Space Weather: A [big] Hole in the Sun’s Atmosphere

The SWLing Post Blog has recently featured a few posts on "Space Weather" & Geomagnetic Storms. As an amateur astronomer, I receive many daily space-related emails in my INBOX right along with the SWLing Post Daily Digest. I thought this might be of interest:

From Spaceweather.com

An unusually wide hole in the sun's atmosphere is facing Earth and spewing a stream of solar wind toward our planet. Estimated time of arrival: April 9th. Polar geomagnetic unrest and minor G1-class storms are possible when the gaseous material reaches Earth. Visit Spaceweather.com for more information and updates.

Image credit: NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.

The hole bisects half the solar disk, stretching more than 700,000 km from end to end. This means Earth will be under the influence of the emerging solar wind stream for more than 4 days after it arrives.

A G1-class storm is "Minor", so I doubt there will be very much "radio" impact - but you gotta admit, a hole that large is interesting nonetheless!

Posted by SWLing Post Contributor Troy Riedel