Equatorial coronal hole faces Earth

Friday, 26 February 2016 23:42 UTC

This northern hemisphere polar coronal hole really is gigantic but we now know that it never stretched down far enough to lower latitudes where the enhanced solar wind flow could reach Earth. The most intense solar wind stream went too far north of our planet to really affect us. Fear not as the geomagnetic conditions at our planet will likely increase in about three days from now as we now have an equatorial portion of this polar coronal hole facing Earth. Because this part of the coronal hole stretches all the way to the equator, we can pretty much guarantee that we will see an enhanced solar wind enviroment around our planet in about three days from now. Instead of blowing out solar wind that goes north of our planet, this portion of the coronal hole is expelling high speed solar wind right at our planet. We expect a brief window where we could reach active (Kp4) geomagnetic conditions once the solar wind stream arrives in about three days from now. High latitude sky watchers should be alert for enhanced auroral displays when the solar wind stream arrives.

Image: the coronal hole as seen by NASA SDO on 26 February, 23:30 UTC.