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The first blank Sun since 2011

No sunspots on July 17, 2014

For the first time since August 14, 2011, the Sun showed no sunspots on its surface today. It started the day, July 17, 2014, with one small sunspot, but that spot apparently decayed away by the end of the day, as indicated by the fact that the sunspot number for the day was listed as zero, the first time that has happened since the solar maximum ramp up began in 2011.

This is strong evidence that the ramp down to solar minimum is beginning.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

3 comments

  • Rene Brobon

    I find it fascinating the sunspot activity is zero. Another recent article I read stated there was something like 17+ years of no observed global warming – I believe satellite data. Correlation? Possibly.

    Thank you Robert

  • Sayomara

    One nice thing if we are entering a period of Solar quite it would make traveling between the planets much easier. Since Radiation is still one of the top issue with any trip between the planets

  • Phill O

    ” Rene Brobon
    July 18, 2014 at 2:56 pm

    I find it fascinating the sunspot activity is zero. Another recent article I read stated there was something like 17+ years of no observed global warming – I believe satellite data. Correlation? Possibly.

    Thank you Robert”

    Hum, seems that report may not have been corrected for the AGW factor! Hey, I am a solar powered global warming nut. Maybe, more precisely, solar powered climate change advocate. Would it not be a great time to be an astrophysics major in solar dynamics?

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