Strange Skies
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New study traces electric currents that flow along Earth's magnetic field

Sarah Witman
EOS Org
Wed, 03 Jan 2018 14:01 UTC
Earth’s magnetic field lines
© ESA/ATG MedialabAn illustration of Earth’s magnetic field lines, which are generated by the planet’s swirling liquid outer core and curve as they get buffeted by the solar wind.
The fact that planet Earth is essentially a giant magnet is not a great secret: A compass works because either end of its magnetized needle is constantly being drawn toward the North and South poles. Scientists believe that the Earth's magnetization is caused by a sea of liquid metal flowing past its solid iron core, creating electric currents and, in turn, magnetic fields.

The Earth's magnetic fields extend to the ionosphere-a layer of plasma and neutral gases about 50-500 kilometers above Earth's surface-and the magnetosphere, which starts at the outer edges of the ionosphere and stretches many thousands of miles into space. Magnetic fields from Earth and the Sun affect the behavior of charged particles in the magnetosphere.

Earth's magnetic field is highly conductive and carries charged particles in a predictable fashion along field lines (giving rise to aptly titled field-aligned currents). Starting in the early 1900s, scientists conceptualized an exchange of energy and momentum between the solar wind (a stream of charged particles emitted by the Sun that flows throughout the solar system) and our planet's own magnetic field.
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Moon

First total lunar eclipse on January 31st

JR
Sky & Telescope
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 23:07 UTC
On Wednesday, January 31, 2018, the first total lunar eclipse in more than two years graces the skies above North America. But unlike the previous one, this eclipse is positioned perfectly for the West Coast and Pacific Rim, while the East Coast and the Atlantic Regions will see little, if any, of the show.
Total Lunar Eclipse
© Sean WalkerThis sequence taken during the last total lunar eclipse on September 28, 2015, was captured in seven separate exposures with a Canon Rebel XSi DSLR and an 8-inch f/3.3 Newtonian reflector.
The eclipse occurs in the morning for western North America and the near Pacific. For the East Coast, the Moon sets before totality arrives, so the best you'll see from, say, Pittsburgh, is a partial eclipse. Viewers in the western contiguous United States (roughly west of a line drawn from Grand Forks, North Dakota, to El Paso, Texas) will have good views of most of the action, with the Moon setting at the end of or soon after totality. The farther west/northwest the viewer, the better the event. Los Angeles sees the end of totality in a brightening sky; the Moon sets before the second partial stage is complete. More northwesterly Seattle sees almost the entire eclipse, missing only the subtle end stage. Honolulu and Anchorage see every stage in an enjoyably dark sky. Alaska, Yukon, most of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, parts of Nunavut, and Hawai'i see the eclipse from start to finish.

Totality falls on the evening of January 31st for eastern Asia and the far Pacific. China, Mongolia, Japan, Korea, Russia, New Zealand, the Philippines, and most of Indonesia and Australia will see the eclipse in its entirety. (Perth, you miss the opening minutes of the event, but this is no big deal as the subtle shadow in the early stages of a total eclipse isn't visible to the naked eye.)
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Cassiopaea

Supernova SN 185 of 185AD could have been an exploding comet


Malaga Bay
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 18:15 UTC
Supernova SN 185
© Malaga Bay
One of the Jewels in the Crown of Settled Science that's been extracted from the mire of mainstream manuscripts and academic assertions is Supernova SN 185.
A supernova is a transient astronomical event that occurs during the last stellar evolutionary stages of a massive star's life, whose dramatic and catastrophic destruction is marked by one final titanic explosion.
...
The earliest recorded supernova, SN 185, was viewed by Chinese astronomers in 185 AD.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernova

The gaseous shell RCW 86 is probably the supernova remnant of this event and has a relatively large angular size of roughly 45 arc minutes (larger than the apparent size of the full moon, which varies from 29 to 34 arc minutes).

The distance to RCW 86 is estimated to be 2,800 parsecs (9,100 light-years).

Recent X-ray studies show a good match for the expected age.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SN_185
Supernova SN 185 is scientifically important because it's [supposed] remnants suggest a "titanic explosion" occurred in the "hollowed-out cavity" of an object in space.
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Binoculars

Austria: Strange funnel-shaped luminescent cloud visible for 15 minutes in night sky

Sacha Dobler
Abrupt Earth Changes
Tue, 26 Dec 2017 17:52 UTC
austria light
This light display appeared between 04:30h and 4:45 h on Tuesday morning 12-26-2017, over the Soboth in South-west Steiermark province Austria, the view in towards the East.

Gerald Reczek reported on twitter, as he was walking his dog in the early morning hours, he saw a light rise up from the horizon and and disperse within 15 minutes.

Severe Weather Europe responded and speculated is likely be the Russian Fregat upper stage burn on the launch of AngoSat communications satellite, Angola's first satellite, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AngoSat_1

According to SWE similar sightings were made in Romania.
No reason is given why a Russian rocket from Kazakhstan would be seen in Austria. Similar explanations were produced when the Norway Spiral appeared over Oslo in 2009.

Comment: The Russian rocket explanation seems unlikely. Whatever the immediate cause, perhaps this has something to do with the luminescence:
As we've theorized in Earth Changes and the Human Cosmic Connection, the atmosphere has become more electrically charged these days as it accumulates increased levels of comet dust (more generally termed 'meteor smoke') and volcanic dust. The atmospheric dust captures electrons that circulate from the (relatively) negatively-charged Earth to the positively-charged ionosphere, creating atmospheric regions with varying electric potential.

The atmosphere is not one homogeneous space - its electric potential varies according to elevation (as a general rule; the higher, the more positive) and to dust concentration (negatively-charged regions). The combustion particles in the rocket trail become electrically-charged (ionized) and when the electric potential difference between the ionized combustion particles and the surrounding space is sufficiently high, it glows.
See: SpaceX rocket launch spooks Californians with eerie glowing trail (VIDEOS)

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Sun

Sun dog appears in northeastern China skies

Matthew Strong
Taiwan News
Tue, 19 Dec 2017 17:06 UTC
Sun dog in China
Residents of the northeastern Chinese province of Heilongjiang said that last Sunday morning they saw a small sun appear next to a larger one as the mercury plunged to minus 24 degrees Celsius.

The phenomenon is known as a "sun dog" or mock sun, an optical phenomenon which appears as a bright spot to the left or right of the real sun within a 22-degree halo. It is caused by the refraction of sunlight by ice crystals in the atmosphere, and has been known since Greek Antiquity.

Residents of the town of Hailun said they witnessed the sun dog Sunday around 9 a.m., and that it lasted for about five minutes.
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Cow

CO2 meat tax, more sun halos & heavy snow hits Germany


Adapt 2030
Tue, 19 Dec 2017 05:57 UTC
Meat tax
© YouTube/Adapt 2030 (screen capture)
New CO2 tax planned for meat producers and consumers globally to hit IPCC targets. Massive blizzard across European Alps stops fuel deliveries in Germany. Hail blankets the desert in UAE and Oman along with biblical flooding. Out of season typhoon and way south latitude track across Philippines. Sun halos across the planet. Our atmosphere is changing with the intensifying grand solar minimum.

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Question

Strange lights filmed above Sheffield, UK

Bridie Pearson-Jones
Daily Mail
Mon, 18 Dec 2017 20:19 UTC
An engineer has captured a video of seemingly strange lights above Sheffield
An engineer has captured a video of seemingly strange lights above Sheffield
An engineer has captured a video of seemingly strange lights above Sheffield.

In the footage the strange comet-like trails of light can be seen shooting around high above Sheffield United's football stadium - changing directions very quickly in the early morning sky.

The video was captured by Peter Savage, 35, an electrical engineer at a security firm, on Friday December 15 at about 7am.

Mr Savage was using the footage of the morning sky to calculate the distances between Mars, Venus, Earth and the moon when he noticed the unexplained phenomenon.

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Bizarro Earth

Cartoon science - Global warming will weaken winds in the Northern Hemisphere, but speed them up downunder!

Joanne Nova
JoNova
Thu, 14 Dec 2017 02:52 UTC
Now they tell us! Climate warming to weaken wind power in northern hemisphere, increase in Australia: study

After building 341,000 wind turbines, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, now climate modelers reveal that winds will decrease in the Northern Hemisphere!
Warming temperatures caused by climate change are set to weaken wind energy in the northern hemisphere, a study shows, lessening the amount of wind power produced for wind farms.

However the southern hemisphere would see a boost in wind, which could potentially turn north-eastern Australia into an attractive investment for energy companies.
Rush, invest your money now. The theory called polar amplification has the success rate of a coin toss. Buy a wind farm in NE Australia!

Luckily wind speeds are not also influenced by cloud cover, jet streams, oceans currents, forest growth, atmospheric tides, solar factors, magnetic fields, ozone levels, cosmic rays, or butterflies. Otherwise this study might be inadequate, uninformed guesswork being used to inform investment decisions!
Cartoon Science
© JoNova
Key points:
  • Atmosphere instability which creates wind changing in northern hemisphere
  • North-east Australia could become an attractive investment for energy companies
  • At present there is only one operational wind farm in Queensland
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Moon

Long-lasting moon halo seen over Tucson, Arizona

Deborah Byrd
Earth Sky
Tue, 12 Dec 2017 00:42 UTC
Moon halo over Arizona
© Eliot HermanDecember 9, 2017 photos – 2 a.m. to dawn.
Halos around the sun or moon are caused by ice crystals, like those in high cirrus clouds. Sometimes you can't see clouds, but - in these photos - you can.

Eliot Herman is Tucson, Arizona has been working all year to compile a series of images of every major meteor shower in 2017. So last weekend, as this week's Geminid meteor shower was rising to its peak, he had his automatic camera set-up running all night. You can see one result in the images above. He didn't catch a Geminid (although he did catch a random meteor, which exploded as it fell). But he caught something equally wonderful, a long-lasting halo around the moon.

Eliot said the halo lasted from 2 a.m. to dawn. You can see twilight coming up in the bottom right image. Then, he said, the halo just: "... blinked out."
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Info

Blood red sky that lasted 9 days: Mysterious hue seen over Far East Asia in 1770 was caused by biggest solar storm ever recorded

Joe Pinkstone
Daily Mail, UK
Thu, 07 Dec 2017 19:35 UTC
giant magnetic storm (stock image)
In 1770, people living in far-east Asia saw the sky turn a deep crimson for over a week - an event that was recorded in ancient scrolls. Now, scientists have analysed the historical event, and suggest the red hue was caused by a giant magnetic storm (stock image)
In 1770, people living in far-east Asia saw the sky turn a deep crimson for over a week - an event that was recorded in ancient scrolls.

Now, scientists have analysed the historical event, and suggest the red hue was caused by a giant solar storm.

Lost to the annals of time, the event could be the largest recorded solar flare in recorded history.

China, Korea and Japan all saw a deep red sky for nine days in the late 18th century.

Researchers from Osaka University have unearthed new documents which suggest the celestial phenomenon was caused by a geomagnetic storm.

'Historical documents can let us trace back solar activity for millennia,' Dr Hisashi Hayakawa, who led the study, told Live Science.

Comment: The main problem with this theory is that it occurred during the 'Little Ice Age', conventionally defined as a period extending from the 16th to the 19th centuries. Causes are suggested to have been decreased solar activity, increased volcanic activity, as well as other factors.

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