 has reached termination shock, which is the where the solar wind first meets interstellar plasma.

Heliopause is the outer boundary of the solar wind. This Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) from June 24, 2002 provides a nice graphically illustrated explanation of Heliopause and Terminal Shock.

It will take a number of years more for Voyager 1 to reach heliopause. Voyager 1 is currently about 90 AUs away. Heliopause is speculated to exist at 110 to 150 AUs.

from-JPL.NASA "The solar system does not end at the orbit of Pluto, the ninth planet. Nor does it end at the heliopause boundary, where the solar wind can no longer continue to expand outward against the interstellar wind. It extends over a thousand times farther out where a swarm of small cometary nuclei, termed Oort's Cloud, is barely held in orbit by the Sun's gravity, feeble at such a great distance. Voyager 1 passed above the orbit of Pluto in May 1988, and Voyager 2 will pass beneath Pluto's orbit in august 1990. But even at speeds of over 35,000 mph, it will take nearly 20,000 years for the Voyagers to reach the middle of the comet swarm, and possibly twice this long for them to pass the outer boundaries of cometary space. By this time, they will have traveled a distance of two light-years, equivalent to half of the distance to Proxima Centauri, the nearest star. "

See this link.

Maybe the main thing that's "going on" is that the sun has gotten warmer lately. After all, Mars is losing ice coverage too...

NASA's page on the heliosphere

CO_2 is trapping solar energy?
If so, shouldn't that increase the temperature of the atmosphere?. Funny, how studies keep finding that the temperature of the atmosphere is actually dropping!
See: http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/essd06oc t97_1.htm
<quote>
Unlike the surface-based temperatures, global temperature measurements of the Earth's lower atmosphere obtained from satellites reveal no definitive warming trend over the past two decades. The slight trend that is in the data actually appears to be downward. The largest fluctuations in the satellite temperature data are not from any man-made activity, but from natural phenomena such as large volcanic eruptions from Mt. Pinatubo, and from El Nino. So the programs which model global warming in a computer say the temperature of the Earth's lower atmosphere should be going up markedly, but actual measurements of the temperature of the lower atmosphere reveal no such pronounced activity.
</quote>

Yes, they do. They are solar powered; in fact, the mission lifetime is determined by how long it will take for the solar panels to become degraded by dust cover.

I attended a lecture about sleep & human performance recently, and this question came up. The best strategy would be to keep the workers in an environment with a light pattern synched to mars time. Unfortunately, this would be very expensive. Even more unfortunately, since Spirit and Opportunity are landing at very different longitudes, they would need two.

That's not going to happen, so they're just using blackout shades, and telling the engineers not to spend much time in the Big Blue Room.

Yes, they do. They are solar powered; in fact, the mission lifetime is determined by how long it will take for the solar panels to become degraded by dust cover.

I attended a lecture about sleep & human performance recently, and this question came up. The best strategy would be to keep the workers in an environment with a light pattern synched to mars time. Unfortunately, this would be very expensive. Even more unfortunately, since Spirit and Opportunity are landing at very different longitudes, they would need two.

That's not going to happen, so they're just using blackout shades, and telling the engineers not to spend much time in the Big Blue Room.

Considering that Mars is experiencing global warming as well, maybe the situation is entirely out of our control? Perhaps we, as humans, have overrated our ability to affect our planet? Or would the extreme environmentalists claim we are somehow screwing Mars over too?

Of course, if this does indicate more of a pattern throughout the Solar System, then we have no control over it whatsoever. Which is probably why it's not really discussed.

Oh, and if you don't like the ABC link above, try it straight from the horse's mouth.

Thanks. Should be interesting.

BTW, your link was out of date. The closest I could find was this: http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Newsroom/FactSheets/FS-05 2-DFRC.html.

HOLY CRAP!

Some of the flights of the X-15 had problems with bouncing off of the atmosphere, and the flight plan for space ship one is almost exactly the same. So they probably do have to worry about re-entry to some extent.

According to this site the flare seems to be well above X20 and, therefore, the strongest ever recorded.

Considering this activity is outside of the 11 year high in the cycle,

According to NASA, this current cycle hit its midpoint in 2000. That's only three years ago and only about 1/4 of the way through the cycle, or 1/2 the way back to the nadir of solar activity. We're about as far from the peak as from the trough, so it's not inconceivable that we'd have this kind of activity now.

I am not an astronomer, of course.

I wonder if there is a chance that the sun may do something that may kill us all. Like shed its entire outer skin or something...

Does that mean I'd be spared the deadline pressure I'm currently under?

So you're saying the Maunder Minimum and the resultant Little Ice Age didn't effect Western European history?

This page from Nasa's Astronomy Picture of the day site shows some amazing images of these sun spots.

They already did the scanning. Now the only need to match it with pictures which I'm sure are available as well.
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/

Actually its only 363 feet or so vertically - you should be safe in the capsule on the top of the damn thing without getting pulverized.

This is only because the shuttle's launch system sprays massive amounts of water a few feet above the launch pad to diffuse the sound reflected from the ground. Without this system, the sound waves reflecting up from the launch pad would destroy the shuttle.

Here's a link with more info: Sound Suppression Water System

Let's not forget that a lot of NASA's budget goes into things not related to the space program. They do research into things like aviation technology; don't forget, NASA evolved from the NACA - the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. They do research in Computer and Information Sciences, geophysics, and biology.... and all of these example come from the NASA Ames Lab; there are 10 other NASA centers! I'm in favor of piloted space as much as anyone, but we have to be careful to bear in mind NASA's other tasks when we discuss what they do and do not have the resources to do.

Let's not forget that a lot of NASA's budget goes into things not related to the space program. They do research into things like aviation technology; don't forget, NASA evolved from the NACA - the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. They do research in Computer and Information Sciences, geophysics, and biology.... and all of these example come from the NASA Ames Lab; there are 10 other NASA centers! I'm in favor of piloted space as much as anyone, but we have to be careful to bear in mind NASA's other tasks when we discuss what they do and do not have the resources to do.

Let's not forget that a lot of NASA's budget goes into things not related to the space program. They do research into things like aviation technology; don't forget, NASA evolved from the NACA - the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. They do research in Computer and Information Sciences, geophysics, and biology.... and all of these example come from the NASA Ames Lab; there are 10 other NASA centers! I'm in favor of piloted space as much as anyone, but we have to be careful to bear in mind NASA's other tasks when we discuss what they do and do not have the resources to do.

Let's not forget that a lot of NASA's budget goes into things not related to the space program. They do research into things like aviation technology; don't forget, NASA evolved from the NACA - the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. They do research in Computer and Information Sciences, geophysics, and biology.... and all of these example come from the NASA Ames Lab; there are 10 other NASA centers! I'm in favor of piloted space as much as anyone, but we have to be careful to bear in mind NASA's other tasks when we discuss what they do and do not have the resources to do.

Apparently no one around here has heard of the MODIS Rapid Response System or the GeoMAC Wildfire Mapping sites.

Enjoy,
The JungleBoy

True. Some indicators for solar activity have been recorded for over a hundred years; the aforementioned magnetometer data and the sunspot number: http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/IONO/sunspot.html

Also, prominences located at the edges of the visible "disk" of the sun have been observed probably as long as that: I found some nice modern day examples in here: http://www.digilife.be/club/Franky.Dubois/world.ht m

But, none of these methods produce quantitative data of the precision or scope available today. One of the top instruments (well, intstrument platform actually)is the SOHO spacecraft launched in 1995 http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/

There have probably been other solar observing satellites prior to soho, but I can't remember any specifics (anyone?).

So, yes, unless a particle storm from a CME event hit earth square in the face, so to speak, there would be no quantitative data of such an event older than... a handful of decades?

...both CMEs came from the same spot on the sun?

Yes, they did. The culprit is known as "sunspot 486". More data at www.spaceweather.com.

Is the sun's rotation much greater than 24 hours?

Actually, there's a latitudal variation to the angular speed of the sun's surface. The period of sun's rotation around solar equator is 29 (Earth)days. On the 60 latitude it's 25 days.

If, however, we do have 100+ years date on all CME events, we would be able to say that it's a statistical anomaly. I just think it's more likely that we don't understand enough about the sun's behavior to properly characerize this event.

I suppose it's an anomalous event in the scope of the recorded history of Earth's magnetic field data... True, to extend this probabilistic term to the entire lifespan and surface of the sun would be silly. But, you have to take in he human aspect of the situation; it's on of the biggest events monitored and recorded. It's a one thing to have the mathematical intuition that events of some magnitude are possible, and to actually witness one (ie. you know that it's possible to win lottery. But you don't, very often. At least I don't :) )

You're also being wrong. CMEs and solar flares are caused by anomalies in the Sun's magnetic field that are also associated with sunspots. This means these events are closely correlated with both individual sunspots and overall sunspot activity.

I for one welcome the alien overlords who are hurling comets at the sun. Even if those fools at NASA claim that it has nothing to do with it.

I for one welcome the alien overlords who are hurling comets at the sun. Even if those fools at NASA claim that it has nothing to do with it.

The MAP (Microwave Anisotropy Probe) showed that the Hubble Constant is 71 Km/Mpc. The Universe is, therefore, still expanding at a speed greater than the speed of light. The analogy of the parent post was beautiful... I understood the facts before, but now I can explain them!

Aurora pictures from last night

The above page has pictures taken in places like Georgia, Iowa, Oklahoma, Texas... some *great* views in Colorado, too. Alaska? The entire sky was green and red last night.

It was too windy here ( SF bay area ) for me to have ventured out last night. Ok, I admit, I forgot to look. My view to the north sucks anyway.

NASA System
Diracian

Actually, we have very accurate data telling us what the spectrum of acoustic oscillations or "sound" was at the time of the "decoupling" of photons and matter, which was only about 350,000 years after the big bang. You might want to check out the technical papers coming out of the WMAP project, to which I have no affiliation. They've produced the most accurate maps of this acoustic noise, and this is the data that was used to make the "sound recordings". Seems kosher to me, and IAANP, so you can trust me :-)

If the earthobservatory sites are down, go to the spacecraft sites themselves.

They are:

• Terra Spacecraft
• Aqua Spacecraft

There are other sites for the other spacecraft as well. These are the ones that I like to promote because I helped to write the command and control software for them.

If the earthobservatory sites are down, go to the spacecraft sites themselves.

They are:

• Terra Spacecraft
• Aqua Spacecraft

There are other sites for the other spacecraft as well. These are the ones that I like to promote because I helped to write the command and control software for them.

The MODIS Gallery, especially the 10/23 compared to 10/28 really does put things into perspective. It's amazing how big of an impact the fires have caused.

The MODIS Gallery, especially the 10/23 compared to 10/28 really does put things into perspective. It's amazing how big of an impact the fires have caused.

The MODIS Gallery, especially the 10/23 compared to 10/28 really does put things into perspective. It's amazing how big of an impact the fires have caused.

This page has a similar picture. It is from NASA's SEAWIFS project. It shows the same fires in a larger area and zoomed out to give a better perspective. Click on the smaller picture to get a gigantic version of the smaller one.

You can see a pretty cool before picture (note, by before, I mean _yesterday_)...

Before

And now, check out the after (today):

After

You can see a pretty cool before picture (note, by before, I mean _yesterday_)...

Before

And now, check out the after (today):

After

don't forget about this one

This story had me wondering if the SOHO satellite at the 1st LaGrange Point was at risk, but I guess NASA has already adressed that:

The high level of energetic particles have caused two SOHO instruments to take precautionary measures: CDS has stopped taking science, and is continually reading out ("draining") their detectors to prevent damage. UVCS ramped down their high voltages and turned of the high voltage supply. Other instruments are less affected, although the onslaught of particles is quite noticeable for some. The "snow" in EIT and LASCO images is not just making it difficult to spot new CMEs, it is also making their on-board compression algorithm less efficient - over time, their observations lag behind the schedule because images take longer to downlink, and their buffer fills up.

Fascinating. I suppose it makes sense to assume that any kind of space photography is mostly going to be of blackness, and so the image data should be highly compressable. But with an event like this, it must be like the satellite is being passed over by a misty fog, and the compression algorithms will break down.

But stilll, space is big. Fantastically big. And two billion tons of material? You may think that's a lot, but to space that's just doodley squat. </bad-hhgttg>

So with that in mind, how much of this material is likely to actually interact with SOHO? How much damage, if any, is the satellite likely to sustain in an event like this? It seems like losing that satellite would be almost as bad as losing Hubble...

This story had me wondering if the SOHO satellite at the 1st LaGrange Point was at risk, but I guess NASA has already adressed that:

The high level of energetic particles have caused two SOHO instruments to take precautionary measures: CDS has stopped taking science, and is continually reading out ("draining") their detectors to prevent damage. UVCS ramped down their high voltages and turned of the high voltage supply. Other instruments are less affected, although the onslaught of particles is quite noticeable for some. The "snow" in EIT and LASCO images is not just making it difficult to spot new CMEs, it is also making their on-board compression algorithm less efficient - over time, their observations lag behind the schedule because images take longer to downlink, and their buffer fills up.

Fascinating. I suppose it makes sense to assume that any kind of space photography is mostly going to be of blackness, and so the image data should be highly compressable. But with an event like this, it must be like the satellite is being passed over by a misty fog, and the compression algorithms will break down.

But stilll, space is big. Fantastically big. And two billion tons of material? You may think that's a lot, but to space that's just doodley squat. </bad-hhgttg>

So with that in mind, how much of this material is likely to actually interact with SOHO? How much damage, if any, is the satellite likely to sustain in an event like this? It seems like losing that satellite would be almost as bad as losing Hubble...

And, actually, a more recent picture shows two enormous sunspots and a newer, largish group. The one that erupted while pointed at us is the middle lower one.

Yup. You saw the sunspots that are in the first image of the news post. The eruption came from the one you see on the left side of the image (the one on right flared, too, but it wasn't pointed right at us).

Pretty nifty! It states a comment should vaporize before impacting, but it is still kind of ironic!

I bet it was an alien spaceship or missile and its doomsday! :P

If you're interested in looking at the offending sunspots in question here they are...

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/Ar chive/Oct2003/California_fc.TMOA2003299_lrg.jpg

Yes, but will the Antelope run Longhorn?