Here are today’s solar images taken from Al Sadeem Observatory, May 16, 2019.
The sky was clear with intermittent light to moderate winds which provided good transparency but average seeing at the time these images were taken.
With the recent decay of AR2740, the lone visible sunspot group AR2741 (Modified Zurich/Mcintosh sunspot configuration: Hsx/alpha) generally retained its tri-lobe dissected structure within its stable major spot and produced a minor C2.0 class solar flare 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 13. A huge eruptive hedgerow prominence at northwestern limb remains visible and the disintegrating plage structure with short stable filaments near AR2741 were distinctively captured in H-alpha imagery.
Space weather agencies* expect continuity of decreasing solar activity with chances of solar flares ranging between to B-class and C-class intensity, mainly from AR2741. 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.
Equipment used are Skywatcher 120mm refractor telescope with Baader filter and unmodified Canon EOS 1D Mark IV DSLR camera for visible imagery and Lunt H-alpha solar telescope and ZWO120MM CMOS camera for H-alpha imagery, mounted on Skywatcher EQ6 Pro. 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 (5:20 PM – 5:45 PM, May 16, 2019):
Average Temperature: 36.6°C
Average Humidity: 11%
Average Wind Speed and Direction: 22.7 kph from N
Average Cloud Cover: 0%
Average Air Pressure: 994.45 hpa
Average Solar Radiation: 141.57 W/m^2
Average UV Radiation: 99 µW/m^2 (low)
