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2026-01-19 - Aurora

A CME impact at about 19:30 triggered an aurora which (for those with clear skies) was visibly across most of the UK and Northern Europe. Sunspot 4341 erupted on  20250118 at 18:09 UTC), releasing an X1.9-class solar flare. 

I missed the peak (not paying attention to social media) but my NW facing meteor camera did capture a wide angle view from 22:00 to 23:00. The move is in mono (sadly), but the brightness of the aurora was outstanding, visible at times through cloud. This is a high speed time lapse movie.

 

My UKRAA magnetometer also detected its arrival, the storm and the tail off back to some sort of normality.

AT the outset of a storm I can often detect (as in this case) a pre-impact usually about 90 minutes before the main impact. this is visible in the dip in Bx and By lines at about 17:35UT. It appears to me that the main impact affecting this part of the Northern Hemisphere was at 19:15, a little earlier than the official NOAA impact time. An 'off the scale in both directions' disturbance is a serious storm and I understand that the storm was classified as G4 (Severe), one down from a maximum G5 (Extreme) storm.

Bx is the E-W deflection of the Earths magnetic field, By is the N-S deflection.

 

The storm abated slightly on the 20th but was still classified as G3.

At 19:00 on the 21st January, the storm appears to be over.

 

 

Looking forward to the next one..

Meteor Camera Highlights

This page lists some of the highlights, significant detections made by my Global Meteor Network Cameras. All in reverse chronological order.

Quadrantids Meteor Shower - 2026-01-03

 

Following on from the Geminids, I had another treat at the peak of the Quadrantids Meteor Shower. It was certainly not as impressive as the Geminids but not bad for a nights work while I was asleep. Incidentally, the Quadrantids refer to a constellation (Quadrans Muralis) that was demoted by the International Astronomical Union when it devised its official list of constellations at its inaugural meeting in 1922. The shower radiant is now in the constellation of Bootes.

UK00DA (SW Facing Camera)

and the radiants plotted as:

The NW facing Camera, UK00DE captured this:

and the radiants plotted:

A total of 282 meteors captured from this very short lived shower. Quite a good result considering it was cloudy part of the time.

Geminids Meteor Shower - 2025-12-12

Up until this date, my record for the number of meteors captured in one evening was about 150. This blew that record out of the water.

UK00DA, facing SW recorded this:

with the radiants determined by this chart:

455 meteors detected of which 338 were Geminids.

 

UK00DE, the NW facing camera also detected, on the same night:

with the radiants determined:

 

Another 342 Geminids. The total for the evening was:

Total: 928

Geminids: 680

Sporadic: 140 (no common source)

Jupiter - 20251219

Jupiter is back with us and visible early evening. Seeing hasn't been very good lately with a great deal of moisture content in the air. Later in the evening, about 21:30, my C11 Edge HD optics got covered in condensed water as the temperature dropped suddenly at about 2100 UT. Yes, I do use a dew shield and a heater.  

Despite the fact that the seeing was only a 3/5 (Antoniadi) at best, I managed to acquire this image using 35% of about 1200 frames captured.

Satellites in view (faint) from L-R  Europa, Io, Ganymede 

CM System III 215.39 degrees

Equipment used was a Celestron C11 Edge HD telescope with a ZWO ASI 224MC colour planetary camera on a EQ6 equivalent mount.

Processed using:

  • SharpCap4
  • AutoStackertt! 4
  • Regsitax6
  • GIMP

 

2025-11-13 - Sun

At this time of year, I only have limited opportunities to observe the Sun in White Light. This is due to trees, houses etc and a low sun that seems to collect clouds.

However, on this occasion I wanted to try out the 'G' band filter. I also wanted a record of AR 4274, the large group that was responsible for a number of 'X' classification Solar Flares. 

This was my first image with the new filter and to say that I was astounded would be a huge understatement. I really couldn't believe the level of detail that I could record with an 80mm refractor.

Note the tilt of the Sun, North is to the top-left of the image.

Equipment used:

  • SvBony 80mm (ED) F7 refractor
  • EQ5 mount with driven RA
  • ZWO ASI 138MM Mono Camera
  • Altair G Band Solar filter
  • Baader Solar Film for Energy Rejection.

Processing was straightforward:

  • SharpCap4.1 (500 frames)
  • AutoStakkert! 4
  • Registax 6 for wavelets and curves

 

 

 

 

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