EDITED SOLAR EVENTS LISTS December 19, 2003 New Event Type -- XFL -- begins Jan 5 New GOES Solar X-ray Imager (SXI) flare (XFL) reports will begin appearing in Edited Solar Events Lists on January 5, 2004. SXI flares from GOES-12 provide valuable flare location and other information, especially when no optical observations are available. SEC developed the SXI flare algorithm, triggered by GOES X-ray events, which finds the brightest area in the latest SXI image and assigns the region number of the closest active solar region. A region number is assigned to off-disk, west limb events if the region recently rotated around the limb. Near-real-time SXI images and a description of the GOES SXI instrument are at http://sec.noaa.gov/sxi/ ======================================================================== September 8, 2003 The Filament disappearance (Type = DSF) reports will now have an associated location. See description on Loc/Frq below. ======================================================================== GOES Satellite Changes On May 15, 2003 GOES-12 became SEC's primary GOES satellite, and GOES 10 the backup. Event Lists show GOES 12 and GOES 10 XRA events. See details at http://www.sec.noaa.gov/GOES.html ======================================================================== EDITED SOLAR EVENTS LISTS This directory contains the last 60 daily files of preliminary solar event reports received at SEC and manually reviewed and edited by the duty forecaster. SEC compiles these lists from preliminary reports received from contributing stations. Incorrect, missed, and incomplete reports are possible. Full-year directories can be found at /indices/2003_events, 2002_events, etc. Today's list is updated every 30 minutes at 2 and 32 minutes past the hour. Yesterday's list is updated every 3 hours. And the lists for the past 3 days are recreated daily at 0302 to pick up late additions or changes. Filename format: YEARMODAevents.txt -- 4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day. In addition, "events.txt" contains the current day's list. "yesterday.txt" contains the previous day's list. A subset, called the "energetic events" is available in other SEC products. Solar Geophysical Activity Summary (SGAS) http://sec.noaa.gov/ftpmenu/forecasts/SGAS.html Daily Space Weather Event Reports http://sec.noaa.gov/ftpmenu/indices/dayevt.html SEC's WEEKLY publication, in Adobe PDF format http://sec.noaa.gov/weekly/ A sample list and descriptions of each field are included below. The format is fixed, 80 columns wide, with standard headers. If no events are reported a single line is shown NO EVENT REPORTS. Your comments and suggestions are welcome. Viola.J.Raben@noaa.gov Sample Report ******************************************************************************** :Product: 20030801events.txt :Created: 2003 Aug 01 2132 UT :Date: 2003 08 01 # Prepared by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, NOAA, Space Environment Center. # Please send comments and suggestions to sec@sec.noaa.gov # # Missing data: //// # Updated every 30 minutes. # Edited Events for 2003 Aug 01 # #Event Begin Max End Obs Q Type Loc/Frq Particulars Reg# #------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1590 + 0119 0126 0132 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C5.6 2.4E-03 0424 1600 0215 //// 0215 CUL C RSP 50-160 III/1 1610 + 0327 0334 0357 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C4.5 5.5E-03 1610 0328 //// 0328 CUL C RSP 23-180 III/1 1620 0504 //// 0504 LEA U RSP 069-150 III/1 1630 + 0523 0535 0542 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C1.3 1.1E-03 0424 1640 + 0607 0610 0616 G12 5 XRA 1-8A B7.6 3.7E-04 0424 1650 + 0706 0736 0750 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C3.9 7.0E-03 0424 1660 0914 //// 0914 SVI C RSP 025-053 III/1 1670 + 0934 0937 0942 G12 5 XRA 1-8A B6.7 2.6E-04 0424 1680 + 1042 1046 1050 G12 5 XRA 1-8A B8.8 2.9E-04 0424 1690 + 1110 1132 1144 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C2.3 3.2E-03 0424 1700 + 1321 1336 1357 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C2.0 3.2E-03 1710 + 1402 //// 1402 SAG C RSP 030-055 III/2 1720 1604 //// 1605 HOL C RSP 025-081 III/1 1730 + 1648 1652 1659 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C1.0 6.0E-04 0424 1760 + 1659 1703 1710 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C1.7 9.5E-04 1740 + 1724 1728 1732 G12 5 XRA 1-8A C2.6 8.9E-04 0424 1750 + 1827 1833 1839 G12 5 XRA 1-8A B6.1 3.8E-04 0424 ******************************************************************************** DESCRIPTION: The first line is the filename. The second line indicates the date/time the list was created. The third line contains the date of the data. Each file (list) contains one UTC day. Lines that begin with # are header lines. Event - This is an arbitrary event number assigned by SEC. It groups several reports into a single event, as determined by the SEC forecaster. + - A plus sign (+) after the event number indicates that more than one report was received for this event, and the forecaster has selected this report to represent those received. Begin, Max, End - The UTC Time (Coordinate Universal Time, same as UT) of the beginning, maximum, and end of the event as reported by the observing site. "////" indicates a missing time. The UTC day of the event's begin time is the UTC day of the list. The UTC day of the maximum and/or end times may or may not be the same as the begin time. Most solar events are several hours in duration. If the maximum or end time is less than the begin time, then assume the times are for the next UTC day. A single letter can proceed a Begin, Max, or End time. A=after, B=before, U=uncertain. For example the begin time A0146 means the event began after 0146. The begin time of an x-ray event is defined as the first minute, in a sequence of 4 minutes, of steep monotonic increase in 0.1-0.8 nm flux. The x-ray event maximum is taken as the minute of the peak x-ray flux. The end time is the time when the flux level decays to a point halfway between the maximum flux and the pre-flare background level. The begin time of an SXI flare (XFL) is minutes following the associated x-ray event. The maximum time is the most intense period in the brightest region of the SXI image. The end time is the last SXI image before the X-ray event end time. Obs - The reporting observatory. CUL - Culgoora, Australia G10, G12 - GOES-10 or -12 satellites HOL - Holloman AFB, NM, USA LEA - Learmonth, Australia PAL - Palahua, HI, USA RAM - Ramey AFB, PR, USA SAG - Sagamore Hill, PA, USA SVI - San Vito, Italy (See the "Station Lists" directory in the "Welcome" directory for more information.) Q - Quality For radio bursts at fixed and sweep frequencies, and for storms, this shows the quality of the data C = Corrected report G = Good U = Uncertain For optical flares, this shows the quality of observing conditions, from 1 to 5, where: 1 = very poor and 5 = excellent X-ray events and SXI flare have a quality of 5 (meaning excellent). Type - Type of report, see http://www.sec.noaa.gov/info/glossary.html BSL = Bright surge on the limb DSF = Filament disappearance EPL = Eruptive prominence on the limb FIL = Filament FLA = Optical flare observed in H-alpha FOR = Forbush decrease (cosmic ray decrease)) GLE = Ground-level event (cosmic ray increase) LPS = Loop prominence system PCA = Polar cap absorption RBR = Fixed-frequency radio burst RNS = Radio Noise Storm RSP = Sweep-frequency radio burst SPY = Spray XFL = SXI X-ray flare from GOES Solar X-ray Imager (SXI) XRA = X-ray event Loc/Frq - Location or frequency. Location is in degrees latitude, north or south, and degrees longitude, east or west, from central meridian. The location is the spherical, heliographic coordinates of the solar region, as a distance in degrees from a line extending from the solar equator (heliographic latitude), and distance in degrees from a line extending from the north solar rotational pole to the south solar rotational pole through the center of the solar disk, as viewed from Earth (central meridian) in H-alpha. Frequencies are in Mhz. Particulars - Additional information from the report, chosen on the basis of the report type. XRA: X-ray Class Class x = peak flux in the 0.1 to 0.8 nm range In mks system In cgs system Wm-2 erg cm-2 s-1 A x < 10-7 x < 10-4 B 10-7 <= x < 10-6 10-4 <= x < 10-3 C 10-6 <= x < 10-5 10-3 <= x < 10-2 M 10-5 <= x < 10-4 10-2 <= x < 10-1 X 10-4 <= x 10-1 <= x Integrated flux from start to end, in joules m E-2. FLA: Importance and brightness Importance is the corrected area of the flare in heliospheric square degrees at maximum brightness, observed in the H-alpha line (656.3 nm). S - Subflare (area < or =2.0 square degrees). 1 - Importance 1 ( 2.1 <= area <= 5.1 square degrees) 2 - Importance 2 ( 5.2 <= area <= 12.4 square degrees) 3 - Importance 3 (12.5 <= area <= 24.7 square degrees) 4 - Importance 4 ( area >= 24.8 square degrees) Brightness is the relative maximum brightness of flare in H-alpha. F - faint N - normal B - brilliant Flare Characteristics VWL = Visible in white light UMB = Greater than or equal to 20 percent umbral coverage PRB = Parallel ribbon LPS = Associated Loop Prominence (LPS) YSR = Y-shaped ribbon ERU = Several eruptive centers BPT = One or more brilliant points HSS = Associated high speed dark or bright surge DSD = Dark surge on the disk DSF = Flare followed the disappearance of a solar filament in the same region BLU = H-alpha emission greater in the blue wing than in the red wing XFL: maximum area (e.g., 1.6e+03) and max intensity (e.g., 1.5e+05). RBR: The peak value above pre-burst background of associated radio bursts at frequencies 245, 410, 610, 1415, 2695, 4995, 8800 and 15400 MHz: 1 flux unit = 10-22 Wm-2 Hz-1 RSP: The intensity is a relative scale from 1 (low) to 3 (high) of any sweep radio event associated with the energetic event, as follows Type II: Slow drift burst Type III: Fast drift burst Type IV: Broadband smooth continuum burst Type V: Brief continuum burst, generally associated with Type III bursts Type CTM: Broadband, long-lived, dekametric continuum Shock speed in km/s Reg# - The SEC-assigned solar region number. The daily SEC Solar Region Summary report contains detailed information about solar regions. see http://sec.noaa.gov/ftpmenu/forecasts/SRS.html For optical events, region numbers are assigned by the observatory. Region numbers are assigned to X-ray events by SEC staff. For SXI flares, an SEC algorithm finds the brightest area in the SXI image and assigns the region number of the closest active solar region. A region number is assigned to off-disk, west limb events if the region recently rotated around the limb.