If you're forecasting the time of space weather events, modeling and extrapolation are good ... but data are better. ☀️🧪🔭🛰️🚀

@swri.org just posted this fun interview I did a few days ago, talking about the PUNCH mission (@punch-mission.bsky.social). More PUNCH results coming soon! ☀️🛰️🔭⚛️

SwRI-led study shows promise for space weather forecasting with NASA’s PUNCH

YouTube video by Southwest Research Institute

youtube.com

If you use FITS files and have a Mac, check out this cool app from the inimitable @gillyspace27.bsky.social ! You install it and instantly Finder previews FITS files properly. If they're #heliophysics data from a known instrument, you even get the official color scheme. Very cool! ☀️🔭🧪🛰️

HelioFITS App - App Store

Download HelioFITS by CHRISTOPHER RAYMOND GILBERT on the App Store. See screenshots, ratings and reviews, user tips, and more apps like HelioFITS.

apps.apple.com

As we approach the eclipse in Spain in just three weeks, it's time to re-post this safe solar viewing guide I wrote way back in 2023. Eyepiece projection with binoculars is a simple, fun, safe way to look at the solar disk as totality approaches. ☀️🔭🚀

The most novel part of the PUNCH mission (@punch-mission.bsky.social) is its three WFIs. Deeply baffled, with optics from @televueoptics.bsky.social, they make polarized images of the entire inner solar system every 4 minutes. The Solar Physics article just dropped! Read it here: rdcu.be/fvaSc ☀️🧪🛰️🔭

Spotted this #EV prototype at the top of #PikesPeak on Monday. It's an interesting body design, reminiscent of chopped-top, chunky refits of 1940s classics. Looks like it can't decide whether to be an SUV, a station wagon, or a hatchback.

Definitely! After all, who would call the White House a starter home?

Dave Vetter@davidrvetter.bsky.social · last mo.

This might be the most blatant example in existence of "rich guy who created a problem attempting to place the blame for that problem on immigrants"

Comet Pan-STARRS provided a nice reminder that the solar wind is not just a stream of disconnected particles. It is a fluid -- with flows, turbulence, and all the other things that fluids do. ☀️🧪🛰️🔭🚀🪐⚛️

PUNCH mission@punch-mission.bsky.social · last mo.

We watched a bright comet's tail break up in the ubiquitous solar wind, turning into vortices like the whirlpools left by an oar stroked through water. But 10x larger than Earth! ☀️🧪🛰️🔭🚀 whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

This probably comes as a shock to nobody, but #unitedairlines has really sucky wifi. 700ms ping , few-percent packet loss, peak speeds well under 1Mbps, several-minute lag on popular websites like this one. #Panasonic is bringing us forward into the 1990s!

☀️🧪🛰️🚀

PUNCH mission@punch-mission.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Visualizing the Artemis-Mission CMEs with PUNCH | PUNCH mission | WhiteWind blog How can you visualize/display a CME when you need to see both the lower corona and a huge 90° wide swath of the inner solar system? Nonlinear stretching! ☀️🧪🔭🛰️ whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

Visualizing the Artemis-Mission CMEs with PUNCH | PUNCH mission | WhiteWind blog How can you visualize/display a CME when you need to see both the lower corona and a huge 90° wide swath of the inner solar system? Nonlinear stretching! ☀️🧪🔭🛰️ whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

I'm at this meeting right now. It is phenomenal. Really great overviews of the field Monday morning from both established scientists and early-career geniuses. Excellent job from the SOC and LOC! ☀️🧪🚀

Living Reviews | Solar Physics@livingrev-solphys.bsky.social · 2mo ago

#SolarWind17 — The 17th International Solar Wind Conference, 14-19 June 2026, Bath, UK www.solarwind17.com All participants are invited to submit papers for peer review to a #SolarPhysics article collection: link.springer.com/collections/...

Recently had the pleasure of reading Babcock's paper again, describing the first solar "magnetograph" (new word, ehtn) in 1953. The instrument and the paper are things of beauty. Amazing what could be done, and how, using the technology of the 1950s. 🧪☀️⚛️🔭 ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/scan/manifes...

Years ago, I made this map of Boulder Canyon, to prove a point (each side of the 15-mile stretch of road has >35 turnouts, which slow drivers almost never use). It metastasized to include many landmarks. Surprisingly, it still works. #boulder #colorado #google www.google.com/maps/d/u/1/e...

Copy of Boulder Canyon Landmarks & Turnouts - Google My Maps

Map of Boulder Canyon, showing all the turnouts that people never seem to use and many landmarks people refer to.

google.com

I spent #MemorialDay doing stuff around the house. Deployed the summer outdoor furniture, weed-whacked the verge around the house, sliced up a pine that blew over this winter, and brought down (and cut up) 12 aspen corpses. Now I'm pleasantly sore. Not too old (yet) for #home #forestry.

Holy cow! Feast your eyes a while, on this gorgeous solar spectrum by the Sol'Ex instrument (assembled by Váradi Nagy Pál). It extends to UV and IR as well as the visible band. Marvel at the F lines, the fine structure, the IR doublets and repeating lines, and the molecular bands. Wonderful! ☀️🧪⚛️🔭

Glad to see helioviewer is working! We're planning at least two more data releases in short order. Current version is v0k, which lets you see the solar wind with stars "moderately" suppressed. Upcoming is v0l, which will be an order of magnitude better. ☀️🧪🛰️🔭

Charles Bell@cbellh47.bsky.social · 3mo ago

PUNCH images now available Images from NASA’s PUNCH mission are now available via Helioviewer.org.

Girl Scouts earn the PUNCH Ancient & Modern Sunwatching Patch! We are working with the #girlscouts to teach kids about #heliophysics and the amazing world around us. A few will become scientists, and all will carry their knowledge into society. ☀️🧪🛰️🔭 whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

OMG thank you @alexwitze.bsky.social! So glad you're taking notes.

Alexandra Witze@alexwitze.bsky.social · 3mo ago

OK, so I was at the first court hearing over the NCAR lawsuit this morning in Denver. I, uh, am not a legal reporter so bear with me as I try to recap a few things. You can view all the court documents here: www.courtlistener.com/docket/72496...

Totally awesome video by Hank Green. I generally avoid YouTube commentary, but this visual segment (roughly 6:45-10:00) is well worth seeing. It's a tour of the hand-held camera photos from the Artemis astronauts, showing #aurora, #lightning, and #satellites. 🧪🛰️🔭☀️

NASA Didn't Even Know!!

YouTube video by Hank Green

youtube.com

It's not every day your sketch gets featured on #Wikipedia's featured-image page. I still love that chimerical-color template. 5-May only: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ After that, look for 5-May here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiped...

J-maps are something I have used for over 30 years. They are a great example of how slicing and rearranging data can turn them into something more, by bringing their information to the fore. ☀️🔭🧪

PUNCH mission@punch-mission.bsky.social · 3mo ago

We're doing quantitative analysis now, tracking CME fronts across the solar system. A tried-and-true way to do that is by generating "height-time maps" (also called "J-maps") that show at a glance how each event moves. Here's a blog post describing how we do that. ☀️🧪🛰️🔭 whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

A Celestial Staring Contest (across 1 AU) PUNCH observes Parker Solar Probe continuously. But Parker Solar Probe also observes PUNCH from time to time! Click the WhiteWind blog link for a nice visual of this celestial "staring contest" between the two missions. ☀️🧪🔭🛰️ whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

Cool to see so many #heliophysics missions participating in the tracking of Comet C/2026 A1 (MAPS). It's a shame it didn't survive. The coronagraph movies are pretty awesome, showing the approach and the departure (as a disintegrated puff of material newly entrained in the solar wind). 🧪☀️🛰️🔭🪐☄️

NASA Heliophysics Spacecraft Witness Comet’s Demise - NASA Science

On April 4, comet C/2026 A1 (MAPS) plunged toward the Sun — flying about twice as far from our star as the Moon is from Earth.

science.nasa.gov

This is very cool! Interesting new driver for better CME arrival-time forecasting.

Disha Sardana@disha-sardana.bsky.social · 4mo ago

🧵 Did you know that the timing of a solar storm can shape its impact? New research confirms it — and it corroborates findings from my MS thesis & JGR paper. 🌐 New highlight: eos.org/editor-highl... #SpaceWeather #SolarStorm #Geomagnetism #MachineLearning #SpaceScience

Man oh man, #matplotlib sucks at memory management. PDL::Graphics::Gnuplot was an unholy terror to write, but it at least it didn't hork up memory like a rabid weasel. Currently leaking 50MB per plot I render to a file -- apparently because I had the audacity to want a colorbar.

Time to register for PUNCH-7, if you haven't! You won't want to miss this one if you're a #heliophysicist. PUNCH data are turning out to be spectacular. (More on that soon). ☀️

This is a really neat result – the #UCSD group are using PUNCH data to drive 3-D models of the entire solar wind flow. Jackson (UCSD Co-I on #PUNCH) invented this field in the early 1980s, using a spinning photometer to make "images" of CMEs. Amazing that we get to work with him today! ☀️🧪🔭🛰️

PUNCH mission@punch-mission.bsky.social · 4mo ago

PUNCH images are now making tomographic models of the solar wind – like a CAT scan of the entire inner solar system! ☀️🧪🔭🛰️ whtwnd.com/punch-missio...

DON’T MISS: next lecture in our lecture series “Im Feuerwerk der Sonne” on April 16th, 7 PM. Volker Bothmer from @unigoettingen will speak about the effects of dangerous #SpaceWeather on terrestrial infrastructure. In German. More here: www.mps.mpg.de/im-feuerwerk... ☀️🌍🔭 @thegoecampus

Here's a fun (for me) overview talk I gave last month, about making the invisible solar wind visible with PUNCH. Thanks to @swri.org for hosting! It was a great time. ☀️🛰️🧪🔭⚛️🚀

2026 Annual Meeting 07 DeForest v1

YouTube video by Southwest Research Institute

youtube.com