Discovery takes flight. Image credit: NASA

The crew of STS-131 have been pretty busy with the inspection of the heat shield and getting ready for docking with the ISS.  I was hoping to hear something this morning because I believe I saw a piece of ice hit the, lemme think…the lower starboard side, just after the external tank separated. The ice appeared to change directions abruptly upon impact and I don’t mean to infer damage just curious is all.

Turns out there was a Ku-band radio anomaly so the inspection results were not sent to the ground.  Instead last I heard the images will be digitized and sent to the ground after docking tomorrow and everything is set for that to happen.

NASA didn’t elaborate on the Ku-band anomaly, probably just something normal.   However there has been a uptick in solar activity since the launch took place and we’ve been in an geomagnetic storm.  While it is true a geomagnetic storm can interfere with radio signals, I tend to doubt the current storm has anything to do with the radio anomaly, the frequency is just too high.

Oh the other hand — , the aurora is back!  The Boulder K hit 7, which it hasn’t done in a long time.  The activity has been tapering off some, but there have been a few further surges.  The Boulder K was at 5 this morning, I went running outside to find clouds over the northern sky.  It appears the new solar cycle is kicking in.  Normally at a Boulder K of 5 I can see a little of the aurora  and 6 or higher is usually a pretty nice show.

The Space Weather Prediction Center has a great page on viewing the aurora and you can check a chart (and map) to see what level of Planetary K index it take to produce a visible aurora at a given latitude.  You will note I am using two scales the Boulder K (K_B) and Planetary K (K_P) indices.  I use the Boulder K because I am more used to it.

You can get a quick look at what is going on from the SWPC in a variety of scales here.