Giant Solar Blast Headed for Earth

my brain's already toast but i'll upgrade my aluminum foil diaper.

Indeed, another layer can never hurt!

I'm going with lead, foil is a bit risky for that region!

Upgrade to lead! QUICK!

The aurora pictures are for our lame amusement, but the sun pictures will be used for intensive study forcasting of solar activity.

No, it will be peaking today. You are all set for tonight!

your father smells of elder berries.

shucks

Nah, I think he was just crazy.

A sun that wants to grow BIGGER but, the awesome COLD of Outer Space holds it down. The sun is spitting at us but the spit is quickly cooled and falls back to cool the sun.

I don't particularly like a GIANT BALL OF FIRE spitting at me.

They used ta say, and swear, the sun is slowly dying but what if the sun is slowly eating Dark Matter? as it travels through the Cosmos running into it at 12 Miles Per Second hmm?

The sun could be consuming a constant diet of Dark Matter as Fuel.

Happy Birthday!

Hope it's a good one.

Thanks

I'll go along with the cool part, but yeah I like global communications, television, Google Earth, XM Radio, wow just about everything. Let's agree to keep the satellites alright and regenerate the ozone layer. It seems that the middle east is getting democracy, so it could be good times for all. Peace?

Yikes! The eye of Sauron.

I'm sure the nuclear stations are, so I'm in good shape.

No, that's light. Light is not causing the northern lights. The northern lights are caused by the solar wind which is the flow of free electrons and positive ions emitted by the Sun in all directions, a result of the Sun's million-degree heat. The solar wind usually reaches Earth with a velocity around 400 km/s. The speed of light is 299792.458 km/s; many orders of magnitude faster. With the sun being ~149597870.700 km from the earth, the solar wind takes ~4.328642092013889 days to reach the earth.

jasonshurbThanks for the info, learn something new every day.

thanks for that

good info.

You're concerned? Why? They'll broadcast over the radio and tell everybody to throw the main circuit box breaker to protect all your electronics in the house. You DO know what a circuit box and breakers are, right?

Fortunately for all concerned at least we can rest good tonight, secure in the knowledge all our highly-educated young people know how to shut down the home's circuit box and avert disaster.

HA HA! Mankind shall Live On!!!!

A plane emerging from a high-voltage power line isn't enough to fool me gramps. hehehe I'm almost 60 and know how to make GRAVITY WHEELS that generate home power safely inside a shielded box in the closet. Space weather Katrina can't touch my box contents.

I'll do like everybody else inventor is doing and sit on my stuff til the price goes up enough. I don't have intentions of drawing this measly SS never increases disability check FOREVER.

Is that an overlay of all the images? That really points out how severe the flare was.

I think it happens somewhat all the time, but this was a severe flare that can interfere with communications and will cause all the cool images!

Very cool pics.

Very desktop worthy.

cool images man. thanks for posting them

No problem, I'm happy to share my enjoyment with others!

Wow I have never seen anything like this before... nothing in our skies...thank you for sharing....

Yeah, it's quite cool! I just hope everything electronic keeps on ticking.

Just to be sure I'm donning my lead undies!

Hi, Jason, what does F5 mean? Incredible photo (sort of), Thanks.

The Function 5 key on your keyboard; the row at the top that you don't ever use. It's not updating very frequently although.

It's like seeing inside the sun! All bets are off for surviving til Saturday y'all. Supernova of the Earth's sun formerly projected for 1 billion years from now has unexpectedly been caused to update by every human pressing F5 at the same time.

Hey, like I said I'm playing it safe and keeping the lead underwear on, other than that I think I should be fine.

Don't go all Glenn Beck on us now.

Glad for the link to michio. Don't know why I haven't thought to look for one. I've had no electricity and heat before and ya just bundle (always good to have extra blankets), get out the flash light and read. Plus, I try to stay mostly in one room. A few candles and my oil lamp, and the room gets pretty comfortable. Everyone needs a break now and then. And that is what this might be. The coffee, tho? Ah, Starbucks bottles. Ok, I'm covered. Personally, I love it when I am forced to not do anything. And if things get really bad, hospitals don't mind if you go hang out. They always have a generator. As long as I don't have to see a flaming ball from the sun come at us. Now that idea could make me do a Beck and Boehner. Sob, sob.

Cool image!

You might be a bit late as the flares could screw with the avionics of the airplane. I wonder if this is the reason United grounded their 757's that hadn't had their required maintainance done.

Why would you want to head to where the Earth's electromagnetic field is weaker?

Me, too. In a second.

ahhhh. Okay, maybe I'd just drive real fast to somewhere I will see beyond a cloud cover. Oh, right, first I have to go buy a car.

Heh. I'm sure it will be quite the show ! +^d

p.s. WOW. It is.

To view the light show which is likely to be spectacular.

In Texas, our grid couldn't handle the cold weather two weeks ago. I hate to see what this will cause.

I'm suddenly scared lol.

The brown outs did suck. Its always fun to have Texans on c u r r e n t,.....uhm,.....even if it is one of you maroon favoring folks. hehe.

GO LONGHORNS ! sorry. old habits.

Ahem, Aggie here.... But a Longhorn med student, I really have an identity crisis. The Brown outs have forced me to get battery backups for almost every outlet. Just irritating. Oh, and gig'em!

Heh ! +^d !

Old T-Sip, here : I would like to say that both student bodies have come together over the bonfire disaster. That at least is good. I never miss a chance to tell an Aggie that my family's hearts went out to you for your loss. In a real way it was our loss , too.

It's a good old fun rivalry, not mean spirited at all. Each of our fight songs mention each other, quite fun. The Thanksgiving game is always a day to come together and enjoy with our fellow Texans the unique tradition.