Space Shuttle Discovery all set for FINAL Launch

A COUNTDOWN TIMER IS AVAILABLE ON THE BLOG REGARDING THE LAUNCH OF STS 133

LIVE STREAM FROM KENNEDY SPACE CENTER,FL VIA NASA TV SHALL BE SET UP ON THE FRONT PAGE OF BLOG AT THE TOP ON 0530HRS GMT,24TH FEB 2011

On the 6th attempt of launch! Space Shuttle Discovery is all set for a launch on its final mission from Kennedy Space Center,FL on mission STS 133

Launch is targeted on 24th Feb 2011 at 0450PM EST (21:50:13) UTC ( 24th Feb) , 03:20:13 hrs IST ( 25th Feb)

As mentioned earlier, the launch has been scrubbed away 5 times due to technical faults due to OMS pod leak and bad weather, Hydrogen leak at the ground umbilical carrier plate as the last reason for the delay.

Below is a tabular display of scrubbed dates of launches and the associated reason

Launch attempts

All times Eastern Time, first 5 are while daylight saving time was in effect (EDT), attempt 6 is during outside of daylight saving (EST)

Attempt	Planned	Result	Turnaround	Reason	Decision point	Weather go %	Notes
1	1 Nov 2010, 4:40:00 pm	scrubbed[46]	---	technical[47]	29 Oct 2010, 10:00 am(T-11 hour hold)	80%	OMS Pod leak[47]
2	2 Nov 2010, 4:18:00 pm	scrubbed[48]	0 days, 23 hours, 38 minutes	technical[48]	(T-11 hour hold)	70%	OMS Pod leak[48]
3	3 Nov 2010, 3:52:00 pm	scrubbed[49]	0 days, 23 hours, 34 minutes	technical[49]	2 Nov 2010, 5:40 pm(T-11 built-in hold)	70%	Electrical fault in backup SSME controller.
4	4 Nov 2010, 3:29:54 pm	scrubbed[50]	0 days, 23 hours, 38 minutes	weather[51][52]	4 Nov 2010, 6:25 am	20%	Decision made at pre-tanking weather briefing to reset clock to T-11 hold and delay ~24 hours due to rainy conditions.[51][53]
5	5 Nov 2010, 3:04:01 pm	scrubbed	0 days, 23 hours, 34 minutes	technical	5 Nov 2010, 12:00 pm(T-6 hold)	60%	Hydrogen leak detected at ground umbilical carrier plate (GUCP)[54]
6	24 Feb 2011, 4:50:24 pm		111 days, 1 hours, 46 minutes			80%

METD WEATHER-

The weather stands excellent for launch with light winds temp in upper 25C and lower 17C and good visibility with partly cloudy conditions

"GO" FOR LAUNCH FROM METD WEATHER

80% ACCEPTABLE CONDITIONS FROM NASA

Lets hope that no technical fault snags the launch this time

Geomagnetic Storm G1 onsets. M6.6 Solar Flare causes Radio Blackout

HYPERACTIVE DAY!

SEVERE SOLARWX

Akshay Deoras

Severe Weather Forecaster

THE KP INDEX HAS REACHED 5 and indicates ONSET of Geomagnetic Storm G1

Kp reached 5 at around 0900UTC.Further Storming is expected and G3 Geomagnetic storm probability can't be ruled out.

M6.6 Solar Flare-

At around 1011UTC, Sunspot 1158 released another Solar Flare of X ray flux M6.6 category. Shortly after this release, Moderate Level RADIO BLACKOUT i.e R2 was noticed on the sunlit side of the earth.

The arriving datas from STEREO shall indicate whether Coronal Mass Ejection has been hurled out or now. Being it very strong, I expect a CME and might be directed towards the earth

CME hits the earth !

SEVERE SOLARWX

Akshay Deoras

Severe Weather Forecaster

The Anticipated Coronal Mass ejections from 15th Feb and 13th Feb events have arrived which was detected by series of shocks recorded by the ACE spacecraft

The earth is having a magnetic field. Sun's magnetic field known as Interplanetary magnetic field(IMF). These two fields are in contact at Magnetopause. Earth's magnetic field is directed towards North and if the IMF points South then due to opposite in nature, IMF partly cancels earth's magnetic field at the point of contact. This phenomena is known as "southward B_z"

This results in pouring in of Solar Wind which triggers Auroras.

The Bz index has reached to 30nT meaning passing of shockwave ( 5-6UTC)

Kp index is now unsettled with level 4 and its expected to reach to 5 indicating G1 storm

High latitude observers must remain alert for Auroras.

GEOMAGNETIC STORM APPROACHING EARTH as Coronal Mass ejection nears!

1st image ( from top) is of 0347UTC,16th Feb. At left most side you can see the expanding CME.

2nd Image is of 15:47UTC showing tremendous progress of CME in 12hrs time lapse.

3rd image shows respective positions of Saturn,Earth,CME

Last image( 4th from top) shows ahead view showing CME approaching towards Venus and earth

SEVERE SOALRWX

Akshay Deoras

SEVERE WEATHER FORECASTER

The Coronal Mass ejection from sunspot 1158 which happened with the X2.2 solar flare on 15th Feb is finally heading towards the earth as seen from STEREO BEHIND HI2 and Ahead spacecraft.

Within the period of 12hrs from today early to noon ( GMT), the expanding cloud forward layers have covered around 40-45% distance between Earth and the left most side of window of Stereo image (as of 1547hrs UTC)

The cloud is also heading towards Saturn,Venus

CME shall hit Earth's magnetic field on 17th Feb by afternoon hours ( GMT) resulting into minor storming in late period as magnetic field of earth destabilizes and pouring down some solar wind creating Auroras in High latitude regions

As mentioned earlier, its a series of CME so more action is likely to be reserved on 18th Feb as minor storming is expected.

Thus high latitude observers shall remain alert for Auroras on 17th and 18th Feb

Sunspot 1158-

The Spot is not gone yet!

Sunspot 1158 which shall be remembered for years for producing an X2.2 Flare is slowly rotating away from the earth facing side of the sun. According to my experience, this sunspot is a Delta sunspot with entangled magnetic fields and closeness of Umbra of one pole and penumbra of opposite polarity making appearance of Delta cat due to less than 2 degree separation.

The sunspot has produced around 9 C class flares from X2.2 event and is still looking good for Minor M class flare till 18th Feb 2011

X2.2 SOLAR FLARE FROM 1158 SUNSPOT... SERIES OF GEOMAGNETIC STORM LIKELY TO HIT EARTH

FROM TOP-
FIRST IMAGE- THE NOAA X RAY FLUX SHOWING CLASSIC X CLASS FLARE

SECOND IMAGE IS THE MDI MAGNETOGRAM SHOWING COMPLEX POLARITY AROUND 1158.

THE 14MIN TIME LAPSE IMAGES FROM STEREO BEHIND SHOWING CME ON RIGHT SIDE. CHECK THE POSITION OF STEREO B SPACECRAFT WITH RESPECT TO EARTH-SUN FROM IMAGE BELOW

LAST IMAGE- THE SUNSPOT 1158 WHICH IS MORE THAN 100,000 KM WIDE!

Space Weather Message Code: SUMX01
Serial Number: 68
Issue Time: 2011 Feb 15 0246 UTC

SUMMARY: X-ray Event exceeded X1
Begin Time: 2011 Feb 15 0144 UTC
Maximum Time: 2011 Feb 15 0156 UTC
End Time: 2011 Feb 15 0206 UTC
X-ray Class: X2.2
Location: S20W15
NOAA Scale: R3 - Strong

SEVERE SOLARWX

Akshay Deoras

Severe Weather Forecaster

BIGGEST SOLAR FLARE OF THE CYCLE OUT FROM THE SUN

The sunspot 1158 has increasingly grown and released X2.2 FLARE-

The strongest of this cycle EVEN OVERTAKING M6.6 FLARE OF 13TH FEB !!!

**At around 0156UTC, The sunspot 1158 released an X2.2 FLARE with Type II radio emission. This Giant solar flare has been captured on images of Solar Dynamic Observatory....

A giant Radio blackout ( expected to BE R3) is also expected from this X2.2 Flare which shall be effective shortly

Thus solar flare erruption also was connected with Coronal Mass Ejection(CME) as seen from the datas of STEREO spacecraft AND IS DIRECTED TOWARDS EARTH

THE CORONAL MASS EJECTION FROM THIS X2.2 FLARE IS DIRECTED ON A LARGE PATH INCLUDING VENUS AND EARTH.

THE CORONAL MASS EJECTION FROM 13TH FEB EVENT COUPLED WITH CORONAL HOLE STREAM SHALL BE REACHING THE EARTH TODAY OR BY 16TH CAUSING AURORAS AND POSSIBLY A MINOR GEOMAGNETIC STORM.

HOWEVER THE CME FROM 15TH FEB EVENT SHALL REACH EARTH AND CAUSE GEOMAGNETIC STORM ON 17TH FEB-18TH FEB OR SO..

STAY TUNED FOR ALERT AND AURORAS AT HIGHER LATITUDE REGION

. On 13th Feb, a M6 Solar Flare was produced from the same sunspot which hurled tremendous Radio waves which caused a R3 Radio blackout which was experienced by many people on different frequencies..

SPACE WEATHER FORECAST-

15TH FEB- ISOLATED ACTIVE PERIOD

LIKELY AURORAS AT HIGH LATITUDE REGIONS

16TH FEB- ISOLATED MINOR STORM PERIOD AS CME OF 13TH FEB ARRIVES COUPLED WITH CORONAL HOLE STREAM

17TH FEB- SAME EFFECT WITH AURORAS FOR SURE.

LATE PERIODS OF 17-18TH FEB,CME EJECTED DURING X2.2 FLARE SHALL HIT THE EARTH AND CAUSING ANOTHER PERIOD OF ACTIVE GEOMAGNETIC STORM ON EARTH

KP 6!!! GEOMAGNETIC STORM ONSETS

SEVERE SOLARWX

AKSHAY DEORAS

Severe Weather Forecaster

Kp indicators showed a classic value of 6 ( G2 Geomagnetic storm) on late night period of 4th Feb 2011.

From a settled value of 2, graph jumped to 6 when the solar wind stream hit the earth at around 2100hrs UTC. Value of 5 ( G1) was recorded at around 11:59PM and then at 4 at around 3AM (UTC) this morning.

KP values greater than 4 indicate Geomagnetic storm.

HIGH LATITUDE OBSERVERS MUST REMAIN ALERT FOR SPARKLING AURORAS AT MIDNIGHT TONIGHT.

Solar Wind arrived late than expected between 1-4th Feb.

Space Weather Predictions need more accuracy for sure!