Has Sunspot 4274 Lost Power?

The question on everyone’s mind is whether sunspot 4274 started losing power. As sunspot 4274 rolls into Earth-facing, it seems be be taking a brief break. This is actually pretty standard behavior for sunspots to quiet just before they hit Earth-facing. It usually takes a couple of days and a rotation out of direct connection with Earth, and it will pick up activity again. 4274 is still Beta-gamma-delta and is approximately 1900 million miles across. If you look closely, you can still see a lot of green negative polarity peppered into the yellow and red positive areas. This means this is still highly unstable and can kick back in at any moment.

We now have two new sunspots rotated into view and another developing. 4277 & 4278 are only Beta class sunspots and likely to stay that way as long as 4274 is strong and drawing power. They are still able to drop solar storms, though. 4276 is Beta-Gama and a little more organized than the other spots; it is kicking out some of the flaring and CMEs.

We did have one significant CME, which they are calling a quarter halo hit. This should impact Friday night, and we won’t be able to see it doing to incoming snowstorms.

Early Morning, we had another quarter halo hit CME. This should be incoming Sunday or Monday, if we get rid of the Clouds. As you can see, we have solar wind from the coronal hole coming in a full halo, so look for these to combine on the higher side.

The second CME, coming about an hour after the first, shows an even stronger full Halo signature from coronal hole stream and CMEs, it is moving slightly faster than the first one, so this is likely to be a snow shovel event. In short, the faster stuff will pick up slower winds and increase the density.

The last CME on Nov 7th comes about 6 hours later, has a slightly wider angle, but is moving up and away from us. NOAA still has it listed as a quarter halo. As you can see, the winds are dying down from the Coronal hole, and the density on the full halo of winds isn’t as strong. This is moving slightly slower than the second CME, so not a strong combination event

We are not getting a lot of direct-hitting plasma yet. Almost all of it has been blast winds from CMEs. but this can change at any time. So far, and again this will change, we have elevated winds through Nov 10th. Tomorrow, 4274 rolls into direct earth-facing, and I look for it to pick back up in activity by the 9th. Here is where we might get the straight-up Plasma dense CME, which will create larger storms.

Below we have the cloud outlook for the next few days. It is going to be rough going at finding holes in the clouds, but I think some areas might be in luck. By Wednesday, we could see the return of some partly cloudy skies and intermittent showers for five days. Not great news, but better than it looked a few days ago. So don’t give up hope. The biggest skill you need in Aurora Hunting is patience.