Auroral & NLC activity, 2018 June 25 to August 31
2018 September 21
Aurora
With no coronal mass ejections and sunspot numbers only just in double figures or at zero, the majority of aurora sightings are now coming from coronal holes. The Sun is in its downward trend and aurorae are now few and far between. It is now getting dark enough to see aurora even from Scotland although in late summer this was hampered by a lot of cloud cover.
There was one G1 storm in both June and July but no sightings in either month. There was one G3 storm and one G2 storm in August with one sighting by Denis Buczynski on Aug 15/16.
NLC
The noctilucent cloud season has now come to an end, and what a record-breaking season it was! We have had sightings from all over the country and beyond – see also the images on the front cover. The reasons we have had such a good season appear to be twofold: first, we have been blessed with a lot of clear weather (even in Scotland!). The second is that, for reasons as yet unknown, the mesosphere has been a lot wetter than normal, as explained in this article: https://spaceweatherarchive.com/2018/08/15/a-mystery-in-the-mesosphere…
(Login or click above to view the full article in PDF format)
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