New aurora activity

[Doug_Kiesling]

The northern half of the US and similar latitudes may see the aurora tonight, a strong geomagnetic storm is in progress at the moment and may intensify further. A

I chased, I saw a faint glow and got to see some great clear sky near Hinkley MN. Lowest temps recorded while waiting for the strange lights in the sky was -29F and thats NOT with the wind chill.

[Broken External Image]:[URL]http://www.lightningboy.net/another_day_at_office.jpg

 

[Brad Emel]

Sunspot 720 sent out a big solar flare with yet another CME coming our way. The flare was an X3. The Space Environment Center (SEC) is currently reporting a G3 geomagnetic storm, probably from the previous flares. According to http://www.spaceweather.com the storm is going to hit sometime on the 18th or 19th.

Hopefully it will be powerful enough to see in central Illinois. The storm last November was unbelievable!

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Tonight is the BIG one. I can feel it, lol. JINX.....sorry all. I predict it will start at 4 p.m. central and last right up until sunset. The clouds will go away just in time to see it go bye bye. Seriously though, good things are going to happen tonight in the Aurora department. I am not sure I've ever seen them mention possible extreme geo storming. Usually they stop at strong to severe and let it do what it will do. The one that got us on the 7th of November wasn't even an X class flare was it?

[Broken External Image]:http://www.sec.noaa.gov/ftpdir/plots/2004_plots/xray/20041106_xray.gif

 

[Jeff Lawson]

I'm excited about tonight, but I'm worried about clouds. The last couple of nights, we've had clear skies (for the most part) up until about 1:00 AM, at which point it goes from clear to overcast in about a half hour's time. It looks like we might be starting off with cloud cover tonight. Bah.

If it's clear, though, I might go ahead and drive north of town and get away from the city lights. I mean, I look at those shots you got from Blair back in November, and that's only 30 miles up the road, so it's not like I'd have to go far to find dark skies. I guess I could drive west or east, for that matter, but might as well head north and get Omaha behind me.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

If you aren't space weather-saavy, and live near OK, you can check out NWSFO OUNs little graphic at http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/enhanced.php , which I'm assume they'll update later today... Now, if only I had my new Sigma 24-70mm for my 20D...

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Yeah Jeff even if you were to drive east or northeast a bit it should get better. The ones last time were seen smack in the middle of Omaha, but of course not as well. I think you'd be fine on the north side of Council Bluffs. That is if it isn't as cloudy as it is right now. Might actually have to make a bit of a drive for this one tonight. Looks like Norfolk or Yankton should be clear by sunset. At least it will be warmer!

 

[Susan Strom]

I wonder if this is worth another late night in the desert. I'm at the 34th parallel but during the last big show, a faint red glow was seen out of Flagstaff, so there might be a shot. I'll watch the indices and see. Wouldn't that be a trip if it was seen this far south (it has before, in Payson, 1 hour up the road from my town).

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Impact! It is herrrreeeeeeeee. Solar wind speed just went from crawl to near max. Now 2 more steps, Bz needs to go south and clouds need to go with it.

 

[Jeff Lawson]

Sigh...I'm completely socked in here. And given the bit of snowmelt that occurred today, we're probably in for some fog, even if the cloud cover does manage to beat it (which, looking at IR, seems unlikely).

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Hopefully the winds will keep us from getting much fog.

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

LOL sounds like it was already here!
http://www.spacew.com/aurora/forum.html

 

[Bill Schintler]

Auroral display the night of 01/20 - 01/21...

A large solar event occurred at 7 UTC today. The effects of it should reach the earth starting at around 6 UTC tomorrow (CST: tonight at midnight). This may result in a significant auroral display in the northern US states (where it's clear to see it).

Here's an animation:
http://gse.gi.alaska.edu/recent/javascript_movie.html
- bill

 

[Skip Talbot]

Can't the aurora wait until after this snow system has moved out of here? Looks like we will still be socked in with clouds tomorrow. Ai ya!

 

[Bill Schintler]

A geomagnetic storm has started...

http://www.sec.noaa.gov/rt_plots/kp_3d.html

 

[Glen Romine]

Yeah, field indices are hopping all over the place - a major storm indeed. Might still be going strong by the time sunset gets here - but clouds will be a problem for many of us. Maybe Mike will be able to capture some more eye candy for us.

Glen