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Polar Maritime

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    C/2012 S1 (ison) Could Be The Brightest Comet Ever Seen By Mankind

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted

    COMET ISON--ANOTHER OUTBURST? Astronomers working with the TRAPPIST telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory report that Comet ISON's production of gas and dust surged another six-fold during the early hours of Nov. 19th. This marks the second outburst since Nov. 13th. Experienced observers put the comet's rising magnitude near +4.0, well above the threshold of naked-eye visibility. The problem is, ISON is approaching the sun and becoming increasingly difficult to observe. Shahrin Ahmad of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, photographed the comet's green core framed by twilight blue on the morning of Nov. 19th:

    Posted Image

    The situation is only going to worsen as the comet plunges toward its Nov. 28th close encounter with the sun. Amateur photography of the comet will be possible for a few more days and, soon, only NASA's fleet of solar observatories will be able to track the sundiver.

    Despite the recent outbursts, which could have been caused by a break up of ISON's nucleus, astronomers with NASA's Comet ISON Observing Campaign believe that the comet is still intact. It will need to be to survive next week's hellish plunge through the sun's atmosphere. If it does survive--a big IF--it could emerge as a splendid naked-eye object for sky watchers in the northern hemisphere.

    Observationally speaking, the next big event in the timeline of Comet ISON's journey comes on Nov. 21st when the comet enters the field of view of NASA's STEREO-A spacecraft. The Heliospheric Imager on STEREO-A will pick up the comet just as Earth-bound telescopes begin to lose it. In the days that follow, STEREO-B, SOHO and the Solar Dynamics Observatory will join the hunt, providing continuous views of Comet ISON all the way to perihelion.

    http://www.spaceweather.com/

    • Like 1

    Wednesday 20th November General Weather chat

    in Spring Weather Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Polar Maritime

    After a cold frosty start to the night, light/moderate rain set in.

     

    Currently; Cool, breezy with light rain.

    Temp 3.3c

    Dp 2.8c

    Wind Chill -0.1c

    Wind S/W 12 mph

    Gusting 31mph at 5:03am

    Rain since midnight 2.1mm

     

    Edit- I could of had a little snow on the front edge of the rain band as there have been reports in Derbyshire, but i was fast off !

    Model Output Discussion 18th Nov.2013-12z onwards.

    in Forecast Model Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Polar Maritime

    From MattHugo over on the statt thread...

     

    NB: Latest (overnight) EC32 update continues the trend from the last update and that is to maintain high pressure near or over the UK right through to the 15th of Dec. This seems quite an extended period for a time of year when climatologically you would expect some sort of Atlantic influence. I'm not 100% sure if the EC upgrades have been incorporated into this update or not, but I would image they will have been to the update later in the week, so it'll be interesting to see if there is a sudden shift. But again its high pressure and temperatures at or around 1C or 2C below average from the EC32 well into December.

    • Like 3

    C/2012 S1 (ison) Could Be The Brightest Comet Ever Seen By Mankind

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted

    COMET ISON'S SUPER TAIL: Comet's ISON's recent outburst of activity has done more than simply brighten the comet. Whatever exploded from the comet's core also created a spectacularly-long tail, more than 16 million kilometers from end to end. Scroll down to see the full extent of Comet ISON as photographed on Nov. 17th by Michael Jäger of Ebenwaldhöhe, Austria:

    Posted Image

    "The tail of the comet stretches more than 7o across the sky," says Jäger. It's almost as wide as the bowl of the Big Dipper.

    Physically, ISON's tail is about 12 times wider than the sun. So, when the head of ISON plunges into the sun's atmosphere on Nov. 28th, more than 15 million kilometers of the comet's tail will still be jutting into space behind it. http://www.spaceweather.com/

    • Like 2

    C/2012 S1 (ison) Could Be The Brightest Comet Ever Seen By Mankind

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted

    COMET ISON UPDATE: Reports of naked-eye sightings of Comet ISON are coming in from around the world. Experienced observers put the comet's magntitude at +5.5 on Nov. 16th. This means it is now fully 10 times brighter than it was only three days ago before the outburst. To the naked eye, ISON appears as a faint smudge of pale green light low in the pre-dawn sky. The view through a telescope is more dramatic. The comet's tail has become a riotous crowd of gaseous streamers stretching more than 3.5 degrees across the sky. Amateur astronomer Waldemar Skorupa sends this picture from Kahler Asten, Germany:

    Posted Image

    The tail is so long, he couldn't fit the whole thing in the field of view. How long is it? Comet ISON's tail extends more than 8 million kilometers behind the comet's nucleus. For comparison, that's 21 times the distance between Earth and the Moon.

    Because so much gas and dust is spewing from the comet's core, it is impossible to see clearly what caused Comet ISON's outburst on Nov. 13-14. One possibility is that fresh veins of ice are opening up in the comet's nucleus, vaporizing furiously as ISON approaches the sun. Another possibility is that the nucleus has completely fragmented.

    "If so, it will still be several days before we know for sure," says Karl Battams, an astronomer with NASA's Comet ISON Observing Campaign. "When comet nuclei fall apart, it’s not like a shrapnel-laden explosion. Instead, the chunks slowly drift apart at slightly different speeds. Given that ISON’s nucleus is shrouded in such a tremendous volume of light-scattering dust and gas right now, it will be almost impossible to determine this for at least a few days and perhaps not until the comet reaches the field of view of NASA's STEREO HI-1A instrument on November 21, 2013. We will have to wait for the chunks to drift apart a sufficient distance, assuming they don't crumble first."

    In short, no one knows for sure what is happening to Comet ISON. This could be the comet's death throes--or just the first of many brightening events the comet experiences as it plunges toward the sun for a close encounter on Thanksgiving Day (Nov. 28th).

    Monitoring is encouraged. Comet ISON rises in the east just before the sun. Amateur astronomers, if you have a GOTO telescope, enter these coordinates. Dates of special interest include Nov. 17th and 18th when the comet will pass the bright star Spica, making ISON extra-easy to find.

    http://www.spaceweather.com/

    • Like 3

    Scepticism Of Man Made Climate Change

    in Climate Change

    Posted · Edited by Polar Maritime

    A common argument against the realities of climate change this year has been “Warming has slowed over the last 16 yearsâ€. Of course, to those well informed, this argument was, from the start, a result of people getting caught up in short term noise in a long term trend. Essentially, refusing to notice that despite an apparent slowing rate of warming, the temperature, year on year, is increasing. But, as a result of new research, this argument, in all its forms, can be tucked up safely in bed. British and Canadian researchers have now demonstrated that the warming trend since 1997 has been grossly underestimated; by as much as half.

    How, you may ask?

    In order to answer this question we must firstly look at how temperature data is obtained. HadCRUT is the dataset of monthly instrumental temperature records formed by combining the sea surface temperature records compiled by the Hadley Centre of the UK Met Office and the land surface air temperature records compiled by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia. This system is the most commonly utilised and referred to dataset in the world-influencing the IPCC and many other international panels.

    HadCRUT, or more specifically, HadCRUT4, takes surface temperatures directly from land based stations or from ships and does not, unlike other systems, interpolate data. The system is capable of gathering temperature information for 84% of the planet. It is this remaining 16% that is the focus of the new study. While you could assert that 84% of coverage is a good representation of the global average temperature, there lies a problem- the coverage is lacking in parts of Africa and the Polar Regions; the Arctic being a particular area of interest.

    As many of you will be well aware, the Arctic has been particularly sensitive to climate change. The area has warmed exceptionally, this has been shown through satellite and reanalysis as well as the more visual aid of unprecedented sea ice loss.

    At this point, you may be asking “surely there is another temperature record�?

    There is. NASA’s temperature record ‘GISTEMP’, which is recorded using satellites, actually tries to address the gap in coverage. This is achieved by the extrapolation of temperatures in areas where no data is being collected by basing temperature on the nearest available measurements. You may argue that this is can be a misrepresentation of data- but at least it’s not simply excluding a region.

    However, NASA, while picking up some pieces dropped by the HadCRUT, has not included corrections in the data for the change in which sea surface temperatures are measured and unfortunately satellites cannot measure the near-surface temperatures but only those overhead at a certain altitude range in the troposphere. So, here we have two massive data sets, used worldwide, both excellent in their own right- but neither perfect.

    In comes new research… (don’t you just love science??)

    Kevin Cowtan from the University of York and Robert Way of the University of Ottawa have developed a new method to fill the data gaps, utilising the geostatistical method known as ‘kriging’ (this might be familiar to GIS users). Kriging essentially weights surrounding measured values and then using these, derives a predicted value for an unmeasured location.

    The team used this technique to produce a hybrid temperature value; taking the difference between satellite and ground data. So, in essence they have created a system that converts satellite data to near surface temperature data.

    They applied this method to the HadCRUT4 data. Previously, HadCRUT4 had shown a small warming trend of only 0.05 °C per decade for 1997-2012- but we must not forget that this trend was missing Arctic temperatures. After filling in these gaps, the team found that the trend is actually around 0.12 °C per decade; matching the long-term trend mentioned by the IPCC and painting a more realistic picture of the current global warming trend.

    More information can be found here:

    http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/11/global-warming-since-1997-underestimated-by-half/

    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2013/nov/13/global-warming-underestimated-by-half


    Also check out this video, which explains the study quite well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhJR3ywIijo

    C/2012 S1 (ison) Could Be The Brightest Comet Ever Seen By Mankind

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted

    COMET ISON OUTBURST: A sudden outburst of brightness from Comet ISON has catapulted it to the threshold of naked-eye visibility. "I've been imaging Comet ISON every morning," reports amateur astronomer Charles Coburn. of Rescue, CA. "On Nov. 14th, to my surprise, I could see it on my DSLR live preview screen." These two images show the comet on consecutive days as photographed by Coburn using the same camera and telescope settings:

    Posted Image

    Reports like Coburn's are coming in from around the world. Apparently, during the early hours of Nov. 14th Comet ISON surged in brightness by a factor of approximately 6. In terms of astronomical magnitudes, it jumped from +8 to +6. If the trend continues, it could be a faint but easy naked-eye object by the end of the week.

    The sudden uptick in brightness could be caused by a fresh vein of ice opening up in the comet's nucleus. Rapid vaporization of ice by solar heat is a sure-fire way to boost a comet's visibility. But, as NASA's Comet ISON Observing Campaign states, "we have no idea." The comet's nucleus is hidden from view by a hazy green atmosphere, so events in the interior remain a mystery.

    "I have a strong suspicion that this is Comet LINEAR (C/1999 S4) all over again," says Mark Kidger of the ESA's European Space Astronomy Centre in Madrid. In the year 2000, Kidger other astronomers monitored Comet LINEAR as it disintegrated en route to the sun. "The sudden appearance of ISON's gas tail (discussed further below), the increasing fuzziness of its coma, and now this sudden outburst all remind me of C/1999 S4 just before it broke apart."

     

    http://www.spaceweather.com/

    • Like 1

    Solar and Aurora Activity Chat

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted

    WAITING FOR THE NEXT FLARE: Solar activity has been low for 24+ hours, but the forecast calls for flares. Two large, complex sunspots are transiting the Earthside of the sun with mixed-polarity magnetic fields that harbor energy for strong eruptions. The next big flare will probably come from one of these two circled regions:

    Posted Image

    NOAA forecasters estimate a 60% chance of M-class flares and a 30% chance of X-flares during the next 24 hours. Flares from AR1890 could be particularly geoeffective. Because of the way the sun's magnetic field spirals through interplanetary space, AR1890 is magnetically connected to our planet. Particles accelerated by an explosion there would be guided in our direction, possibly causing a radiation storm around Earth. http://www.spaceweather.com/

    • Like 1

    Solar and Aurora Activity Chat

    in Space, Science & nature

    Posted · Edited by Polar Maritime

    http://www.solarham.net/

     

    The new CME prediction model released by the Goddard Space Flight Center is calling for a direct Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) impact by late November 12th. The plasma cloud was flung into space and towards Earth by the X1 solar flare last night. Geomagnetic storming will be possible once the plasma cloud arrives. More updates in the days ahead. Visit the link below to watch the latest prediction model.

     

     

    Posted Image

     

    Maybe a glancing blow now..

     

    Update: A faint CME associated with that plume could deliver a glancing blow to Earth's magnetic field on Nov. 12th or 13th. Stay tuned for further analysis.

    • Like 1
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