23 April 2024 was a busy day for solar emission. Dave Typinski at AJ4CO Observatory, Florida, USA recorded this spectrogram using an FSX spectrograph fed by two 24 foot long TFD (Terminated Folded Dipole) antennas arranged similar to a Radio JOVE dual dipole array.

We see here some Solar Type III bursts at 1735 UTC, followed by a radio blackout from an M2.9 Class X-ray flare peaking at 1745 UTC, followed by a Type II radio burst from 1750 to 1815 UTC, followed by a couple of Type III bursts at 1825 and 1843 UTC.

23 June 2023 - Larry Dodd, K4LED, provides a very valuable service to the Radio JOVE community: a 24/7 livestream view of the output from his radio observatory in Georgia, USA.

Recently, Larry created short video segments that highlight solar radio storms he observed on June 20th and 21st 2023, associated with powerful X-class and M-class X-ray flares.

As a further aid to the Radio JOVE community Larry also created a video explaining some of the features of his livestream as well as describing the Radio-Jupiter Pro software and the Radio JOVE project in more detail.

Check out Larry's livestream if you detect something on your equipment and want a quick confirmation or if you don't have radio equipment and you're just curious to know what's up right now. You might catch a solar burst in the act or the more elusive Jupiter radio bursts. Don't forget to 'like' his livestream and subscribe to the K4LED YouTube channel to help keep him 'on the air.'

23 February 2023 - Radio JOVE participants made a rare night-time observation of a solar radio burst in the upper HF band around 0613 UTC on 23 Feb 2023. The ability to observe solar bursts at night is rare and occurs only when conditions support a propagation mode known as antipodal focusing. In this mode, the solar burst emission enters the region between the ionosphere and Earth's surface on the day side of the planet. Some portion of the emission gets trapped between the ionosphere and the surface, whereupon it propagates via ionospheric and ground reflection like any other HF band signal. Propagation then converges from all azimuths at the antipodal point on the night side of the planet. If a radio observatory is located near the antipodal point, the solar burst may be observed.

The Space Weather Prediction Center logged a major Type V (continuum emission) event on 23 Feb 2023 between 0612 and 0617 UTC as observed by the Learmonth, Australia facility. This burst was observed by several Radio JOVE participants in the southern USA from Florida to New Mexico as shown in Figures 1 through 5 below. The burst was not present in spectra recorded by Carl Pajak in Wasilla, Alaska, most likely because that station was too distant from the antipodal point.

Figs 1 & 2 - At AJ4CO Observatory in High Springs, Florida, sunset was at 2325 UTC and next sunrise was at 1132 UTC. The Sun reached lower culmination at 0543 UTC (AZ 0deg, EL -70deg), a half hour before the burst was observed. At 0613 UTC, the observed burst time, the Sun was 69 degrees below the horizon at an azimuth of 21 degrees. This was not precisely antipodal to AJ4CO Observatory, but apparently close enough.

Fig 3 - John Cox in Easley, South Carolina observed this burst.

Fig 4 - Thomas Ashcraft in Lamy, New Mexico observed this burst.

Fig 5 - Larry Dodd, K4LED in Jasper, Georgia observed this burst.

Note: Even though these events are rare if you've been around as long as Radio JOVE has been you may see another. On August 4th, 2011 at 0358 UT another midnight solar burst was observed. See our Radio JOVE Bulletin article in the November 2011 issue.

05 November 2022 - Radio JOVE observer John Cox from Easley, South Carolina, USA observed a Jupiter radio storm that lasted over 1.5 hours. The radio bursts detected that evening were from a Jupiter radio event known as an Io-B storm. These storms can be predicted based on the orientation of Jupiter facing Earth and the orbital position of Jupiter's moon, Io. On the night of November 5th both of these conditions were such that an Io-B storm was predicted to occur. Observer John Cox was ready. His radio equipment enabled him to detect these bursts over the frequency range of 16 to 24 MHz. He produced from these data both fixed frequency time series plots at 20.1 MHz as well as dynamic spectrograms. His spectrograms display the wispy features of the Jupiter radio emission superimposed by striations due to propagating through Jupiter and the Earth's plasma environments. Also present in these spectrograms are local radio interference which appear as narrow vertical stripes. For more information on Jupiter radio bursts see the following articles: The Jovian Decametric Emission - (University of Florida) and the Radio JOVE Science Brief: The Jovian Decametric Radio Emission and if you're interested in planning for your own Jupiter radio observation you may want to read the Radio JOVE Bulletin article, So you want to observe Jupiter with Radio JOVE? - Planning your observing

04 September 2022 - Two Radio JOVE observers, separated by over 1400 miles simultaneously observed a strange feature in their spectrogram data. Featured here are the spectrograms from Thomas Ashcraft of Heliotown Radio Observatory in Lamy, New Mexico (upper panel) and Dave Typinski of AJ4CO Radio Observatory in High Springs, Florida (lower panel). The strange feature is known as a Propagation TeePee, a spectral mark attributed to distant lightning that several Radio JOVE participants including Ashcraft and Typinski had reported in a scientific journal and presented at a recent meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU). More details on Propagation TeePees can be found in the February 2020 issue of the Radio JOVE Bulletin and in the Geophysical Research Letters article, 'Propagation Teepee: A Possible High-Frequency (15-30 MHz) Remote Lightning Signature Identified by Citizen Scientists.'

10 June 2022 - Here are a couple of movies of Jupiter on Vimeo with two types of Jovian radio bursts.

First is Jupiter generating S-bursts:

Second is Jupiter generating L-bursts:

Tom - Heliotown Observatory - New Mexico

02 June 2022 - The Sun continues to be active, and we are seeing several solar radio events per week. See the excellent data from the Millhopper Radio Observatory from Francisco Reyes in Gainesville, FL showing a very nice Type III (15:53 UT) solar burst. The spectrographs show the Right- and Left-handed Circular Polarization (RHP and LHP) from a wide band spectrograph connected square dipole antenna array. Notice that the RHP and LHP data are nearly the same in both spectrographs meaning that the solar radio emission is mostly unpolarized. The bottom graph shows calibrated data from the original Radio JOVE receiver at 20.1 MHz, Right-hand circularly polarized.

30 April 2022 - Very strong solar radio burst activity was recorded today. Many of these bursts are thought to be associated with an X1 class solar flare. See the excellent data from Hawks Nest Radio Observatory (HNRAO) from Jim Brown in Industry, PA showing Type III (13:43 UT) and Type V (13:50 – 13:58 UT) solar bursts. The top graphs in each pair are calibrated data from the original Radio JOVE receiver at 20.1 MHz and a dual dipole antenna. The spectrographs show the Right-handed Circular Polarization (RCP) from an SDRplay RSP1A connected to a wide band terminated folded dipole (TFD) square antenna array. Because the solar emission is mostly unpolarized, the new Radio JOVE kits (SDRplay RSP1A and a dual dipole) would show similar spectrograph data.

30 March 2022 - Tom Ashcraft in North Central New Mexico shared this graphic of an X1.3 class Solar Flare event that he recorded at his Heliotown observatory in the community of Lamy.