Terry's Astronomy Thread.

[Bluearrowll]

Daily Suspicious0bserver's Weather Post:
September 27, 2014

What's in the sky tonight?
September 27, 2014

-Fast-growing sunspot AR2175 has developed a 'beta-gamma-delta' magnetic field that harbors energy for significant eruptions. As a result, NOAA forecasters have upped the daily odds of M-class flares to 65% and X-flares to 10%. Stay tuned for weekend fireworks.

-During the early hours of Sept. 26th, something exploded behind the southeastern edge of the solar disk. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory photographed a massive plume of debris rising over the sun's limb.

As the inset shows, the plasma-plume was big enough to swallow dozens of planets Earth. In this case, however, Earth was not in the line of fire. The ejecta will completely miss our planet.

X-rays from the eruption registered C8 on the Richter Scale of Solar Flares. The actual intensity must have been much higher, though, because the flare was eclipsed by the edge of the sun. The underlying active region might be potent.

In a few days, the blast site will emerge into view as the sun's rotation turns it toward Earth. Then we will be able to evaluate its potential for future eruptions, increasingly geoeffective as the sun slowly spins on its axis.

Astro Picture of the Day:
September 27, 2014

Source:
Taken from an Atlantic beach, Cape Canaveral, planet Earth, four identically framed digital images are combined in this night skyscape. Slightly shifted short star trails dot the sky, but the exposure times were adjusted to follow the flight of a Falcon 9 rocket. The September 21 launch delivered a Dragon X capsule filled with supplies to the International Space Station. Above the bright flare seen just after launch, the rocket's first stage firing trails upward from the left. After separation, the second stage burn begins near center with the vehicle climbing toward low Earth orbit. At the horizon, the flare near center records the re-ignition and controlled descent of the Falcon 9's first stage to a soft splashdown off the coast.