Polar Flares To Be Visible Tonight 88
ideaMUX writes "NASA's solar dynamics observatory recently detected an M-class flare hurling a coronal mass ejection (CME) into space. The CME is not fully directed toward Earth, but some of the plasma cloud may be visible in the magnetosphere tonight, causing a geomagnetic disturbance and possible aurora. NASA said M-class flares are medium-sized, and can cause brief radio blackouts that affect Earth's Polar regions. Minor radiation storms sometimes follow M-class flares."
"Polar Flares"? (Score:3, Informative)
That's an original, I think.
Re:From all residents outside the [ant]arctic circ (Score:5, Informative)
Here [alaska.edu]'s a forecast for tonight's event, it's possible that anyone north of about 55 degrees in North America will get a glimmer.
True, that leaves most of us SOL. But that's why CME events are special -- people who can't normally see the aurora borealis get a chance to view it.
Re:Earth has two poles (Score:3, Informative)
The article's title and description refers to polar, so no where is it north-centric.
Even the UAF site has a map for the Southern Hemisphere.
Re:From all residents outside the [ant]arctic circ (Score:3, Informative)
The OP mentioned "North America". Incredible as it seems, there's this country in North America to the north of the US with 35 million people in it that might want to see this event. Remarkably, this story is relevant for them.
Re:From all residents outside the [ant]arctic circ (Score:2, Informative)
Nope... often visible in the continental US (Score:5, Informative)
Nope. I generally do pretty well [flickr.com] here in NE Montana.
This shot [flickr.com], and this one [flickr.com], are aurora photos from the CME event last week.