The Dutch Observatory

Today skies are clear but the seeing is terrible with  fast wind gusts.  Although the total count of sunspots has increased by 5, the total sunspot area is only 510 millionth today and also the number of flares in the last 24 hours is a lot smaller, only 5 flares have been recorded in the three reported active regions of which the two largest are only 240 and 250 millionth. The large filament which we have been observing the last week, shows  a lot less activity.  I am sorry for the bad quality of the images today caused by the bad seeing.

Clear Skies today.  The Sun has rebound from yesterday’s low and shows a total of 610 millionth in sunspot areas today.  The filament that stretches  over 700,000 miles across the southern half of the Sun is massive and beautiful.  Will this filament erupt before it will turn to the backside of the Sun?  Today also the number of flares associated with no-named areas on the Sun, outnumbers the number of flares produced by named areas.  A full disk image today as well as close ups of the filament, AR2282 and the end of the filament.

Clouds and areas of clear skies. (mostly cloudy here ), so made only a full disk image.  Today’s Sun has the lowest active region and sunspot area as I remember.  Sun spot area has reduced from 510 yesterday, to 370 millionth  today, although I must say the Sun looks beautiful with a large number of filaments.  We’ve had 14 flares over the previous 24 hour period.  AR2282 which is still pretty new, also looks nice and it is beginning to gain in size.   Maybe something will develop here.

Clear but unstable skies this morning.  Today the Sun is picking up a little in flare count. 10 C-class flare in the last 24 hours.  The 4 named  active regions pretty much stayed as they were yesterday.  Today a close up of a part of the large filament.  I believe it is a beautiful structure.

Clear and relative stable skies 4/6 today.  The highlight of the Sun today are not the active regions or Sun spots, but the massive filament that stretches for about 700.000 miles.  It is huge.  There are only three named regions today and AR2277 has decayed from 340 to 200 millionth and AR2280 is only 160. Smaller, but they have produced 6 C-class flares.  Wonder what’s next in store.

The sky was filled with con-trails and thin high clouds.  Imaged the full disk as good as I could.  Today the Sun is calming down a little further.  Only 3 named active regions with only one C-flare produced by 2280 and 2281 each and 3 by non-named regions.  Quite a difference from the week of October 20, 2014.  One of the legs of the large filament also shows a breakdown.

Clear Skies the morning of 2/5, but the Jetstream above makes it murky.  Today the sun is getting more quiet again with 4 recorded active regions with spots.  AR2277 with a size of 490 produced only 1 M-class flare in the previous 24 hours and AR2280 one C-class flare and has decayed to 150 millionth.  Today a full disk image and a close up of a beautiful and very large filaprom which even extends to the “backside” of the Sun.