THE WILSON EFFECT: The air in the French Alps was unusually steady on Aug. 25th when the comet lines up with Gemini's brightest stars, Castor and Pollux, making it particularly easy to find. Comet Nishimura can be found in the pre-dawn sky using backyard telescopes larger than 6 inches. This would make it visible to the naked eye from rural areas. Standard models suggest a peak brightness of 3rd magnitude. Possibilities range from dramatic brightening to a disappointing fizzle. Anything could happen when intense sunlight touches the comet's pristine surface for the first time. 18th, the comet will make its closest approach to the sun deep inside the orbit of Mercury. Indeed, that is more likely.īecause this is Comet Nishimura's first trip to the inner solar system, it is extra unpredictable. Does that mean Comet Nishimura is an interstellar comet? Not necessarily. It will visit us only once, with the sun acting as a gravitational slingshot, sending the comet hurtling back into deep space after its flyby. Although it is relatively dim right now (magnitude +9), Comet Nishimura (C/2023 P1) could soon brighten more than 100-fold to become a naked-eye object in mid-September.Ībove: A sky map with an inset photo of the comet from Dan Bartlett of June Lake, CAĪ " hyperbolic comet" is a comet with too much energy to remain trapped inside the solar system. Japanese amateur astronomer Hideo Nishimura discovered it just a few days ago in the constellation Gemini. NEW COMET ALERT: A hyperbolic comet is falling into our solar system. NOAA forecasters say there is a 15% chance the calm will end with an M-class solar flare on Aug. The sun remains relatively quiet for the third day in a row despite the presence of multiple large sunspot groups. 28, 2023, as a show of thanks for years of service and hope for future daisies: Until then, we will maintain AIM's iconic "daily daisy," frozen at Feb. There may be some hope of a recovery as AIM's orbit precesses into full sunlight in 2024. As a result AIM is offline, perhaps permanently. What happened to NASA's AIM spacecraft, which has been monitoring NLCs since 2007? Earlier this year, the spacecraft's battery failed. As the season progresses, these dots will multiply in number and shift in hue from blue to red as the brightness of the clouds intensifies. For the rest of the season, daily maps from NOAA 21 will be presented here:Įach dot is a detected cloud. An instrument onboard NOAA 21 ( OMPS LP) is able to detect NLCs (also known as "polar mesospheric clouds" or PMCs). The first clouds were detected inside the Arctic Circle by the NOAA 21 satellite. The northern season for NLCs began on May 26th. There are no significant equatorial coronal holes on the Earthside of the sun. Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica Neutron counts from the University of Oulu's Sodankyla Geophysical Observatory show that cosmic rays reaching Earth are slowly declining-a result of the yin-yang relationship between the solar cycle and cosmic rays. Credit: SDO/HMIĬosmic Rays Solar Cycle 25 is intensifying, and this is reflected in the number of cosmic rays entering Earth's atmosphere. All of these sunspots have stable magnetic fields that pose little threat for strong solar flares.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |