Posted on 10/01/2008 5:54:24 AM PDT by SpinnerWebb
Astronomers who count sunspots have announced that 2008 is now the "blankest year" of the Space Age.
As of Sept. 27, 2008, the sun had been blank, i.e., had no visible sunspots, on 200 days of the year. To find a year with more blank suns, you have to go back to 1954, three years before the launch of Sputnik, when the sun was blank 241 times.
"Sunspot counts are at a 50-year low," says solar physicist David Hathaway of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. "We're experiencing a deep minimum of the solar cycle."
Paint an icicle on his nose.
“To find a year with more blank suns, you have to go back to 1954, three years before the launch of Sputnik, when the sun was blank 241 times.”
*&^%-&*%$# Commie &*(^$*$#!!!!
Oh - and make a note this article is from 2008!!
2008 ended with 266 spotless days. 2009 has recorded 119 so far, but as was pointed out in another article, they have reported sub-surface magnetism as “spots”, so the actual count is higher.
“...so the actual count is higher.”
And like another freeper had pointed out once, when comparing the older historical data (like the Maunder Minimum, etc.) - those spots were counted based on primitive telescope information. So we are counting things that would not have been counted 500 years ago. (Heck - probably 20 years ago!).
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