No solar images were taken today, April 17, 2018, due to unfavorable condition (thunderstorm) at the proposed time of observation.

Solar activity remains at very low levels over the past 24 hours. During the past 24 hours, space weather agencies designated the area of pores observed in the central region of the Sun’s visible disk as AR2705 (refer to the previous post) but decayed shortly. Meanwhile, a single pore was spotted (encircled in visible imagery below) which could be a potential new active region in the next few hours. The latest sunspot number (based on visual count and Wolf number calculation) is 1. Tiny prominences at the limbs and plages were distinctively seen in H-alpha imagery.

Despite the lack of sunspots, a huge stream of solar wind from a huge coronal hole will be on its way towards the Earth which will produce some perturbations in the Earth’s magnetic field causing some weak geomagnetic storms, aurora activity and possibly few brief radio and satellite communication disruptions in the next few days. More information about it here.

Space weather agencies* forecast solar activity to remain at very low levels with chances of weak X-ray fluxes or flares ranging up to B-class intensity. The extent of the frequency and intensity of the Sun’s activity will highly depend on the magnetic flux fluctuations happening in the visible ARs in the coming days. Close monitoring is being conducted by numerous space weather agencies for any significant development.

*Technical reports courtesy of Solar Influence Data Center (SIDC), NOAA-Space Weather Prediction Center (NOAA-SWPC)

*FALSE-COLOR VISIBLE AND MONOCHROME H-ALPHA IMAGERY COURTESY OF SOLARHAM.COM AND NSO/GONG H ALPHA NETWORK MONITOR RESPECTIVELY