Sun
Today's spotty Sun... #DwarfMini
09.03.2026 17:27
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Sun
Today's spotty Sun... #DwarfMini
Occultation
Tau Scorpii Occultation
-Finally, the -57.1% illuminated waning gibbous Moon occults the +2.8 magnitude star Tau Scorpii for Alaska and the northern Pacific region tomorrow at 15:14 UT:
Stellarium.
Antares Occultation
-Next, the -58.8% illuminated waning gibbous Moon occults the +1.1 magnitude star Antares (Alpha Scorpii) for New Zealand tomorrow at ~12:16 UT:
Occultation
Pi Sco
The Moon occults multiple bright stars worldwide over the next 24 hours:
-First up, the -64.0% illuminated waning gibbous Moon occults the +2.9 magnitude star Pi Scorpii for the Indian Ocean region tonight at 22:11 Universal Time (UT):
Interesting arguments for and against the privatization of space: theconversation.com/a-plan-b-for...
Time to find and adjust those non-networked clocks on microwaves, coffee pots etc and remember just how to reset ‘em (or just let ‘em keep blinking).
We’re now in that span of the year where North America is sprung forward, but most of the EU has yet to do so. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayligh...
It’s that time of the year once again. Time for lots of folks in parts of North America that still follow the archaic practice of Daylight Saving Time to ‘Spring Forward’ one hour.
Andoya
A NASA launch from Andøya in 2019 looked like this: www.nasa.gov/solar-system...
Andøya Space will carry the launch campaign live: www.youtube.com/watch?v=eor8...
Coming up in just a few hours: we’ve got a NASA-supported launch campaign of Norway’s ICI-5b sub-orbital rocket from Andøya Space in the high Arctic. Onboard are several experiments which will be released shortly after launch looking to study the northern lights and high-altitude plasma turbulence.
Sun
Solar activity is picking up again this week- #DwarfMini
Interesting. This finding paints a portrait of a younger, rebellious Galileo, writing in the margins:
www.science.org/content/arti...
An unfavorable orbit and a lot of Saharan dust over Central Europe made observation difficult. Nevertheless, we were able to record about 90 minutes of today's PROBA-3 pass from Switzerland. PROBA-3 CSC shows currently a repeating rotation pattern of approximately 1150 seconds.
The Sun’s southern rotational pole is actually inclined at us today to its max on March 6th, and alternates with the north pole of the Sun on September 8th. You can see this top-spinning motion of the Sun in this sped up animation over a year: www.youtube.com/watch?v=twhI...
Sun tilt
It’s true: the Sun has ‘seasons’ of its own. The rotational pole of the Sun is actually tipped 7.25º versus the ecliptic plane, meaning that it slowly seems to nod back and forth throughout the year, as seen from our Earthly vantage point. That’s as per Guy Ottewell’s Astronomical Calendar 2026.
Here's a great view of comet E1 Wierzchos from last month:
www.flickr.com/photos/77768...
A hybrid 4-stage solid-liquid fuel rocket, KAIROS is built to hoist smallsat (~250kg) payloads to Sun-synchronous orbit. This was the third attempt for the company and the rocket to achieve orbit. Happens.
Space One launched their KAIROS rocket on the Rising Star Mission from Space Port Kii in Japan last night. The liftoff appeared to go well until a few minutes into flight, when the rocket experienced an anomaly, and can be seen spiraling back down towards the sea.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=EV-6...
Thermal Eclipse
Finally, check out this unique view of totality by Wah Wah in Canada using a thermal camera: spaceweathergallery2.com/indiv_upload...
Eliot Herman watching from Arizona also noted deep glowing color gradients as the Moon darkened: www.flickr.com/photos/eliot...
Am still seeing some amazing images trickling in from yesterday’s total lunar eclipse… and some unique observations of totality.
@filipp-romanov.bsky.social imaged the eclipse remotely from a site in Utah, and noted a dramatic ‘ozone fringe’ at the onset of totality: www.flickr.com/photos/filip...
Solar halo and sundogs on March 2, 2026, above the Sea of Japan. Photographed in Yuzhno-Morskoy, Nakhodka, near the lighthouse chapel.
#PhotoHour #StormHour
@astrodave.bsky.social
@davidbflower.bsky.social
In addition to the above, I imaged the total lunar eclipse on 2026-03-03 remotely using iTelescope.Net T14 (0.1-m f/5.0 astrograph + CCD) in Utah Desert Remote Observatory at Beryl Junction, Utah, USA.
#PhotoHour #StormHour #astronomy #eclipse #Moon
@astrodave.bsky.social
@davidbflower.bsky.social
An image of a total lunar eclipse with a full moon that looks orange.
Beautiful conditions for this morning's (ongoing) total lunar eclipse. 🔭
This is what it would look like to fly over the Martian North Pole aboard @esa.int's Mars Express orbiter.
This sequence of 117 images was captured by the VMC camera on June 14th, 2019 over the course of 3 hours and is played a 1200x speed. #planetsci
Credit: ESA/Simeon Schmauß
flic.kr/p/2rQAPdw
The next total lunar eclipse isn’t until December 31st, 2028 favoring Asia and Australia, and the America’s won’t see another total lunar eclipse again until June 26th, 2029. eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/LEplot/LEplo...
John Buchanan
Julie Straayer
Jeff Dai
Doug0013
Looks like lots of folks battled clouds across the visibility region. Here are some great images courtesy of: Eliot Herman (Arizona), Gianluca Masi/Julie Straayer (Australia), doug0013 (Calif), Jeff Dai (in China, plus Great Wall!) and John Buchanan (Utah): spaceweathergallery2.com/indiv_upload...
3x Eclipse
Did you see it? We had a fine view of this AM’s total lunar eclipse through thin clouds here in downtown Bristol this AM… I actually watched from Solar Hill across the border in Virginia, the site used by the August 7th, 1869 total solar eclipse expedition.
Here's a quick animation of this AM's total lunar eclipse, with one shot every five minutes through the Dwarf Mini through partial phases up to totality when clouds shut down the show:
Start of totality, juuuust as clouds started to roll in...
