Solar Flare

Lucky Timing

On July 3rd it had been more than two months since my last solar imaging session. Conditions were unusually nice for a July morning! Humidity was low, skies were clear, a modest breeze blew away annoying insects, and temperature ranged in the low 70's. Summer mornings in Williamsburg are rarely clear and clouds inevitably increase near noon. By 11:00 AM clouds put an end to my observing opportunity. The satellite view below shows the temporary clear viewing window for southeastern Virginia. One major sunspot and a few filaments appeared on the Sun's disc as you can see in the next full-disc mosaic constructed from 21 individual panels.

Sunspot 2835 appears on the right in the Sun's southern hemisphere. It is accompanied by three floating filaments. In center, above the equator is an active area numbered 2837. Also in the northern hemisphere, on the right, near the limb, is a filament. To this filament's right, almost on the rim itself is sunspot 2838 just before emitting a flare. (Click on the image to get a larger view with better detail.) 

The previous mosaic was processed to show details on the disc so rim details are not visible. The next mosaic was processed to show prominences and spicules around the rim.When the previous disc mosaic is inverted positive to negative, the floating nature of the filaments becomes more apparent. Once again, you should enlarge these images to see the best detail.

I used my Hinode solar guider while capturing all individual images here. It prevented image drift caused by imperfect tracking. Let's take a closer look at some features. Active area 2837 did not display a visible sunspot umbra, but you can see white areas of higher energy emission around the slightly disturbed surface. 

Large sunspot 2835 was better placed near center on the solar disc a few days earlier. On July 3rd 2835 was diminishing, approaching the western limb, and soon to rotate out of sight. A white area of energetic emission is left of the umbra. A nice prominence sat on the limb nearby. I had to combine two images to make the prominence visible. The image showing sunspot detail did not show the prominence. The image showing the prominence overexposed the sunspot. Combining the images makes a nice scene.

Now we come to the solar flare! The explosion happened in a small, relatively inconspicuous developing sunspot numbered 2838 very close to the northwestern limb. In the next image, captured before the flare at 9:58 AM EDT, sunspot 2838 is a small white area on the Sun's limb to the lower right of the dark filament. 

Things had changed 36 minutes after the previous image was obtained! When I returned to get another image at 10:35 AM EDT, I saw an extremely bright overexposed area bursting out of the sunspot! Sometimes the timing is lucky!

Although the small eruption doesn't look very dramatic, it was the most powerful solar flare observed in four years! It caused magnetic field fluctuations on Earth and a shortwave radio blackout over the Atlantic Ocean. Flare strength is described on a scale that measures x-ray brightness. The flare above was classed as an X1.5 flare, at the lower end of the most powerful type. It's always a surprise to see rapid change on the Sun in real time! The flare was extremely bright on my laptop screen.
 

At The Beach

Outer Banks 2021

Our annual trip to the North Carolina shore was a week later than last year. Traffic was incredibly heavy on Route 12 as we neared our rented house. It took 50 minutes to cover the final 2.5 miles! Cars, frozen in place, stretched as far as we could see. Some enterprising kids were selling frozen ice pops and handing them through car windows as traffic crawled by. 

Eventually, we did leave the traffic backup and arrived at our house pictured below. A flag flies from the crow's nest.

The house was newer than one we had rented previously. It was pleasantly bright and cheery as we entered and had this view of the living room area. 

Bedrooms were bright and clean.

The indoor sun porch looked inviting.There was also a screened porch with comfortable chairs and a nice swing. This was a great place for reading in the swing chair, napping, eating breakfast, or hearing wind brushing through pine branches outside.

The small back yard pool had warmer water than the cold ocean.Sophie couldn't wait to jump in.

When tired of the beach E and K could hang out with drinks and watch the kids.

Annabelle isn't fond of beach sand or waves. She's much happier floating around in the pool for hours with help from her special yellow buoyant device which wraps around her neck and keeps her head above water. She drifts from side to side, grabs pool ladders, and seems to have a great time!The pool was nice, but much more time was spent at the beach.Paddle boarding was difficult this year because windy conditions made rough water. After a day packed with activities in the sun youngsters sometimes needed a break inside. 

Over the years I've discovered nice neighborhood roads for bike rides. When riding near sunrise there are very few cars, and residential streets transform into wide bike trails. On one morning ride a fox trotted across the road directly in front of me. I stopped to fish my phone out for a picture, but the fox was too nervous to keep still for a portrait. Not long after the fox encounter I came upon three bucks browsing along a driveway. I saw many more male deer than female on my rides. You may have to click on the next picture to enlarge it in order to see the antlers more clearly.

I hadn't spent extended time alone with my daughter for more than a year. It was nice to bike together and talk over breakfast one morning. I discovered a way to pedal from our house to a bagel place. Ellen rode her massive electric bike and I had my mountain bike.

Another traditional father/daughter beach activity is completing a jigsaw puzzle. This year the 1,000-piece puzzle was called, Merlin's Laboratory. Honestly, I probably did the majority of puzzle work on this one. The final result was very nice. Four crystal spheres were interesting features in the puzzle because they formed small distorted images of their surroundings.

Each year we go to the Duck boardwalk to see the sun set. Annabelle is uncomfortable around all the people on the boardwalk, so I happily volunteered to slowly push Annabelle in her wheeled chair round and round on unoccupied shady walking trails while everyone else strolled the boardwalk toward Donuts on a Stick for ice cream. Annabelle seemed to enjoy the relative quiet. She took the opportunity to touch trees, leaves, and flowers along the way. Sunset viewing was successful!

A nice person offered to take this family picture in the golden light. 

Speaking of sunsets - we observed a few from the crow's nest atop our house. This is a panorama of the scene we viewed as the sun set below the northwestern horizon.One evening there was a display of crepuscular and anticrepuscular rays. The first picture shows crepuscular rays looking northwest. The second picture, a few seconds later, shows anticrepuscular rays converging on the antisolar point exactly 180 degrees to the southeast. 

It was pleasantly breezy up in the crow's nest when these family pictures were taken.

One day C told me to check out the colorful iridescent cloud floating among others in the fair sky. Sometimes called a rainbow cloud, the effect is caused by light scattered by small ice crystals.

We had magnificent weather for our entire stay. It was much breezier than other years, but the breeze was welcome on hot days. The wind helped discourage annoying evening insects. Rain held off until our drive home to Williamsburg.