The Hand-Drawn History of Tracking Sunspots
Forecasters at NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center have assessed the current conditions on the Sun through daily drawings of the various phenomena since 1972. This image is from June 4, 2024.
Credit: NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center
This week’s MapLab come from Hayley Warren, a Bloomberg graphics reporter who recently contributed to a story about the geomagnetic storms that lit up Earth’s skies last month. She became interested in the rich data available related to space weather and its scientific visualization. “I wanted to explain the significance of what had just occurred using images that intersect both art and science,” she says.
Last month, the strongest geomagnetic storm since 2003 created a stunning show of aurora that was visible in many parts of the world. As we reported in our recent graphic about this solar activity for Bloomberg News, more auroras are predicted in the coming weeks as the Sun completes another full rotation, revealing the same massive complex of sunspots that caused the mid-May storms.