Here are today’s solar images taken from Al Sadeem Observatory, July 5, 2021.
The sky was mostly clear with moderate breeze which provided good transparency but average seeing at the time these images were taken.
A lot has been going with solar activity over the past 24 hours. AR2836 has completely disintegrated into plage. The large sunspot group AR2835 (Cko/beta) experienced decay on its trailer spots; while maintaining its huge leader spot in place and has produced mostly weak B-class and C-class solar flares. The newly numbered AR2839 (Cao/beta) continues to grow in structure and also put up a few minor C-class solar flares. In contrast, continuous decay persists in the much smaller sunspot group AR2837 (Bxo/beta). Additionally, a new small bipolar active region was seen emerging NE of AR2837 (encircled; undesignated at this point). The latest sunspot number (based on visual count and Wolf number calculation) is 43.
Other noteworthy solar features observed were enhanced plages associated with the upper-mentioned sunspot groups, as well as some elongated eruptive filaments at the SW quadrant, and mostly small quiescent prominences at the WNW and SW limbs as distinctively captured in H-alpha imagery.
Space weather agencies* forecast solar activity to be at low levels with chances of solar flares of mostly B-class to C-class intensity, mainly from the upper mentioned sunspot groups in the next few days. 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 (5:30 PM – 6:00 PM, July 5, 2021, from NCM Al Wathba Station):
Average Temperature: 45.45°C
Average Humidity: 9.0%
Average Wind Speed and Direction: 11.03 kph from SE
Average Cloud Cover: 0%
Average Air Pressure: 988.0 hPa
Average Solar Radiation: 149.67 W/m^2
