No sunspot monitoring information was issued yesterday, January 1, 2018, due to time constraints from personal errands.

Here are today’s solar images taken from Al Sadeem Observatory, January 2, 2018.

The sky was clear with light air turbulence making the seeing and transparency good at the time these images were taken.

Solar activity remains at very low levels with no significant solar flare activity recorded over the past 24 hours. No active sunspot regions currently exist on the Sun’s visible disk. The latest sunspot number (based on visual count and Wolf number calculation) is 0. Numerous small plages/faculae including the one rotating into Earth-view at the Sun’s eastern limb (encircled) which is currently being watched for any structural development, as well as tiny prominences, were clearly captured in H-alpha imagery.

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. 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)