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Eruptions from the face of our star are called ‘prominences’ and cause vast amounts of superhot gas to shoot into space, often forming beautiful loops on the solar surface. During the solar minimum, the number of flares and sunspots is dramatically reduced. When the sun leaps back from its minimum after roughly 11 years, we’re likely to see more and more ferocious explosions on the sun. Nasa warned: ‘After our Sun passes the current Solar Minimum, solar activity like eruptive prominences are expected to become more common over the next few years.’ The space agency has just released dramatic pictures...

A leading pioneer in the study of Grand Solar Minima and their effects on the planet has been solar physicist Professor Valentina Zharkova of Northumbria University. She has been attacked savagely for her theory that the weakened solar magnetosphere during a Grand Solar Minimum is the main factor in driving global cooling on Earth, but she is increasingly being vindicated as global cooling progresses. Recently, Professor Zharkova gave a lecture to the Global Warming Policy Foundation. You can view the lecture below, but it’s heavy-going. Here’s a summary of her main points: • The solar magnetosphere is key to understanding...

One hundred fifty-nine years ago, our sun belched out a sea of charged particles aimed at Earth. It sped toward us at millions of miles per hour, walloping the planet hard enough to addle the world's telegraph systems and bring the northern lights as far south as Jamaica. Damage from the solar storm, called the Carrington Event, was pretty limited — chiefly because the world didn't have a lot of very long wires that are susceptible to disruption. But that was then, and a massive solar storm will come our way again. That's because the sun is constantly convulsing with...

Such storms only occur occasionally but result in a massive spike in geomagnetic activity and radiation. For driverless vehicles which rely heavily on GPS, this could cause mayhem as the connection between a GPS system and the satellites could be cut off. In theory, disaster could follow on the roads. According to Scott McIntosh, director of the high-altitude observatory at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, using GPS heavily in programming a driverless car from Point A to Point B is an issue. ... Fortunately, there are systems in place to avoid truly disastrous scenarios. In fact,...

Lead author, Henrik Svensmark, from The Technical University of Denmark has long held that climate models had greatly underestimated the impact of solar activity. He says the new research identified the feedback mechanism through which the sun’s impact on climate was varied. Professor Svensmark’s theories on solar impact have caused a great deal of controversy within the climate science community and the latest findings are sure to provoke new outrage. He does not dispute that increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have a warming impact on the climate. But his findings present a challenge to estimates of how...

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The sun is heading into a period known as solar minimum, during which activity at the surface will ‘change form.’In this time, certain types of activity, such as sunspots and solar flares will drop – but, it’s also expected to bring the development of long-lived phenomena including coronal holes. According to NASA, solar minimum could also enhance the effects of space weather, potentially disrupting communications and navigation systems, and even causing space junk to ‘hang around.’

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The mysterious closure of a solar observatory in southern New Mexico earlier this month happened after the FBI started opened a child pornography investigation involving a janitor’s computer found at the observatory and agents tracked wireless signals used to access child porn, according to an FBI search warrant affidavit filed in federal court. The mountaintop Sunspot Solar Observatory closed for from Sept. 6 to Sept. 17 but the research association that manages it has said only that an unspecified security issue was the reason for the closure. The facility employs a small group of scientists, researchers and...

Our sun has been behaving very strangely, and this unusual behavior is really starting to affect our weather patterns. There have been virtually no sunspots in 2018 as solar activity has dropped to alarmingly low levels. As a result, our atmosphere has been cooling and shrinking, and experts are warning that we are heading for a bitterly, bitterly cold winter. And even though the official start of winter is well over a month away, winter weather is already sweeping the nation. As you will see below, a giant winter storm is about to slam into the east coast, but what...

Powerful Solar Storm Likely Detonated Sea Mines During Vietnam War By Brett Carter | November 9, 2018 3:46 pm Solar flares captured on sun. (Credit: NASA/SDO)On Aug. 4, 1972, the crew of a U.S. Task Force 77 aircraft flying near a naval minefield in the waters off Hon La observed 20 to 25 explosions over about 30 seconds. They also witnessed an additional 25 to 30 mud spots in the waters nearby.Destructor sea mines had been deployed here during Operation Pocket Money, a mining campaign launched in 1972 against principal North Vietnamese ports.There was no obvious reason why the mines...

Freak changes in the composition of space around the sun are about to drive a chain of meteorological events locking the UK into a savage early Arctic freeze, it has been claimed. The so-called solar corona has become dotted with holes on its Earth-facing side threatening serious knock-on effects to the flow of the jet stream and the weather this winter. Temperatures are expected to nosedive towards the end of October bringing ‘substantial snowfall’ across Scotland, northern and central England. It could herald the start of a four-month Polar assault with snow and sub-zero temperatures threatening to grip the nation...

Sunspot Solar Observatory is transitioning back to regular operations as of September 17th On September 6th, the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) made the decision to temporarily vacate the Sunspot Solar Observatory at Sacramento Peak, New Mexico as a precautionary measure while addressing a security issue. The facility closed down in an orderly fashion and is now re-opening. The residents that vacated their homes will be returning to the site, and all employees will return to work this week. AURA has been cooperating with an on-going law enforcement investigation of criminal...

This is a multi-faceted story, but it comes together to create one large surreal event. I cannot truly give you the answers you will want, but I can put all the pieces of the story on the table. It will be up to you to put them together, or you might never be able to do so. I still do not understand where the truth lies in this scrambled event. On September 7, the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) made the decision to suddenly vacate the Sunspot Solar Observatory at Sacramento...

UPDATE 9/12/18 4PM PST The issue may be related to Mercury (the metal, not the planet). On a tip from a science journalist friend who covers telescopes and who has been there, I verified the observatory uses a vat of liquid mercury as a float bearing for the giant solar telescope. According to an internal NSO/NMSU document, that bearing is “high-risk” during maintenance. If there was a major mercury spill, it might explain why the Feds are there, with FBI providing security. The amount of Mercury is said to be in the “tens of gallons” range, which is next to...

In what may be one of the more bizarre stories of 2018 so far, an undisclosed security threat has shut down a solar observatory in New Mexico, and angered local authorities in the process.

In March our supplier of energy was more inactive than in the previous months. The sunspot number was only 2,5, which is only 8% of what is normal for this month into the average cycle (month 112).Only solar cycles 5 and 6 were weaker. A sunspot was detected only on 6 of 31 days. An observation made on April 10, 2018, allowed us to say that at approximately 30° southern heliospheric latitude the SDO solar research satellite saw a tiny spot (it was too small to be officially counted as a sunspot) that certainly belonged to the next approaching solar...

In linking to my sunspot update this week, there has been a lot of speculation at the climate website WattsUpWithThat that the next solar cycle has begun...which suggested that this sunspot was the first such sunspot this cycle, was not quite accurate however. This sunspot with an opposite polarity, which decayed so quickly that it did not rate getting a sunspot number, was not the first... The grand minimum of the 1600s, dubbed the Maunder Minimum in honor of the scientist who first identified it, was a century where almost no sunspots were visible. There was no apparent solar cycle....

Is the mini Ice age upon us? If the solar minimum is an indicator, then yes, we may well be entering one. Very long but well worth the watch

There’s a lot of evidence mounting that solar cycle 25 will usher in a new grand solar minimum. Since about October 2005, when the sun’s magnetic activity went into a sharp fall, solar activity has been markedly lower, with solar cycle 24 being the lowest in over 100 years.Interplanetary magnetic field – Image from NOAA Space Weather Prediction CenterSolar cycle 24 – Image from NOAA Space Weather Prediction CenterDaily observations of the number of sunspots since 1 January 1900 according to Solar Influences Data Analysis Center (SIDC). The thin blue line indicates the daily sunspot number, while the dark blue...