Coronal hole faces Earth
Sunday, 31 January 2016 12:26 UTC
A small equatorial portion of the northern hemisphere polar coronal hole is now facing Earth.
This coronal hole is rather small but it does have an equatorial portion so we should still experience some noticeable effects when the solar wind stream arrives at Earth in about three days from now. A brief intensification of the geomagnetic activity at Earth can be expected when the stream arrives. A Kp-value of 4 might be possible, which stands for active geomagnetic conditions.
It should be obvious in the solar wind telemety when the stream arrives as we are at very quiet levels at the moment. The solar wind speed is under 300km/s right now which is slow. The direction of the IMF did turn southward this morning around -5nT which could increase auroral activity at high latitudes in the hours ahead.
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