New cycle 24 sunspot group 1029 quite impressive
Monday, October 26, 2009 at 23:28 On October 23rd, group 1029 emerged and has been growing rapidly ever since. Likely to be the largest in 2009 and possibly in Solar Cycle 24.
It has emitted B and C class solar flares.
Image from http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/
Reader Comments (2)
SDIC lists the Wolf Number of Sunspots as 44 for 10/26/09. They have not released the report for 10/27/09 but it should be of the same magnitude if not higher.
I've been tracking the daily numbers of SDIC sunspots since the transition of Cycle 23 to 24 using 12/1/06 as a "starting point".
I had to go back to the November 2006 report for the last time SDIC reported a daily sunspot number as high as 44. That was 11/3/06 which had a count also of 44.
If a month has an average count below 5, it is considered a month of "low activity".
It will be interesting to see if October or November exceeds this “low activity” average.
The last time we had a month above 5 avg. was March 2008 at 9.3. Then Sol went into its long snooze.
J Gary,
That is very exciting and promising news. Many are really looking forward to the true awakening of Cycle 24. It would be great to have evidence we are getting close.
Andy
K5PO