Here are today’s solar images taken from Al Sadeem Observatory, February 23, 2021.
The sky was mostly clear with intermittent moderate to fresh breeze which provided good transparency but average seeing at the time these images were taken.Â
The two designated bipolar sunspot groups AR2804 (Modified Zurich/Mcintosh sunspot configuration: Cao/beta) and AR2805 (Cao/beta) quickly grew up in structure and obtained further magnetic complexity over the past 24 hours. Space weather agencies recorded few weak B-class solar flaring activities from AR2804, while AR2805 has been generally quiet throughout the monitoring period. The latest sunspot number (based on visual count and Wolf number calculation) is 39.
Some small quiescent and huge eruptive prominences (at the SW limbs) at the limbs, short eruptive filaments near AR2805, and enhanced plages associated with the upper-mentioned active regions and former AR2803, were distinctively captured in H-alpha imagery.
Space weather agencies* forecast solar activity to be at low levels with chances of solar flares of up to B-class intensity, mainly from the upper-mentioned sunspot groups. Close monitoring is being conducted by numerous space weather agencies for any significant development.
Equipment used are Skywatcher 120mm refractor telescope with Baader filter and unmodified Canon EOS 1D Mark IV DSLR camera for visible imagery. For H-alpha imagery, the equipment used are Lunt 60mm H-alpha solar telescope, and QHYCCD 290III mono camera; all mounted on Skywatcher EQ6 pro mount Pre-processing of visible solar images was performed in PIPP, stacking in Autostakkert, slight wavelet adjustments in Registax 6, and post-processing in Adobe Photoshop CC.
*TECHNICAL REPORTS COURTESY OF SOLAR INFLUENCE DATA CENTER (SIDC), NOAA-SPACE WEATHER PREDICTION CENTER (NOAA-SWPC)
Weather Data (4:30 PM – 5:00 PM, February 23, 2021, from NCM Al Wathba Station):
Average Temperature: 28.5°C
Average Humidity: 27.0%
Average Wind Speed and Direction: 22.1 kph from NNW
Average Cloud Cover: 20%
Average Air Pressure: 1005.43 hPa
Average Solar Radiation: 249.0 W/m^2
