Space Weather

The service "Spacecraft Operations - Space Weather in the Solar System Space" provides forecasts, nowcasts and alerts related to space weather in the heliosphere. The service is aimed at solar system mission operators who require information, at locations away from the Earth, in order to make informed decisions on the planning and execution of spacecraft operations.
The focus has been on the assessment of solar wind and solar wind transient propagation within the heliosphere. Forecasts are primarily based upon models driven by remote observations of the Sun and corona. Access to historical mission data provides additional context upon which to base operational decisions. Future developments are expected to extend the support for assessment of SEPs and extension of the solar wind modelling beyond the orbit of Mars.

This service is implemented through a combination of products, tools and alerts which can be found through the following tabs along with expert support provided by the teams constituting the SWE Network. Should you require further guidance in the use of this service, or have specific questions about any aspects of the service presented here, don't hesitate to contact the Helpdesk.

A set of models and in-orbit sensor datasets are provided with the help of tools and products such as those listed below. Additional relevant products, tools and alerts can be found by selecting the desired tabs given at the top of this page.

For technical forecasts of the heliospheric weather conditions please consider the following products and tools

• The Alert/E product provides notifications of enhanced near-Earth heliospheric weather conditions supported by four day probabilistic forecasts and human expert forecaster commentary from the UK Met Office space weather group. This can be a good initial starting point for near-Earth heliospheric operations.
• The Enlil Me (Mercury), V (Venus), E (Earth) and Ma (Mars) products give a -2 day to +5 day view of the modelled solar wind speed and density at the corresponding heliospheric targets. They make use of the well known Enlil 3d heliospheric model with forecaster determined CME inputs and summary of anticipated heliospheric weather condititions at the target.
• The STEREO+CH (STA+CH) product uses solar wind measurements at STEREO-A together with assumptions on persistence to forecast the solar wind speed at Earth some 8 days in advance.
• The AWARE_NEXT (AWR_NXT) product provides a forecast of the likelihood of Hight Speed Streams (HSS) and Corotating Interation Regions (CIRs) within the next 24 hours.
• The HPARC/PR provides a timeline of heliospheric weather events on a month by month basis using inputs from the various products accessible through this page

For the current heliospheric conditions the products shown below can be useful. Please note that there is a lack of near-real-time data from solar system locations away from the Earth and STEREO-A. For other locations consider using the model products given above.

• The SW/L1 provides the solar wind and interplanetary magnetic field conditions at the L1 position 1.5 million km upstream of the Earth.
• The SEP/E presents the energetic proton fluxes which can provide an indication of solar energetic particles enhancements in the near-Earth heliosphere region.
• AWARE and AWARE_A provide automated in-situ detection of interplanetary shocks, CMEs and SIRs at the location of Earth (AWARE) and the STEREO-A (AWARE_A) spacecraft. The location of STEREO-A means that persistent solar wind features detected there are likely to be observed at Earth a few days (currently ~8 days) later.
• Other relevant data on current conditions may be available from the SWE Data browser.

More advanced users may wish to understand and model particular heliospheric features themselves. A few modelling tools are provided below to assist with this.

• The Drag Based Model (DBM) is a simple and fast model for looking at the outward propagation of CMEs. You enter the initial CME characteristics and DBM will indicate the speed and arrival time at your chosen target
• The ensemble version of DBM (DBEM) runs the model many times whilst perturbing the CME parameterisation providing a statistical assessment of likely spread in arrival times and speeds.
• PROPTOOL is a Java application that can support analysis of radial, co-rotation and simple SEP propagation within the heliosphere and much more besides.
• Heliopropa is a 1D MHD model that propagates observed plasma properties observed at Earth's L1 location to other targets within the solar system.

This service page is curated by the Heliospheric Weather ESC. For further information, please contact SSCC Helpdesk.

Heliospheric Weather encompasses the effects of the solar wind, including the transient structures therein, as they propagate out from the Sun's corona through the heliosphere. This includes heliospheric effects that directly influence the Earth and also other locations within the heliosphere that may be relevant to interplanetary exploration missions.

For spacecraft operations within the solar system, the solar wind and CME forecasts and forecaster commentaries provide the short and medium term assessment of the conditions which are likely to prevail and should be considered when assessing operations activities. In particular, the current products provide information on the potential for high speed solar wind streams and for the arrival of CMEs and SIRs in the vicinity of a spacecraft. The human forecaster augmented products and commentaries provide a good starting point for assessing the prevailing and likely conditions at near-Earth (Alert/E, Enlil/E) and a selected set of Heliospheric locations (currently Mercury, Venus and Mars; Enlil/Me/V/Ma). For situations including Earthward directed CMEs a 24 member ensemble of low resolution Enlil runs is also undertaken in order to help assess the uncertainty in the forecast arrival times. The DBM and associated enemble version (DBEM) models allow the user to undertake their own quick assessment of CME propagation taking account of CME launch characteristics and heliospheric drag conditions.

Due to the lack of near-real-time in-situ plasma measurements away from the near-Earth (and STEREO-A), real-time alerting is limited to warnings resulting from model predictions and the heliospheric regions near to the Earth and STEREO-A. The best estimates of conditions at these locations is from the forecasts. Use of Nowcasts at L1 may be useful to assess the current accuracy of the forecast models and when considering co-rotating structures.

A number of tools are provided to assist users in assessing the propagation of space weather related phenomena within the heliosphere. The PROPTOOL incorporates simple models for radial, co-rotating and SEP propagation while the DBM is dedicated to giving an estimate of CME arrival time and speed.

PROPTOOL being used to assess flare related SEP arrival at Earth.

When trying to assess if a spacecraft anomaly could be related to space weather effects a starting point could be to check the current flare activity by examining one of the Solar Flare products from the "Solar Activity: Nowcast" menu on the Products tab. If there appears to be activity around the time the anomaly was observed then the PROPTOOL can be used to help determine if SEPs linked to the flare are well connected with the target location.

The event timeline tool, HPARC/PR under the Tools tab, may also provide useful information on any identified solar wind transients (such as CMEs) that may have been recorded at the relevant time.

HPARC/PR timeline of identified solar wind transients.

Additional contextual information is available from the archive products and may help to assess operational activities based on previous measurements. The AMDA tool allows data mining of a broad range of scientific data from current and recent space missions.

Caveats

Users should be aware that the accuracy of forecasts away from the Sun-Earth line is expected to be reduced due to the additional uncertainties (such as propagation direction) and evolution of features (compared to their identification and characterisation from a Sun-Earth line perspective).

For further information, please contact SSCC Helpdesk. 

The products provided for this service are split into forecast and nowcast for three physical domains consisting of 1) Solar Activity; 2) Interplanetary Medium at L1; and 3) Interplanetary Medium Outside L1. Access to archive and reconstructed products from these physical domains and related alerts are also provided. The Solar activity provides the driver for space weather effects within the solar system and on planetary environments. The L1 and Outside L1 products provide forecasts and nowcasts of the enviroment at those locations.

The tools that are currently provided support 1) The modelling of solar wind transients (such as CMEs) which can be used to help assess potential arrival at a particular heliospheric location; 2) Access to space environment tools that can help to predict the likely environment to be encounted; 3) Archive data mining;

The following alerts are relevant to the Space Weather in the Solar System service area. They provide alerts related to transient phenomena such as flares and CMEs. Within the heliospheric context the user should be aware that there are constraints on alerting for locations away from the Sun-Earth line due to the lack of NRT assets upon which to do the assessment.

Solar Flare Detection

UGraz/KSO Latest Solar flare alert

 UGraz/KSO

SIDC Latest Solar GOES-flare alert

 ROB/SIDC

SIDC Latest human moderated alert

 ROB/SIDC

Solar Flare Detection and Location

UGraz/KSO Latest Solar flare alert

 UGraz/KSO

SIDC Latest human moderated alert

 ROB/SIDC

CME Onset

Near-Earth CME arrival predictions (WSA-Enlil + Ensemble)

 Enlil/E

No preview available

Near-Earth space weather notifications

 Alert/E

No preview available

H-ESC product assessment report

 HPARC/PR

No preview available

SIDC/CACTus Latest automated halo CME alert

 ROB/SIDC

CIR Alert

AWARE_NEXT Enhanced 24 hour solar wind forecast

 AWR_NXT

Near-Earth space weather notifications

 Alert/E

No preview available

Automated WARnings of Earth arrivals

 AWARE

Automated WARnings of STEREO-A arrivals

 AWARE_A

SIDC Latest human moderated alert

 ROB/SIDC

Solar Particle Event Onset

Near-Earth space weather notifications

 Alert/E

No preview available

SIDC Latest human moderated alert

 ROB/SIDC

Geomagnetic Storm Warning / Solar Wind Shock Arrival

Near-Earth space weather notifications

 Alert/E

No preview available

Automated WARnings of Earth arrivals

 AWARE

Automated WARnings of STEREO-A arrivals

 AWARE_A

This section provides links to web pages or resources that are not part of the SSA Space Weather Network or esa.int domain. These sites are not under ESA control, and therefore ESA is not responsible for any of the information or links that you may find there.

Reference documents

Currently there are no documents available under this section.