News Stories relating to "sun"

The NASA website says: "Imagine you're in California. It's July, the middle of summer. The sun rises early; bright rays warm the ground. It's a great day to be outside. Then, suddenly, it begins to snow--not just a little flurry, but a swirling blizzard that doesn't stop for two weeks." According to solar physicist David Hathaway, "Something...

In Whitley's new journal,he writes: "The sun is in the most unusual state that has ever been observed. At a time when it should be recording greatly diminished sunspot activity, the most active sunspot ever observed has just finished crossing its face. The largest solar flare ever recorded?by far?exploded out of this sunspot on November 4. [But...

Auroras have been photographed as far south as Houston midway through one of the most unusual solar events ever recorded. The earth's magnetic field is at present extremely thin and pushed back far from the sunward side of the planet by the powerful solar wind. Therefore, it is possible that significantly higher than expected radiation levels...

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Environment Center has issued an Official Space Weather Advisory stating that two very intense centers of activity have emerged on the sun. One of them, Sunspot 484, has grown into one of the biggest sunspots in years, and it's now about the size of the planet Jupiter. It may...

Suicide rates worldwide are at the highest in the summer, and it turns out it's not just because of the heat. But people who get more sun actually have less cancer, so what's a person to do?

Elizabeth Svoboda writes in Discover Magazine about Australian neurochemist Gavin Lambert, who says that extended exposure to bright sunlight may...

There's evidence that the Earth's magnetic poles are about to flip. What's interesting is this: it's already happened on the Sun. Like the Earth, it has a north and south pole. But for nearly a month, beginning in March 2000, the Sun's south magnetic pole faded, and a north pole emerged to take its place, so the Sun had two north poles. By May...

On March 17, magnetic fields above Sunspot 314 erupted with an X-1 class solar flare. X level solar flares are the strongest, with the capability of creating protracted solar storms on earth, with radio blackouts and electromagnetic damage. However, X-1 is the least powerful of these great flares, and this one was not aimed directly at earth...

This message comes from Henry Willis, who will be interviewed on Dreamland Saturday, February 8 about his book, Earth's Future Climate: "On Jan 31, several C and on minor M Class solar flares were observed. The solar wind striking the Earth increased from 390 km/sec. to over 1,000 km/sec. This increase in solar wind hit the Earth precisely at...

Long-term climate changes, as well as our daily weather, are linked to the sun's activity. We're especially affected by coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which are huge bubbles of electrified gas. "Coronal mass ejections are the hurricanes of space," says astronomer Nancy Crooker. "They have strong magnetic fields that link to the earth's field,...

Weather fluctuations can have subtle and dangerous effects on your health, including a small increased risk of stroke, cancer or mental illness.

After looking at 3,289 first-time stroke sufferers in Dijon, France, researchers found there were fewer strokes in warmer months and more strokes overall when there was a drop in temperature...

The Earth has been granted a reprieve and will probably escape being swallowed up when the Sun dies in about 7.5 billion years. New calculations actually extend the length of time the Earth will be habitable by 200 million years.

In the end, the surface of the planet will become too hot for life to survive. Earth-dwellers will have to...

At 5:38 AM EST an X-Class solar flare erupted near sunspot 9632. A radiation storm is now in progress, and is intensifying. Some radio blackouts are possible.

The flare also emitted a very large Coronal Mass Ejection into space. This CME will pass earth on Tuesday or Wednesday, and is likely to trigger magnetic storms.

Radio...

The second most powerful solar flare since 1975 has erupted from the sun. This follows two huge coronal mass ejections that flooded earth with auroroas over the past weekend. All of this activity has been centered around sunspot AR 9393, the largest sunspot in years and one of the most active in recent history. This sunspot is 14 times the size...