Let's drop some space dub today:
Andrew McCarthy again.
The moment of the jump, captured in hydrogen alpha light to resolve the sun’s atmosphere.
— Andrew McCarthy (@AJamesMcCarthy) November 13, 2025
We decided to release the photo in print- both as an up close shot and showing the full disc of the sun, which you can see here: https://t.co/K4DovGV4ni pic.twitter.com/hYHg7rZXdK
And what the Sun gave us this week.
Aurora from an airplanepic.twitter.com/bF6leCAc2X
— Cosmic Gaia (@CosmicGaiaX) November 11, 2025
In Florida?!
OMG I am so excited- the northern lights in Florida tonight! Photo taken at Innerarity Point in Perdido at 8:50PM- NO FILTER ADDED!💫 pic.twitter.com/zjaoCgwJqv
— All Things Emerald Coast (@AllEmeraldCoast) November 12, 2025
INCOMING!
DID YOU SEE IT? ☄️ A meteor just streaked across the Southwest Florida sky in broad daylight at 12:39 PM this afternoon. This video is near Orangetree in Collier County from a WINK viewer. @spann @stormhour pic.twitter.com/ibzZU3DuQN
— Matt Devitt (@MattDevittWX) November 11, 2025
It's not easy seein' green.
Aurora was so bright the ground turned green.pic.twitter.com/qaCmvDotDS
— Curiosity (@MAstronomers) November 10, 2025
More bolides. If I were in Russia, this might make me shiver a bit. I asked my research assistant about bolides.
Bolides are exceptionally bright meteors—fireballs—that outshine all planets and stars as they streak through Earth’s atmosphere at speeds of 11–72 km/s. Caused by meteoroids (space rocks typically 1 meter to tens of meters across) ablating and compressing air into a glowing plasma, they produce a visible trail, sonic booms, and sometimes fragmentation. Most burn up completely, but larger ones can survive to impact as meteorites.
The term "bolide" specifically denotes fireballs exceeding magnitude –14 (brighter than the full Moon) or those that explode mid-air (airbursts). Notable examples include the 2013 Chelyabinsk event, a ~20-meter asteroid that detonated with ~500 kilotons of energy over Russia, injuring 1,500 people via shockwaves, and the 1908 Tunguska airburst, which flattened 2,000 km² of forest. Bolides are studied via camera networks (e.g., NASA’s fireball tracker) to assess planetary defense risks.
Incredible video of a bright bolide captured by a flight attendant during a flight over the European part of Russia
— Curiosity (@MAstronomers) November 11, 2025
📹 sasha_bashnya_ pic.twitter.com/UquuNnhGoG
Funny, I expected it to be brown.
Here’s my best photo of Uranus pic.twitter.com/wdOPiR968m
— Andrew McCarthy (@AJamesMcCarthy) November 11, 2025
I said it, and I'm not sorry.
In the meantime, here's some time-lapse.
I captured photos of the moon every night for a month to watch how it dances 👀 pic.twitter.com/UukAnSvB8W
— Andrew McCarthy (@AJamesMcCarthy) November 10, 2025
More bolides. At least I think it's a bolide.
WOW! Last night I dozed off after the Aurora had began to subside a bit but left the camera rolling just in case and to my surprise, this morning when I pulled the SD card I discovered I captured an absolutely massive fireball exploding over the skies near Buffalo, SD with aurora… pic.twitter.com/kYu6IDPqbe
— Aaron Rigsby (@AaronRigsbyOSC) November 7, 2025
I have my issues with Carl Sagan. Primarily, it's because he kept pushing the "nuclear winter" thing when the paper had been pretty conclusively refuted, for openly political reasons. But when it was on his game, he was right.
“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”
— Space 8K (@uhd2020) November 11, 2025
- Carl Sagan pic.twitter.com/7lugLH9iS3
That's it for this week. Come back next week for more Sky Candy.
