Welcome to the ESA Space Weather Service Network
Please note that all ESA-SWE Services are under review/construction

3.7.0

SWE Portal 3.7.0 Release Note

The ESA Space Weather team is pleased to announce that SWE Portal 3.7.0 was released on July 11 2023.

In this update, the ESA SWE Services have been enhanced to introduce a new service page layout along with the incorporation of the new and updated products and tools listed below. The SWE Portal also introduces a number of new pages and features reachable via the adapted left-hand menu including a section dedicated to providing information for Portal users.

Not sure which products are linked to which service? Find the latest Service-Product linking here: Service Application Matrix

From the Space Radiation Expert Service Centre:

  • The new Internal Charging and Environment Analysis (ICEA) product group provides:
    • charging analysis reports including the computed maximum electric field, surface potential and charging current for various dielectric material and shielding configurations. The results are obtained from daily runs of DICTAT coupled with the GOES-16 observations of the past day and the Sheffield NARMAX Radiation Belt predictions for the next day through the Virtual Space Weather Modelling Centre
  • The new Radiation Belt Indices (RB-IND) product group provides: 
    • Indices regarding various spacecraft effects. The R ratio reflects the risk for solar array degradation by comparing the observed 4 MeV proton fluences with the reference model AP8 min for different orbits. The Ca4 and Ca8 indices provide a global risk indication for any mission in the magnetosphere regarding surface and internal charging respectively
  • The Office National d'Etudes et de Recherches Aerospatiales (ONERA) product group provides:
    • A group of new Radiation Belts Forecast And Nowcast (RB-FAN) products on radiation belts related risks alerts to spaceborne users as a function of typical (LEO, GNSS, GEO) and user-specified orbits
      • Different types of risks alerts are presented ranging from global orbit green-yellow-red light alerts to specific risks induced by high energetic protons and electrons.
      • These risks are based on solar panel degradation and internal charging first order estimations.
      • The RB-FAN products also provide access to in-depth analyses of the current and forecasted dynamics of the radiation belts and associated illustrations.
  • The University of Turku (UTU) provides:
    • The UTU-SEP product group has been extended with two new products. The High-energy Solar Energetic Particle environment mission specification: heavy ion peak flux provides a calculator to evaluate the peak fluxes for high-energy (13-100 MeV/n) heavy ions for mission durations between 0.5 and 7 years. The Very high-energy solar proton event database is a catalogue of very high-energy (>300 MeV) solar proton events observed during solar cycles 22-24and provides fluence and peak flux spectra for all events, and flux spectra at 5-min resolution for selected well-observed GLEs.
  • The Space Applications & Research Consultancy (SPARC) provides:
    • The new GEO/NGRM product group contains 6 products derived from the Level 2 electron and proton fluxes measured by the NGRM instrument on board the EDRS-C satellite at GEO. The electron and proton differential flux products show the recent near-real-time observations and provide access to the real-time and archived data. The electron and proton flux alert products show the current conditions and allow users to subscribe to receive email alerts when chosen thresholds for selected energies are surpassed. In addition, the product group includes recent daily integral electron fluences as well as electron flux measurements from several GEO missions at different longitudes
  • The Center for Space Radiations (CSR) provides:
    • The PROBA-V/EPT product group that has been expanded to include estimates for the total ionising and non-ionising dose accumulated per day along its orbit. The contributions from electrons, protons and helium as measured in the energy range by EPT are taken into account. Different levels are defined to indicate high and exceptional levels of dose per day.
  • ESA SWE Data Centre (SWE Portal) provides:
    • Space Radiation Applications for Spacecraft Operators (SRASO). This is a software that provides a tailored, easy to use interface for spacecraft operators to access data, models and expertise on space weather and its potential impacts on their operations. A dedicated request to the SSCC Helpdesk is required to access data and use the functionality of this new application in detail.
  • The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) provides:
    • an update of the list of Neutron Monitor stations used in the GLE Alert++ algorithm. In total 8 stations that are permanently offline were removed, and the station in Dourbes, Belgium (DRBS) has been added.

From the Ionospheric Weather Expert Service Centre:

  • The Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV) provides:
    • new products displaying nowcast and forecast of maps of Maximum Usable Frequency (MUF) and its deviation from empirical models over Europe
    • new products displaying nowcast and forecast of vertical Total Electron Content (vTEC) over the Italian Peninsula
  • The Space Research Centre Polish Academy of Sciences (SRC PAS) provides:
    • a new measurement of 30 and 38 MHz by passive riometer antenna in Pallas (Finland)
    • two new demonstration products: estimated Signal to Noise ratio (S/N) for Polar radio link over 1.8 MHz and alerts for radio absorption events at 30 MHz and 38 MHz
  • The Ionospheric Group of the National Observatory of Athens (NOA) provides:
    • a real-time warning system called Warning and Mitigation Technologies for Travelling Ionospheric Disturbances Effects (TechTIDE). This provides the results of complementary TID detection methodologies and many external drivers to help users assess the risks and develop mitigation techniques tailored to their applications. TechTIDE methodologies are based on the exploitation of data collected in real time from Digisondes, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers and Continuous Doppler Sounding System (CDSS) networks. The results are obtained and provided to users in real time
  • The Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) provides:
    • a new product displaying vTEC Global Ionospheric Maps computed by UPC's TOMION-v2 software and based Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) data
  • The Ionosphere Monitoring and Prediction Center (IMPC) provides
    • Updates of the European and Global TEC maps nowcast and forecast
  • The Institute of Physics, University of Graz (UNIGRAZ), Austria in collaboration with TUGRAZ provides:
    • the new product SODA (Satellite Orbit DecAy), a 15-hour forecast for satellite orbit decays induced mostly by interplanetary coronal mass ejections (ICMEs)
  • ESA SWE Data Centre (SWE Portal) provides:
    • The IONMON archive has been made available and users can now browse and download the IONMON data

From the Geomagnetic Expert Service Centre:

  • The British Geological Survey (BGS) provides:
    • Additional product Geoelectric Hazard Map. Modelled surface electric field displayed on a map of Great Britain and Ireland as an indicator of space weather hazard.
    • Update to G.156 Geomagnetic Activity Alert
    • Updates to all relevant products to provide data download
  • The Technical University of Denmark (DTU) provides:
    • Data from magnetometers owned and monitored by several partners. These are divided in different regions – both magnetic latitudes and magnetic longitudes.
    • An update of the aurora nowcast product over Greenland. The product design is now improved. Additionally, during significant geomagnetic conditions, the maximum value of the equivalent current is printed in the title, and the position is marked with a white line on the map. The cloud coverage in the largest cities in Greenland is included as colour-coded dots on the map.
  • The Swedish Institute of Space Physics (IRF) provides:
    • Auroral indices derived from the all-sky images from Kiruna for both real-time and archive with 1-minute resolution.
  • The Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) provides:
    • Near-real-time Allsky Camera (ASC) images from the Kevo station in Northern Finland. The product detects the presence of aurora features in the images through an automatic auroral recognition routine.

From the Heliospheric Weather Expert Service Centre:

  • The Istituto nazionale di astrofisica (INAF) provides:
    • MagEffTool, a new product used for the in-situ detection of the magnetic flux-rope structures embedded in coronal mass ejections, an estimation of these structures based on the magnetic helicity, plus context plots for geoeffectiveness inspection.
  • The Centre de Données de la Physique des Plasmas (CDPP) provides:
    • The Shock Tool product forecasts of shock wave properties along magnetic field lines connected to the Earth and different spacecraft, along with background solar wind and estimated CMEs parameters, providing added value related to the properties of the known important accelerators of SEPs.
  • STFC/RAL Space provides:
    • The SWFSC/E solar wind forecast comparison has been updated to include data in the comparison from the SWiFT product being federated within Portal release 3.7. The STEREO+CH product is no longer presented by default but can be selected from the options menu.
    • The updated version of the STA+CH solar wind forecast product has an improved look and some small enhancements to the backend processing to be consistent with those already implemented in the ESWF product. The forecasting capability is currently limited by the proximity of STEREO-A spacecraft to Earth, this situation will improve as it pulls ahead of Earth again following the closest approach in August 2023.
    • The HPARC Product Report is updated with backend changes to accommodate for GOES energetic proton data provided through the UKMO and for the DBEMv4
    • An incremental update of the products shown at HPARC Space Product Browser was performed
  • Infor’Marty (in conjunction with IRAP/CDPP) provides:
    • SWiFT-Helio1D is an automated pipeline to predict ambient solar wind properties using one-dimensional solar wind propagation modelling. With the semi-empirical solar wind emergence near the Sun, the SWiFT-Helio1D provides modelling of solar wind properties at 1AU, this includes stream interaction regions at L1 upstream of the Earth with a lead time of 3 to 7 days.

From the Solar Weather Expert Service Centre:

  • The Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences (ASUCAS) provides:
    • White light images approximately every 60 minutes each sunny day (7/7, holidays included)
    • Halpha images are provided each sunny day (7/7, holidays included)
    • Sunspot group drawing and characteristics.
    • Flare forecast for the full disc and per visible active regions
    • Daily space weather bulletin
  • The Solar Influences Data analysis Centre (SIDC) provides:
    • The ICAO Space Weather Advisory browser, a tool to access and browse through the official advisories on space weather impacts on aviation, issued for the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). Advisories are created for three different impact categories: GNSS, HF communication and Radiation.
  • The Université Paris-Saclay (UPSaclay/MEDOC) provides:
    • Synchronous synoptic maps are maps of the solar photospheric magnetic field and continuum intensity on the full solar sphere, in heliographic (Carrington) longitude and latitude, where data are taken as close as possible to a reference time. These maps are built from SDO/HMI (NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory mission / Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager) data.
  • The University of Graz (UNIGRAZ/KSO) provides:
    • F10.7 index and the F30 index observations. And it also provides the daily F10.7 and F30 forecasts optimized for short-term changes with lead times up to 3 days.

In this update, some products have also been removed from the ESA SWE Service Network namely:

  • The CME near-Earth arrival time predictions tool (Drag Based Model Tool)
  • The On-Demand Enlil 3D MHD Case Study
  • The On-Demand EUHFORIA 3D MHD Case Study
  • The Near-real-time map of the Total Electron Content (TEC) for the European region (now replaced in the Services by the optimised version)
  • The Near-real-time global map of the Total Electron Content (TEC) (now replaced in the Services by the optimised version)
  • 1 hour forecast of the Total Electron Content (TEC) for the European region (now replaced in the Services by the optimised version)
  • 1 hour forecast of the Total Electron Content (TEC) worldwide. region (now replaced in the Services by the optimised version)
  • Local scintillation indices S4 & σφ (now integrated into the product Global Scintillation Indices by IMPC)
  • The MSTID activity over Czechia (now integrated into the TechTIDE warning system by NOA)

Your feedback is important! We kindly invite you to tell us your thoughts on the new SWE Portal release, all feedback is welcome and will help improve the SWE Portal and better tailor our services to your needs.

Our SSCC helpdesk are here to help and can be contacted by sending us an email (helpdesk.swe@esa.int) or by filling the SWE Portal support request form. A short user satisfaction survey is accessible at the bottom of our replies upon closure of your requests, we would be grateful if you could follow the link to provide feedback on our helpdesk response and help us to improve our service.

Please contact the SSCC Helpdesk (helpdesk.swe@esa.int) for any further information.