Top Three Missions Advancing Solar Storm Forecasting

Several missions have been crucial in enhancing our ability to observe and predict solar storms, providing vital data for space weather forecasting and protecting Earth's infrastructure.

The top 3

  1. SOHO: Longest-Running Solar Observer: The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), a joint ESA/NASA mission launched in 1995, has far exceeded its planned three-year lifespan, continuously providing data on the Sun from its core to the solar wind and discovering over 5,000 comets, making it a main source of near-real-time solar data for space weather prediction.
  2. STEREO: 3D Views of Solar Ejections: NASA's Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO), launched in 2006, uses two observatories to provide stereoscopic, 3D views of the Sun's coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which are crucial for understanding and forecasting space weather.
  3. Parker Solar Probe: Touching the Sun's Corona: NASA's Parker Solar Probe, launched in 2018, made history by flying through the Sun's upper atmosphere, the corona, for the first time in December 2021, providing unprecedented close-up data to understand solar wind and energetic particles.

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